Club Swimming: A Sport or A Lifestyle?

Full Article: http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-race-between-high-school-and-club-swimming-1432053345?tesla=y

In the May 15th class (3rd module), we discussed the problems that involve elite sport training programs for the youth. These issues include:

• Emphasis on the potential for children to gain material rewards through sports
• Children often "working" long hours and become like "laborers", but these elite programs are not governed by child labor laws
• Raise ethical issues about adult-child relationships which can result in: injuries, eating disorders, pressure, and emotional mistreatment

Although these issues are not directly addressed in the article above by Frederick Dreier, they can be easily identified through the content of Dreier's article.

The first of these elite training program problems that was mentioned above is portrayed in Dreier's article about California State high school swimmers not wanting to compete in the first ever statewide swim meet.  Some of the fastest swimmers in the state such as Abbey Weitzeil and Aiden Burns, are sitting out of the state meet because it interferes with summertime club swimming meets, like the Junior National Championships in July and other international meets across the world.  These prestige high school swimmers are more focused on their Olympic time trials for next June rather than just becoming a California State swimming champion.  They are not only high school swimmers, they are aspiring Olympians.


Many of these exceptional high school swimmers like Weitzeil and Burns, are part of swim clubs across the state, such as the Santa Clara Swim Club and the Mission Viejo Nadadores; which brings us to the second problem of elite training programs.  These swim clubs train and compete in an Olympic size, 50 meter pool, compared to high schools, who swim in 25 yard pools.  Both the Santa Clara Swim Club and the Mission Viejo Nadadores have high intensity workouts for all levels of competition.  At the Mission Viejo Nadadores, in the 8 and under division, these young swimmers have practice Monday through Saturday.  At each advancing age group, practice grows increasingly longer and harder.  When these swimmers reach high school, they are introduced to an hour and a half morning practices starting at 5 followed by another practice in the afternoon that is close to 3 hours long.

• Mission Viejo Nadadores practice schedule can be viewed HERE.
• Santa Clara Swim Club practice schedule can be viewed HERE.

These long practices, in addition to attending school and doing school work, leaves little time for recreational activities.  Amanda Beard and Janet Evans, who both are Olympic champions, participated not only in club swimming but also high school swimming.  Both Beard and Evans are glad that they competed in high school because they had greater social opportunities than they did with their swim clubs.  Beard even reminisces about socializing with regular kids in high school swimming who weren't training for the Olympics.

Amanda Beard (age 14) after winning in 1996 Olympics in Atlanta

Finally, the last issue with these elite training programs are the pressures they bring upon youth through adult-child relationships.  If these relationships are negative, the end result could be injuries, eating disorders, and emotional mistreatment.  According to the National Eating Disorders Association, some risk factors for athletes include sports that emphasize appearance or muscularity, like swimming.  Another risk factor are sports that focus on an individual rather than a team.  Even though a swimmer is part of a team, they are individually competing to record good times and win their specialty events.  Swimming, being an endurance sport, also is a risk factor for eating disorders.  Training for a sport since childhood, or even being an elite athlete can increase the risk of eating disorders in athletes.  Usually injuries that occur in swimming are minor, but they most often occur  in the ligaments in the shoulder due to overuse. Beard, who was an Olympian at only 14 years old, said she was glad to be a part of her high school swim team because it was a break from the pressures of competing at national and international events.  She says that a balance is needed so these kids don't get burned out by the pressures to make the Olympics.

References:

Athletes and Eating Disorders. National Eating Disorders Association. Retrieved from https://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/athletes-and-eating-disorders

Dreier, F. (2015). Does High School Swimming Matter? The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved from http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-race-between-high-school-and-club-swimming-1432053345?tesla=y 

Mission Viejo Nadadores. (2015). Mission Viejo Nadadores. Retrieved from http://www.mvnswim.org/Home.jsp?_tabid_=0&team=scmvn

Santa Clara Swim Club. (2015). Santa Clara Swim Club. Retrieved from http://www.teamunify.com/SubTabGeneric.jsp?team=pcscsc&_stabid_=48931

Solomon, D. (2010) Swimming Injuries. Stop Sports Injuries. Retrieved from http://www.stopsportsinjuries.org/swimming-injury-prevention.aspx