WEBVTT - Schoolboy rugby to star runners: How can we best protect our young athletes? 0:00:06.280 --> 0:00:06.720 Hilda. 0:00:06.800 --> 0:00:10.000 I'm Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a 0:00:10.080 --> 0:00:11.719 daily podcast. 0:00:11.240 --> 0:00:13.320 Presented by the New Zealand Herald. 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:20.200 School rugby has been under the microscope for years now 0:00:20.239 --> 0:00:24.880 after controversies over poaching between schools and the live broadcast 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:29.360 of games. Those tensions have flared up again, with secondary 0:00:29.400 --> 0:00:33.480 schools pushing back against NZED Rugby's plans for an under 0:00:33.560 --> 0:00:37.200 eighteen team to take on Australia. It's not the only 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:41.120 sporting code to face pushback though. This week our young 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:42.800 rowers take to the waters for the. 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:44.440 Marty cart b Regatta and. 0:00:44.440 --> 0:00:48.280 For the first time year, fourteen students are barred from 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:51.880 taking part. It all adds to an ongoing debate about 0:00:51.920 --> 0:00:55.280 how much focus we should be putting on teenage athletes 0:00:55.600 --> 0:00:59.480 while still allowing the likes of record breaking runner Sam Ruth. 0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:01.840 Later on the Front. 0:01:01.600 --> 0:01:05.600 Page, we'll talk to AUT Associate professor and co director 0:01:05.920 --> 0:01:10.600 of AUT's Sports Performance Research Institute and z Simon Wallace. 0:01:11.040 --> 0:01:12.520 But first we speak to. 0:01:12.600 --> 0:01:16.640 Nzet Herald journalist Gregor Paul about his latest reporting into 0:01:16.760 --> 0:01:25.640 school sports. Gregor The Herald reported recently about tensions between 0:01:25.720 --> 0:01:29.119 schools and New Zealand Rugby about plans to create an 0:01:29.240 --> 0:01:32.480 under eighteen's team. Now the schools feel this would not 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:35.920 only detract from the boys' education, but from the existing 0:01:36.080 --> 0:01:37.440 secondary school teams. 0:01:37.800 --> 0:01:40.120 What do you make of zetas wish here? 0:01:40.280 --> 0:01:42.600 Yeah, you've got to see this problem and there's a 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:46.200 problem from both sides. That the schools have run their 0:01:46.240 --> 0:01:50.000 own program if you like, forever and the pinnacle of 0:01:50.200 --> 0:01:54.000 first fifteen rugby for the last forty five years has 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:55.960 been a New Zealand secondary schools team. 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:58.040 Now New Zealand Rugby, it's not that they. 0:01:57.920 --> 0:02:01.840 Don't like that idea, but they want to have some 0:02:01.960 --> 0:02:06.200 kind of control and influence on kids of that age 0:02:06.400 --> 0:02:08.720 because the way things are playing out at the moment, 0:02:08.840 --> 0:02:11.799 if you're an elite player at that age group, you're 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:14.680 not that far away from becoming a professional, and you're 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:16.840 not even that far away in some cases of becoming 0:02:16.880 --> 0:02:19.680 an All Black. For some kids, it's a really short 0:02:19.720 --> 0:02:23.240 step from school to super rugby into the Old Blacks. 0:02:23.280 --> 0:02:26.000 So New Zealand Rugby want to have greater influence. They 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:28.359 want to call that a pathway, they want to call 0:02:28.400 --> 0:02:31.800 that a high performance team, and hence they want to 0:02:31.919 --> 0:02:34.680 take ownership of what I suppose and their argument for 0:02:34.800 --> 0:02:36.880 doing it is that they feel that there are kids 0:02:36.919 --> 0:02:41.200 who are under eighteen. They say about thirty percent of 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:43.640 the kids that got picked in their various teams last 0:02:43.720 --> 0:02:46.600 year who weren't actually at school, or they were at 0:02:46.639 --> 0:02:49.880 schools where they didn't have a first fifteen program and 0:02:49.919 --> 0:02:52.240 they were therefore forced to play for clubs. So if 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:54.800 you open, if you change the New Zealand secondary schools 0:02:54.800 --> 0:02:58.280 into an under eighteen team, it becomes more inclusive and 0:02:58.360 --> 0:03:01.280 you can have more kids avail to play in it. 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.280 But the schools will be arguing, look, this is a 0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:07.360 this is a system that's not broken. Why are we 0:03:07.480 --> 0:03:08.440 trying to fix it? 0:03:08.720 --> 0:03:11.880 Do you reckon the school's defiance is actually about the boys' education? 0:03:12.040 --> 0:03:14.200 Or do the schools get some kind of incentive by 0:03:14.240 --> 0:03:15.880 having a good team that wins all the time? 0:03:16.000 --> 0:03:17.600 Or am I just being a negative Nancy? 0:03:17.919 --> 0:03:19.960 I know you're not being a negative Nancy. Mean, look, 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.840 I think that there's a general level here school principles. 0:03:24.400 --> 0:03:27.600 I didn't spend a lot of time around my school principle, thankfully, 0:03:27.880 --> 0:03:30.200 but they tend to be you know, they've got a 0:03:30.280 --> 0:03:32.919 view about how they want things. They've controlled things, they 0:03:32.919 --> 0:03:35.400 want things to be on their watch. It's on a 0:03:35.480 --> 0:03:38.600 sort of broadbrush level. They don't like the idea of 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:41.440 outside interference of a third party i e. 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:45.120 In New Zealand Rugby having control over their kids. So 0:03:45.200 --> 0:03:47.760 that's part of the issue. Is it about their education? 0:03:47.800 --> 0:03:50.280 Well, there's a legitimate concern that if you give a 0:03:50.320 --> 0:03:56.000 third party the right to schedule training, camps, trials, when 0:03:56.120 --> 0:03:59.080 matches get played at that level, you could easily have 0:03:59.240 --> 0:04:03.360 massive interfere apearance in your academic schedule because they won't 0:04:03.360 --> 0:04:05.080 be aligned at that point. And you know, if New 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:07.600 Zealand Rugby decided they want to have a camp in September, 0:04:08.040 --> 0:04:09.839 then you know kids are going to be asking can 0:04:09.880 --> 0:04:11.760 we leave school? Can we come out of school at 0:04:11.760 --> 0:04:13.720 a time where they really do need to be in 0:04:13.720 --> 0:04:16.400 school for their academic cycle, which you know that's kind 0:04:16.440 --> 0:04:18.359 of getting close to exam time. So there is a 0:04:18.480 --> 0:04:23.599 legitimate concern around giving control of scheduling to another body 0:04:23.760 --> 0:04:26.680 because schools argue that they, you know, they are the 0:04:26.720 --> 0:04:31.560 best institution to provide a holistic and conjoined education if 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:35.280 you like. Where they can build Rugby around academics, they 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:39.040 can build it around other commitments without everything you know, clashing, 0:04:39.360 --> 0:04:42.200 So yeah, I do think they're concern on that front 0:04:42.240 --> 0:04:43.800 as genuine. 0:04:43.600 --> 0:04:45.800 How many of these kids would actually go on to 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:49.240 have successful careers in rugby and become an all black 0:04:49.279 --> 0:04:51.960 and stuff. Because if you take them, the ones that 0:04:52.000 --> 0:04:54.200 are really good in school, ship them off to these 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:59.599 kind of camps and they don't succeed in becoming a 0:04:59.680 --> 0:05:04.560 rugby star and their education is laxed, then that puts 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:06.880 a huge amount of pressure on them. 0:05:07.080 --> 0:05:11.039 Yeah, one hundred percent, right, Look, tiny, tiny, one percent, 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:13.320 I would imagine I don't actually know the numbers, but 0:05:13.640 --> 0:05:16.320 people sort of quote less than one percent. You know, 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:19.960 what of these kids will will succeed in becoming full 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:23.159 time professional rugby players for a duration that they could 0:05:23.160 --> 0:05:25.160 say that they made a living out of it. 0:05:25.360 --> 0:05:26.279 Very hard to do. 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:28.960 So the schools, I think are right because if you 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:32.160 create an under eighteen team and start talking about pathways, 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:35.320 training camps, all this kind of stuff, it starts to 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:39.240 feel that you're professionalizing the system in the minds of 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:41.599 the players, and the schools are arguing, well, if we 0:05:41.680 --> 0:05:44.039 just have a New Zealand Secondary schools team at the 0:05:44.040 --> 0:05:46.480 pinnacle and at the end of the year, the best 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:49.400 twenty kids are picked and you get to go to Australia. 0:05:49.480 --> 0:05:52.920 It's almost like a prize rather than your a career 0:05:52.960 --> 0:05:55.679 and centive. It's a hey, your prize is you played 0:05:55.720 --> 0:05:57.640 really well on our team. Someone else thought that you 0:05:57.720 --> 0:06:00.359 were that good that you'll play in a schools team. 0:06:00.680 --> 0:06:04.920 So you're kind of de intensifying. You're not glamorizing it 0:06:04.960 --> 0:06:07.240 to the same extent. You're not saying if you make 0:06:07.320 --> 0:06:10.000 this team, you know you're now in a system where 0:06:10.000 --> 0:06:12.640 we're pushing you through with a view that you could 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:16.240 become a professional rugby player. You're just being rewarded for 0:06:16.360 --> 0:06:18.560 having played quite well and a lot of the kids 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:21.920 are more comfortable with that environment because we do. 0:06:22.360 --> 0:06:23.839 I feel I would rather start. 0:06:24.080 --> 0:06:26.599 I would like to see holistic kids coming out of 0:06:26.600 --> 0:06:28.640 school so that you could play for a New Zealand 0:06:28.720 --> 0:06:29.839 secondary schools team. 0:06:29.640 --> 0:06:30.960 Because you're really good at rugby. 0:06:31.320 --> 0:06:33.960 But your plan at that point is still you know 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:36.880 you've done well academically, you're off to go to university 0:06:37.040 --> 0:06:39.559 or you're involved in a trade and you're thinking along 0:06:39.640 --> 0:06:42.400 those lines rather than I've made the New Zealand under 0:06:42.400 --> 0:06:45.120 eighteen team. I'm now thinking I could push forward and 0:06:45.160 --> 0:06:48.279 try and be a professional rugby player. The nuance is 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:51.000 quite significant when you think about it in those terms. 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:56.760 I mean, when I was a student, it was for 0:06:56.920 --> 0:06:59.359 kind of a pretty common knowledge that the big school 0:06:59.360 --> 0:07:01.280 has always got the best players. The school I went 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:04.360 to was far from a top sporting school or academic school, 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:07.880 so we didn't have the best team. Nobody was being 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:10.400 enticed to come and play for our school, that's for sure. 0:07:10.720 --> 0:07:12.720 Any players we had were guys that were kind of 0:07:12.760 --> 0:07:15.120 homegrowing and just went through the ranks. And that's kind 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:17.880 of what some of the schools who are complaining about 0:07:17.920 --> 0:07:20.320 this practice are saying, Like, one of the principals of 0:07:20.440 --> 0:07:22.640 one of the schools that has lost the player to 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:24.640 Saint Kens has seen you and our teachers worked hard 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:27.560 on him one of the students for three years academically 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:29.720 and he's done really well. And now Saint Kent's are 0:07:29.760 --> 0:07:32.760 reaping the benefits not only from the academic staff but 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:33.840 also sporting wise. 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:40.040 And this comes only a few years after some major 0:07:40.120 --> 0:07:44.560 scandals in schoolboy rugby. Hey, firstly, we've had several instances 0:07:44.600 --> 0:07:48.320 of tensions over alleged poaching of students to play for 0:07:48.360 --> 0:07:51.640 a school rugby team, starting in late twenty eighteen, when 0:07:51.680 --> 0:07:54.880 I think Saint Kent's wasn't it got boycotted from the 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:56.400 competition over its tactics. 0:07:56.440 --> 0:07:57.880 Then in twenty twenty, Sky. 0:07:57.720 --> 0:08:00.880 Sports broadcast plans of school games ran into issues with 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:03.680 Auckland and they eventually pulled the pin. Now, why are 0:08:03.680 --> 0:08:06.600 we so passionate about teenagers playing rugby? 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:08.960 What does a win mean for school? 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:09.760 Well? 0:08:10.080 --> 0:08:13.120 When you say why are we, I mean push back 0:08:13.120 --> 0:08:15.400 on the question a little bit and say who's the Wii? 0:08:16.000 --> 0:08:19.400 Because as a parent to three kids, you know, I 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:23.400 fully endorse sport as something that my kids have all done. 0:08:23.440 --> 0:08:24.160 They've all enjoyed it. 0:08:24.200 --> 0:08:27.320 But I couldn't care less what level they perform at. 0:08:27.480 --> 0:08:29.200 I don't care whether they win or lose. I just 0:08:29.280 --> 0:08:31.920 care that they enjoy it. And I suspect that there 0:08:31.960 --> 0:08:37.320 are a massive mix of views among parental communities around. 0:08:37.480 --> 0:08:39.560 You know how many parents would agree with me on that? 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:42.800 How many parents think, actually, I want my kid to win, 0:08:42.880 --> 0:08:44.400 I want my kid to play for the top team. 0:08:44.440 --> 0:08:47.760 I want my kid to be coached almost professionally. Because 0:08:48.000 --> 0:08:50.800 your question is where does the passion come from and 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:53.800 what does passion mean? I suppose because everyone's got a 0:08:53.840 --> 0:08:56.640 different view about what role sports should play, whether it's 0:08:56.760 --> 0:08:59.720 just for participation, to round that in education, is it 0:08:59.720 --> 0:09:02.360 to in is that a career prospect? And I think 0:09:02.440 --> 0:09:05.480 all of these things aren't particularly well managed through the 0:09:05.520 --> 0:09:08.880 school system because schools come under that kind of such 0:09:08.880 --> 0:09:12.840 a variety of pressures from different parental expectation that they 0:09:12.840 --> 0:09:15.320 don't quite know how to manage it. And probably what 0:09:15.360 --> 0:09:19.000 we've seen is that we've aired towards allowing those that 0:09:19.080 --> 0:09:22.440 want professionalization of sport, that want their kid to be 0:09:22.480 --> 0:09:24.760 given every opportunity to go on and play at the 0:09:24.840 --> 0:09:28.880 highest level. I think we've carried out to that parental 0:09:29.000 --> 0:09:31.480 force and that's where you see the passion coming from. 0:09:31.559 --> 0:09:35.160 Hence we got televised drugby hence we had poaching, because 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:38.960 schools feel that pressure, particularly private schools who use it 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:42.520 as an enticement tool. They think success on the sports 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:45.360 field relates to people wanting to pay money to come 0:09:45.360 --> 0:09:48.200 to that school because their kid might get that opportunity that, 0:09:48.360 --> 0:09:50.920 you know, to play at the highest level. So I 0:09:50.960 --> 0:09:54.600 really think we've got a multitude of problems that swirl 0:09:54.640 --> 0:09:58.480 around school sport and it all relates to different expectations, 0:09:58.559 --> 0:10:02.080 and schools probably got out of control in the sense 0:10:02.120 --> 0:10:05.440 that they bowed to the pushy parent, if you like, 0:10:05.559 --> 0:10:07.360 and maybe what we've seen in the last two three 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:10.040 four years of schools regaining a bit of control and 0:10:10.080 --> 0:10:12.320 pushing back against the pushy parents. 0:10:12.480 --> 0:10:13.400 Heading to the water. 0:10:13.559 --> 0:10:13.800 Now. 0:10:13.960 --> 0:10:17.600 Earlier this year, schools involved in the rowing competition voted 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:22.000 overwhelmingly to ban year fourteen players from taking part in 0:10:22.000 --> 0:10:24.760 the Marty cap. These were players who should have graduated 0:10:24.880 --> 0:10:27.920 high school already, but remained enrolled for a few more 0:10:27.920 --> 0:10:30.319 months so they can keep competing. Now, are you surprised 0:10:30.360 --> 0:10:34.000 it took this long to ban this practice. 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:35.440 Well, probably not, because I think it's one of those 0:10:35.480 --> 0:10:38.800 things that crept up through a legitimate pathway that I 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:43.319 think back in time there was some legitimacy to some 0:10:43.480 --> 0:10:47.160 academic kids coming back for a short period because I 0:10:47.160 --> 0:10:50.920 think back then there were exams potentially all overseas, exams 0:10:50.920 --> 0:10:52.560 that they were doing that they needed to come back 0:10:52.600 --> 0:10:54.760 and do that enhanced their ability to go to an 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:59.160 overseas university, and hey, guess what, while you're here, legitimately, 0:10:59.280 --> 0:11:00.720 you know, you might as well up in the boat 0:11:00.720 --> 0:11:03.640 and row or whatever was happening. So I think there 0:11:03.679 --> 0:11:06.480 was a sort of legitimate start to all this, but 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:09.800 what always happens in schools is that that system, over 0:11:09.880 --> 0:11:12.640 time gets abused, and certainly in rugby, there were guys 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:16.240 coming back to school who had done particularly well academically 0:11:16.280 --> 0:11:20.640 in year thirteen, but they also hadn't fulfilled ambition, you know, 0:11:20.960 --> 0:11:23.760 to make a representative team, or they felt that if 0:11:23.800 --> 0:11:26.400 they came back for a year fourteen, you know, they 0:11:26.520 --> 0:11:29.920 might get picked up on a professional contract or a 0:11:29.920 --> 0:11:32.720 pathway or whatever they were thinking. And over time the 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:35.040 system kind of got out of control a little bit 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:38.040 and people lost track of just how many year fourteen 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:41.520 kids were coming in to play sport. So it's probably 0:11:41.559 --> 0:11:45.360 just one of those gradual creeps that happened, and then 0:11:45.400 --> 0:11:49.440 eventually I think the rowing probably became the flashpoint where 0:11:49.559 --> 0:11:52.440 principles realized, actually, there's actually quite a lot of kids 0:11:52.520 --> 0:11:54.880 because of the timing of the Mardi Kappas suspect because 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:57.800 early in term one, so if you have year fourteen kids, 0:11:57.800 --> 0:11:59.360 they can come back for one term. 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:01.160 And I think they just got out of control. 0:12:01.200 --> 0:12:03.719 They realized how many kids were doing it, and now 0:12:03.720 --> 0:12:06.280 they've taken a stance and say, nop, this is getting 0:12:06.520 --> 0:12:09.040 this is getting silly. So look, it doesn't surprise me 0:12:09.080 --> 0:12:10.840 it took that long because you've got to have a 0:12:10.840 --> 0:12:13.000 bit of an overview, and it's sometimes hard to see 0:12:13.040 --> 0:12:13.920 when you're in the system. 0:12:14.160 --> 0:12:15.760 Thanks for joining us, Gregor. 0:12:15.720 --> 0:12:16.800 Absolutely my pleasure. 0:12:29.040 --> 0:12:32.360 In a country where some sports reigned supreme, there's a 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:36.920 huge focus on prepping and priming our next generation of stars. 0:12:37.080 --> 0:12:41.400 Co director of AUT's Sports Performance Research Institute and said 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:44.760 Simon Wallace joins us now to talk about the pressure 0:12:44.960 --> 0:12:51.600 we put on our teenage athletes. Simon, you've done research 0:12:51.880 --> 0:12:54.679 into this area. What can you tell us about the 0:12:54.760 --> 0:12:57.600 health impacts on teens that are caught up in those 0:12:57.720 --> 0:12:59.440 high profile sports like this. 0:12:59.840 --> 0:13:03.640 It's not so much the impact, it's the potential impact 0:13:03.880 --> 0:13:08.480 that the increasingly pressurized environment which we've seen over a 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:11.360 number of years, which is sort of accelerating at the moment, 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:16.200 consequently leads to potential impacts on young people participating in sports, 0:13:16.280 --> 0:13:18.760 and those can be play out in religion to physical 0:13:18.920 --> 0:13:24.120 and physiological impacts, mental health impacts, and psychological The evidence 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:26.880 sort of shows that if there's a supportive environment in 0:13:26.920 --> 0:13:30.280 place for young people as they entered these environments, a 0:13:30.320 --> 0:13:33.439 lot of those can be mitigated against. So it's really 0:13:33.480 --> 0:13:36.440 about the support networks that are in place to help 0:13:36.520 --> 0:13:40.960 young people navigate these pressures, which ultimately decide if these 0:13:40.960 --> 0:13:42.360 impacts are going to play out. 0:13:42.200 --> 0:13:42.760 In any way. 0:13:42.960 --> 0:13:46.199 Tell me what does high athlete identity mean? 0:13:46.559 --> 0:13:49.680 High the identity is an area throughout the last decades 0:13:50.160 --> 0:13:54.679 for youth in particular, is problematic, as if you define 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:58.120 your character in relation to your ability. Let's say in 0:13:58.160 --> 0:14:01.840 New Zealand, same school verse fifteen rugby player, they just 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:05.360 associated with that. With rugby sort of being perceived traditionally 0:14:05.360 --> 0:14:07.720 as our national sport, you could have your identity wrapped 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:10.800 up with being that rugby player. That can be challenging 0:14:10.840 --> 0:14:14.080 in many ways because if you get injured and for example, 0:14:14.160 --> 0:14:16.839 and your career ends, or if you get injured and 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:19.840 you miss the season, if your sense of self worth 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:23.400 and self esteem is so wrapped up in your athletic prowess, 0:14:23.520 --> 0:14:25.360 then that can have an impact on other aspects of 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:28.000 your life. And if that's taken away, that can be 0:14:28.080 --> 0:14:29.960 you know, sort of devastating effects. 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:33.200 It's quite a common trope in those teen dramas, isn't it. 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:35.480 When there's a high school jock or something and he 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:37.840 gets a knee injury and he thinks the world's going 0:14:37.880 --> 0:14:38.160 to end? 0:14:38.200 --> 0:14:39.000 Is it that kind of thing? 0:14:39.120 --> 0:14:40.880 Yeah, And if you think about sort of you know, 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:43.360 in the New Zealand situation like the rugby league, so 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:45.640 a lot a lot of young people go over to 0:14:45.720 --> 0:14:49.160 the NRL sixteen seventeen, eighteen years of age. There's a 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:51.480 lot invested in that that might be sort of wanting 0:14:51.480 --> 0:14:53.840 to make the family proud, that obviously want to establish 0:14:53.920 --> 0:14:56.840 themselves a professional career if other things have gone by 0:14:56.840 --> 0:14:58.880 the by, So if they're not focusing on their education 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:01.520 and sort of upskilling, so if sport doesn't work out 0:15:01.560 --> 0:15:05.400 for them, you know, that can be really problematic. So 0:15:05.440 --> 0:15:08.440 we've seen that over the years with people going into 0:15:08.560 --> 0:15:11.880 pursue high performance sport careers and then that's been taken 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:14.480 away for whatever is lid and make the cut based 0:15:14.520 --> 0:15:17.480 on sort of talent development or they got injured and 0:15:17.520 --> 0:15:19.560 that didn't work out, or they got homesick and need 0:15:19.560 --> 0:15:21.480 to come home. So if everything is wrapped up and 0:15:21.960 --> 0:15:23.560 you know, I'm an athlete as opposed to I'm a 0:15:23.600 --> 0:15:26.240 seventeen year old boy or a girl who happened to 0:15:26.320 --> 0:15:29.840 be good at sport, then that gets really problematic. 0:15:29.440 --> 0:15:32.240 So it would be important to have that support network 0:15:32.280 --> 0:15:32.920 around you. 0:15:33.240 --> 0:15:34.160 Yeah, one hundred percent. 0:15:34.200 --> 0:15:38.240 And social media has magnified everything that we experienced, well, 0:15:38.240 --> 0:15:40.240 when I experienced when I was younger. You know, if 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:43.200 you were going through those adolescent years, they're tough enough anyway, 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:46.560 but now with a constant spotlight on you through social 0:15:46.640 --> 0:15:50.360 media and self image and status and all. 0:15:50.240 --> 0:15:52.080 Of that, there's no real hiding from it. 0:15:52.400 --> 0:15:55.120 You can't get so it's almost like a constant pressure 0:15:55.160 --> 0:15:58.080 that you can't get away from. So learning strategies to 0:15:58.120 --> 0:16:01.120 deal with that and having the supported networks around becomes 0:16:01.200 --> 0:16:02.160 really really important. 0:16:04.880 --> 0:16:07.840 Before I started looking up statistics, I made a phone 0:16:07.880 --> 0:16:10.480 call to the guy in my town who's the president 0:16:10.560 --> 0:16:14.000 of the local Little League association. He told me that 0:16:14.040 --> 0:16:17.320 the Little League Association has been in existence since nineteen 0:16:17.400 --> 0:16:20.280 fifty nine. Now, we couldn't come up with a statistically 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:23.960 credible estimation of the number of children who had played 0:16:24.360 --> 0:16:26.880 in the league over all of those years, so for 0:16:26.920 --> 0:16:29.880 the sake of argument, let's just say it was a lot. 0:16:30.080 --> 0:16:33.400 They told me that in their almost sixty years of existence, 0:16:33.720 --> 0:16:36.480 the number of children that had gone through their program 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:38.760 that he knew of that ended up playing Major League 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:41.760 Baseball was two. 0:16:43.640 --> 0:16:46.040 I would all like to think that everyone can flourish 0:16:46.120 --> 0:16:49.320 and succeed, but being really stick here, only a handful 0:16:49.360 --> 0:16:52.120 of kids playing in their chosen sport today are actually 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:54.400 going to make it professionally, aren't they. So what's the 0:16:54.480 --> 0:16:57.720 point of putting so much pressure on these teenagers? 0:16:58.160 --> 0:16:58.320 Yeah? 0:16:58.360 --> 0:17:01.960 I think, Look, I love and it's great to see 0:17:02.120 --> 0:17:05.080 people excel and do their best at it. But we 0:17:05.160 --> 0:17:08.600 know the evidence shows in the United States with the 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:09.560 NFL and. 0:17:09.560 --> 0:17:11.240 The Premier league football academies. 0:17:11.480 --> 0:17:14.040 You know, it's something like, you know, these young people 0:17:14.080 --> 0:17:16.880 aget signed up really at really young ages for these 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:20.880 premier league academies, and yeah, very few. We know from 0:17:20.880 --> 0:17:23.040 the evidence that very few actually make it through to 0:17:23.080 --> 0:17:23.879 professional ranks. 0:17:23.920 --> 0:17:24.560 So if you take the. 0:17:24.520 --> 0:17:27.359 Premier league football academies in the UK and you look 0:17:27.400 --> 0:17:30.960 at the NFL, the amount of athletes who are signed 0:17:31.000 --> 0:17:33.359 quite young and actually go on to play in the 0:17:33.400 --> 0:17:36.320 professional game, I think it's about one to two percent 0:17:36.440 --> 0:17:39.600 of young people who actually are signed up with football 0:17:39.640 --> 0:17:40.720 academies in the UK. 0:17:41.040 --> 0:17:43.480 So very few people actually do make it through. You'd 0:17:43.520 --> 0:17:44.040 have to ask the. 0:17:44.040 --> 0:17:47.600 Question, why so much pressure and why so much investment 0:17:47.760 --> 0:17:50.359 so young, and it sort of closing the door on 0:17:50.480 --> 0:17:54.439 late developers. As youth develop at different stages, some develop 0:17:54.480 --> 0:17:57.720 earlier than others, and that those late developers possibly not 0:17:57.800 --> 0:18:02.040 selected early on because of their haven't developed physically as 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:06.200 fast as their peers. Possibly we're losing them from sport 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:08.479 as well. So it's a double wammy. The ones who 0:18:08.520 --> 0:18:11.080 are in the system the majority don't make it, and 0:18:11.280 --> 0:18:14.200 it closes the door on other people from actually entering 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:15.040 into the system. 0:18:15.119 --> 0:18:17.840 So I saw last week fifteen year old runner Sam 0:18:17.920 --> 0:18:21.160 Ruth became the youngest person to ever run a sub 0:18:21.240 --> 0:18:24.520 four minute mile. Now, this is obviously a major achievement 0:18:24.560 --> 0:18:27.600 for him personally, but for the country as well. Where 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:31.240 do we strike that balance between supporting clear superstars like 0:18:31.600 --> 0:18:35.000 Sam but not thrusting them into the spotlight so much 0:18:35.080 --> 0:18:37.320 that it could negatively impact on them. 0:18:37.480 --> 0:18:38.680 Yeah, I've been following that. 0:18:38.720 --> 0:18:41.800 You know, that's an incredible performance from somebody who are 0:18:41.800 --> 0:18:44.120 young and attract significant media attention. 0:18:44.680 --> 0:18:47.040 From Olympics point of view, the International Olympic. 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:51.359 Committee commissioned about twenty five leading experts in youth development 0:18:51.560 --> 0:18:56.040 from across the world, so scientists, physiologists, people with experiencing 0:18:56.080 --> 0:18:59.280 coaching youth development sports psychologists. 0:19:00.040 --> 0:19:02.000 They came up with a consensus. 0:19:01.560 --> 0:19:05.080 Statement on what age is the right age when young 0:19:05.080 --> 0:19:06.840 people should be going to the Olympics, and they couldn't 0:19:06.840 --> 0:19:09.920 agree on an age. So what they did do was 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:12.640 identify all the challenges and barriers, some of them we've 0:19:12.680 --> 0:19:15.520 talked about that do impact on young people, and they 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:19.520 came up with recommendations that would support somebody like Sam 0:19:19.600 --> 0:19:21.760 for example, be a classic example of that. But it's 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:25.119 having the right people around them who understand the appropriate 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:29.240 training load for people going through the adolescence and they'll 0:19:29.240 --> 0:19:32.399 go through various stages of growth spurts. We know that 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.640 during adolescence the risk of injury is much higher than 0:19:36.680 --> 0:19:39.159 for other age groups. So it's having that knowledge around 0:19:39.160 --> 0:19:42.040 them from the trainers and the people working with them 0:19:42.080 --> 0:19:45.119 physically to understand what an appropriate training load is. Then 0:19:45.160 --> 0:19:48.360 you also need some supportive parenting around them to help 0:19:48.400 --> 0:19:50.919 guide them through the pressures that come with that. You know, 0:19:50.960 --> 0:19:53.760 the school environment and everybody involved with them around them 0:19:53.800 --> 0:19:57.080 needs to be providing a lot of support. Now, now 0:19:57.119 --> 0:19:59.359