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Speaker 1: I can tell you this as a college coach, the

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Speaker 1: kids whose parents were the drivers behind it. Once that

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Speaker 1: driver has taken away the work ethic, the desire to

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Speaker 1: keep doing it, these things that actually propel you to

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Speaker 1: the professional level are no longer there, and I don't

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Speaker 1: thought the kid at all for that. This is the

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Speaker 1: Reformed Sports Project, a podcast about restoring healthy balance and

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Speaker 1: perspective in all areas of sports through education and advocacy. Hi,

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Speaker 1: this is Nick Bonacoor from the Reformed Sports Project podcast.

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Speaker 1: Joining me today is Steve Magnus, a world renowned expert

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Speaker 1: on health and human performance and co creator of the

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Speaker 1: Growth Equation, which explores performance and well being. Steve is

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Speaker 1: authored or co authored numerous books on these topics and

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Speaker 1: has also previously served as head cross country coach at

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Speaker 1: a major Division one university. Steve and I discuss how

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Speaker 1: in today's youth sports culture, the push for athletic success

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Speaker 1: often see was driven by the parents, and how early

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Speaker 1: specialization can lead to burnout over youth injuries and identity challenges.

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Speaker 1: I am excessively excited. I don't even know if that

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Speaker 1: makes any sense with those two words together, but I'm

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Speaker 1: excited because I was connected to this gentleman through kind

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Speaker 1: of like my hero. I have his book sitting Shotgun

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Speaker 1: with me. I'm recording this in my car and his

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Speaker 1: book Range is sitting Shotgun with me. David Epstein and

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Speaker 1: his buddy cross country coach Runner. Uh, just just an

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Speaker 1: unbelievable advocate for you know, helping kids and training and teaching.

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Speaker 1: Steve Magnus, Steve, thanks for coming on. I'm extremely excited

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Speaker 1: to have young So I came across your content. It

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Speaker 1: seems like you and David Epstein are buddies and uh,

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Speaker 1: he said you. You know, as far as the messages

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Speaker 1: concerned youth athletics, you're we're all passionate about it. When

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Speaker 1: you look at the landscape of youth sports today, Um,

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Speaker 1: what do you see as a coach, as an athlete?

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Speaker 1: You know that concerns you the most? Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: it's it's it's kind of disturbing in a lot of

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Speaker 1: ways because I grew up as like one of those

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Speaker 1: prodigy type athletes who was really good when I was young. Um,

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Speaker 1: but it was all all driven by kind of myself

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Speaker 1: and I just had this race to train, so I

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Speaker 1: just did it, and my parents were like I don't

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Speaker 1: know what's wrong with this kid, but like he wants

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Speaker 1: to go run a lot, so like, go for it.

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Speaker 1: But what I see now is the opposite, and that

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Speaker 1: so much of it is parent driven, and it's just

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Speaker 1: it just ticked me aback. I guess that example I

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Speaker 1: can give. As you know, I coached collegiate and professional athletes,

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Speaker 1: and I get reached out to almost you know daily,

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Speaker 1: um from high school, middle school youth parents asking for

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Speaker 1: you know, uh lessons for their nine year old kid.

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Speaker 1: And I started to notice that trend a couple of

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Speaker 1: years ago. I was like, hey, this is weird. And

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Speaker 1: then my fiance teaches first grade, so occasionally I've accompanied

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Speaker 1: her to like, you know, one of her students, first

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Speaker 1: grade students soccer games or football games and stuff. And

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Speaker 1: I remember the first experience. I got out there and

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Speaker 1: I'm watching and these parents are going nuts, absolutely crazy

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Speaker 1: for like, you know, a six year old soccer game

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Speaker 1: where they're just all following the ball. And then once

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Speaker 1: they found out that like, oh, this guy's coached like

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Speaker 1: Olympic level athletes, it's like everyone swarms to me and

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Speaker 1: asks about their you know, six year old in terms

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Speaker 1: of his like running speed, and all this stuff in

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Speaker 1: my head, I'm like, hold on, guys, like step back,

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Speaker 1: like time out, step back, your kid is six years old,

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Speaker 1: Like who cares? But you know, I guess like the

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Speaker 1: overwhelming enthusiasm for that that like, oh my gosh, my

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Speaker 1: kid needs to make it in this this sport, and

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Speaker 1: I need to do everything possible to make sure that

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Speaker 1: he makes it. And if I don't, like I'm a

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Speaker 1: bad parent, that feeling, um, I think is leading towards

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Speaker 1: some very dangerous things. You know. It's funny you you

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Speaker 1: said quite a bit there, and the one thing that

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Speaker 1: stood out to me, and I've been talking a lot,

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Speaker 1: I've been thinking a lot about this, about my own experience,

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Speaker 1: and when it kind of hit me of when I

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Speaker 1: decided again, I was never elite. You know. I played

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Speaker 1: college baseball. I played a year in Europe, you know,

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Speaker 1: and but I played against guys professionally and in college

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Speaker 1: who went on to major league careers. And there was

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Speaker 1: a difference. There's a major difference between number one, just

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Speaker 1: being a high school athlete and two going on to college.

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Speaker 1: And then there's levels, right, there's levels of elite. What

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Speaker 1: I say elite, there's there's just such levels, right, you

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Speaker 1: get the college and there's levels of college and but

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Speaker 1: what to me, it all comes down to his willingness.

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Speaker 1: But at the same time, when do you become willing,

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Speaker 1: like when you still believe in the tooth fairy like

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Speaker 1: we're expecting. And this is what kind of bothers me

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Speaker 1: is And it's kind of like socially accepted to treat

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Speaker 1: ten nine eight kids who thoroughly believe in Santa Claus

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Speaker 1: like their professional athletes. And what what are your thoughts?

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Speaker 1: Is that kind of what you're talking about? Yeah, I'm sorry,

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Speaker 1: but if you need extra coaching for private coaching when

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Speaker 1: you're eight, nine, ten years old, eleven years old, twelve

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Speaker 1: year old, then there is a problem. Like your your

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Speaker 1: kids should be playing, having fun and figuring out how

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Speaker 1: to move his body right, and that is that is

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Speaker 1: the key. You shouldn't be like trying to treat this

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Speaker 1: kid like he's a product almost and that oh, if

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Speaker 1: I can give him a head start and develop these

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Speaker 1: things and make him a better picture, better or quarterback

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Speaker 1: or whatever, then he gets the scholarship. And once you

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Speaker 1: get the scholarship, he's going to get the professional contract.

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Speaker 1: Like that that pathway that parents think exists like it

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Speaker 1: doesn't exist because what inevitably happens, and there's always exceptions,

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Speaker 1: but what inevitably happens, and I can tell you this

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Speaker 1: as a college coach, is that the kids who whose

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Speaker 1: parents were the drivers behind it, once that driver has

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Speaker 1: taken away the work ethic, the desire to keep doing it,

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Speaker 1: the things that actually propel you to the professional level

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Speaker 1: are no longer there. And that's not and that's not

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Speaker 1: like I don't fault the kid at all for that,

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Speaker 1: Like of course they wouldn't have the drive to do

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Speaker 1: something after that. I mean, it's no different than you

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Speaker 1: were I if we were, you know, being forced that

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Speaker 1: math seven when we're when we're young, we probably get

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Speaker 1: sick of like, oh gosh, like I don't want to

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Speaker 1: do math for a career or something in this line

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Speaker 1: that sucks, you know, And and that's kind of what

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Speaker 1: what happens when we just force fea is we're just

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Speaker 1: taking away that intrinsic motivation and beating it with the

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Speaker 1: sticks so that it's like no longer there. And that

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Speaker 1: what what all research kind of shows is that intrinsic

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Speaker 1: motivation is the long term driver. So if we take

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Speaker 1: that away, like you're not gonna last, You're gonna burn out.

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Speaker 1: I read a quote from his name is Eric Crescy,

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Speaker 1: and I posted it and I don't want to he's

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Speaker 1: a I think he's involved in strength and conditioning for

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Speaker 1: like the New York Yankees and and in Major League Baseball.

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Speaker 1: And he said, he said, I often get calls from

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Speaker 1: parents asking what training they could do for their nine

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Speaker 1: year old that professional that we're doing with kind of

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Speaker 1: like you said that we're doing with our pro athletes.

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Speaker 1: He goes, I wish they'd ask what are pro athletes

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Speaker 1: were doing when they were nine years old, i e.

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Speaker 1: Playing multiple sports and goofing around with their friends. From

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Speaker 1: your experience as someone who you know was elite precocious,

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Speaker 1: what was your experience like as a young kid nine

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Speaker 1: years old? Exactly? I mean that's what I did, right,

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Speaker 1: I So I became really good at running my senior

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Speaker 1: year in high school. I was the fastest miler in

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Speaker 1: the country and brand four one for a while. But like,

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Speaker 1: I didn't take running seriously, So that was when I

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Speaker 1: was eighteen. I didn't take running seriously until I was

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Speaker 1: probably fifteen or sixteen. When I was I remember when

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Speaker 1: I was like, you know, an elementary school, like fifth grade,

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Speaker 1: you do the p physical fitness you know tests, and

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Speaker 1: I barely missed our elementary school record by like a

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Speaker 1: couple of seconds. And the key teacher comes up to

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Speaker 1: me after and it's like, hey, do you want to

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Speaker 1: train and then you can do this in a couple

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Speaker 1: of weeks. And I'm like, no, that sounds horrible. I

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Speaker 1: don't want to train for running, Like running isn't fun.

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Speaker 1: Why Because at that point, I was playing soccer, I

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Speaker 1: was playing baseball, I was doing all these other things

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Speaker 1: that were like fun. And guess what, Like soccer is

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Speaker 1: great at conditioning, and I was pretty good at it

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Speaker 1: because I could run really fast. But like once I

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Speaker 1: got to high school and you know, started enjoying running,

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Speaker 1: I was like, oh, this is fun, Like I'm pretty

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Speaker 1: good at this. I could be good at this. I'm

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Speaker 1: gonna start training seriously for it. And I think when

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Speaker 1: you go that route, it's it's perfectly okay because like

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Speaker 1: you set your foundation with enjoying different sports, and like

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Speaker 1: that enjoyment leads you to like having fun with it

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Speaker 1: all this stuff, developing some confidence around it, and more

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Speaker 1: so developing movement and um, in a lot of different

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Speaker 1: areas and directions. So because I played soccer, baseball, basketball,

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Speaker 1: all that stuff growing up, Like my body was resilient

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Speaker 1: enough once I decided like, hey, I want to specialize

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Speaker 1: this sport. My body could handle it. And if we

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Speaker 1: don't have that foundation, that background, like you're not going

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Speaker 1: to be able to handle it, and you're gonna get

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Speaker 1: injured and all that stuff and all these overuse injuries. Um.

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Speaker 1: I mean, as I said, like my faiance, they teach

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Speaker 1: us first grade and every once in a while, so

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Speaker 1: tell me, hey, my kid has you know, one of

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Speaker 1: my students has Achilles tendonitis or something like that. And

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Speaker 1: I'm like, how in the world does a six year

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Speaker 1: old get like tendonitis? Like this makes no sense in

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Speaker 1: my brain because I'm like six, seven, eight years old.

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Speaker 1: Like you're the most resilient of any any time of

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Speaker 1: your life. You just get banged up, bounced back, and

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Speaker 1: you're good. Um, And any time we're starting to see

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Speaker 1: these issues like that's a red flag of like oh

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Speaker 1: my gosh, like we're seeing over youth injuries at this age.

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Speaker 1: That's a problem. So you're seeing it from like a

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Speaker 1: running specific like it's prevalent and no different than it

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Speaker 1: is in baseball or soccer. Same type of thing where

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Speaker 1: you're seeing over youth injuries and as a result of

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Speaker 1: overdoing it from young ages. Yeah, I mean any time.

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Speaker 1: Like here's the thing that people need to understand, Like

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Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what support you're doing, Like if you're

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Speaker 1: increasing the volume of it at that young of age

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Speaker 1: too much, you start to see these overuse patterns. Right

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Speaker 1: in baseball for pictures, it's like elbow timnitis. Sure all

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Speaker 1: that stuff, same with tennis. Is the same in running, right,

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Speaker 1: that shouldn't be occurring at this stage. Like, if that's happening,

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Speaker 1: we're doing something wrong. When we come back, Steve and

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Speaker 1: I will get into mental health where we left off.

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Speaker 1: Steve and I were about to get into identity issues

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Speaker 1: that spawned from early specialization and the subsequent mental health

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Speaker 1: side effects. One of the things that um, you know,

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Speaker 1: aside from the physical and you know, I don't know

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Speaker 1: what your extent is. I'm from my experience as as

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Speaker 1: a runner, which is very very you know, we did

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Speaker 1: it in the college baseball and stuff as conditioning, and

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Speaker 1: now that I've gotten older than with kids, I actually

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Speaker 1: enjoy going out running a five k to just kind

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Speaker 1: of well. When I was younger, I hated it. But

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Speaker 1: my point is is that from a psychological standpoint, how

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Speaker 1: do you see this specialization or overuse stuff is specific.

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Speaker 1: How do you see it affected a kid's emotional well

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Speaker 1: being from a young age. That's a really good question

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Speaker 1: and something that I'm pretty passionate about, because, um, what

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Speaker 1: people often fail to realize is that the formation of

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Speaker 1: our identity, so our sense of self. I saw a

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Speaker 1: quote with you about identity, and that's what I wanted

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Speaker 1: to go and go ahead, I'm sorry, yeah, perfect, Like

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Speaker 1: we form our identities through trying things and seeing if

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Speaker 1: we enjoy it, seeing if it sparks interests, right, And

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Speaker 1: what most of the research shows is that we go

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Speaker 1: through these distinct patterns right where we're almost in it, Okay,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna try everything out kind of stage and like

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Speaker 1: it doesn't matter if we try something, ditchit, move on

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Speaker 1: to the next. And then we get to this period

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Speaker 1: where we're kind of narrowing into it, and then we

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Speaker 1: get to this period we start cementing, right. And what

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Speaker 1: most of the research shows, and my experience too, and

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Speaker 1: and and coaching, is that when you're young, like you are,

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Speaker 1: you have this open floor for creating your identity. It's

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Speaker 1: why little kids will get obsessed with something and then

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Speaker 1: the next week move on from it. Right, they don't

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Speaker 1: get that attached to it because they're exploring. Okay, what

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Speaker 1: what you find with um children who specialize in sport

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Speaker 1: too young is their identity almost cement too early, right,

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Speaker 1: because they start thinking like, oh, I don't just play sports,

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Speaker 1: so I don't play baseball or run track or something.

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Speaker 1: It's more like I am a baseball player. Right. You

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Speaker 1: make that switch of like this is something I do

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Speaker 1: to something, this is something I am. And once that

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Speaker 1: becomes cemented, then it's harder to let go of it.

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Speaker 1: If or move on from it, or if you start

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Speaker 1: to do poorly in it, then it becomes an attack

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Speaker 1: not on the thing that you do, but who you are.

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Speaker 1: So what we're seeing is like again, kids who specialize early,

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Speaker 1: they're getting this like almost early cementing of their identity

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Speaker 1: and it becomes intertwined. What they do becomes intertwined with

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Speaker 1: who they are, and at that young of age, that

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Speaker 1: can create some really unhealthy emotional problems. Right. So you

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Speaker 1: know the thing that I like to kind of point

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Speaker 1: to is like, if you're really good at sports, your

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Speaker 1: identity can sometimes if you specialized subment when you're like eight, nine,

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Speaker 1: ten years old, well the rest of your friends are,

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Speaker 1: you know, getting over believing in Santa like moving on

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Speaker 1: and trying a billion different art projects and banned and

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Speaker 1: all these other things. Well you're sitting there, like going

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Speaker 1: to baseball practice or soccer practice, you know, six seven

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Speaker 1: days a week, and this becomes who you are, and

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Speaker 1: it becomes really difficult to kind of move on from

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Speaker 1: or let go or inevitably if you fail, you don't

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Speaker 1: deal with it as um easily as if that identity

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Speaker 1: was an intertwined So I uh. I talked to a

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Speaker 1: lot of Olympians and professional athletes, and I've heard several

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Speaker 1: that have told me they were told at a young

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Speaker 1: age sport is what you do. It's not who you

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Speaker 1: are because coaches, do you know the mental health issues

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Speaker 1: I think we are sitting personally. I have no data

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Speaker 1: to back this up other than my experience and what

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Speaker 1: I've talked to, and I think we're sitting on an

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Speaker 1: atomic bomb of mental health issues to come from the

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Speaker 1: result of this current culture of youth sports, and I

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Speaker 1: think a lot of it ties into this identity issue.

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Speaker 1: I think kids are walking around. I can think of

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Speaker 1: one here in my town has been a quarterback since

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Speaker 1: he's six. He's literally known as a quarterback. Well if

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Speaker 1: he farts the wrong way. I mean, he's a freshman

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Speaker 1: in high school. His entire identity is crushed, and it's like,

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Speaker 1: how do you recover from that? You know, I don't know,

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Speaker 1: you know, maybe he'll be fine, But I think the

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Speaker 1: psychological aspect of it, from my panage point, is a

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Speaker 1: lot harder for people understand. What are your thoughts on

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Speaker 1: how people are willing to accept mental health and and

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Speaker 1: the seriousness of it unless they have been exposed. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you know. That's the problem is most of the physical stuff.

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Speaker 1: You can sit here and be like, oh, you know,

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Speaker 1: overuse injuries, and people grasp that, they get that, they're

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Speaker 1: like okay, like I can see why that could be bad.

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Speaker 1: But you start talking about identity or some sort of

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Speaker 1: mental health potential issue and it's like you look at

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Speaker 1: people with blank stares, right, And that's that's part of

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Speaker 1: the problem, is that it's not as well known, it's

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Speaker 1: not as well accepted. So those issues. What happened is

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Speaker 1: they get hidden, right or you get parents or teachers

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Speaker 1: or coaches or whoever it is who just kind of

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Speaker 1: give you the old sport cliche of like, oh, you

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Speaker 1: just gotta like tough your way through that. And that's

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Speaker 1: that's almost the worst advice you can give, because like,

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Speaker 1: now you have someone who's been told not to make

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Speaker 1: sense of the issue they're dealing with and not to

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Speaker 1: come terns to terms with it, which means they try

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Speaker 1: and push it down, push it underneath until it eventually comes,

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Speaker 1: you know, swelling uh, to the forefront. And I think

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Speaker 1: that that's that. I think you're right. I think that

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Speaker 1: this is one of these issues that is going to

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Speaker 1: be very, very big because in the past you didn't

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Speaker 1: have to confront these issues until later in life. I mean,

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Speaker 1: we look at identity issues and like there's the midlife crisis,

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Speaker 1: which you know is kind of ubiquitous and well known,

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Speaker 1: and it's like, okay, what is that. Well, that's kind

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Speaker 1: of a coming to terms with like who you thought

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Speaker 1: you were going to be at like the peak of

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Speaker 1: your life and who you actually are. And we have

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Speaker 1: you know, forty year old people who can't adjust well

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Speaker 1: to that that that issue and maybe rightfully so, and

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Speaker 1: now we're putting that on maybe Candle Heaven twelve thirteen,

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Speaker 1: fourteen years old. Whenever you come to terms with like

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Speaker 1: you're not as good as you know the parents coach

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Speaker 1: told you when you were you know, six step in

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Speaker 1: here sook you were gonna be, which is going to

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Speaker 1: be the large majority of people. Um, that's like a

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Speaker 1: ticking time bomb waiting to happen. I gotta tell you, see,

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Speaker 1: I love when I get people who are so passionate,

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Speaker 1: especially about the mental health side, and you're clearly very

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Speaker 1: educated on it and passion and I'm just what would

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Speaker 1: be your piece of advice to a parent who has

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Speaker 1: a young child who might know it ten years old

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Speaker 1: what they want to focus on, but likes to do

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Speaker 1: other things, but it's feeling that pressure to potentially specialize.

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Speaker 1: I would tell the parent to play the long game

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Speaker 1: and chill out here. Here's the thing, Like every parent

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Speaker 1: gets super excited like oh my gosh, my kid's gonna

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Speaker 1: be really good at this, or like her, he's got

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Speaker 1: the potential, but like it's like I don't know if

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Speaker 1: the analogy works, but it's like seeing a piece of

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Speaker 1: fruit and picking it too early, and you've just wasted

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Speaker 1: all this potential, right, And I think I think that

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Speaker 1: as a parent or teacher a coach, it's just like

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Speaker 1: being patient allowing your kid to explore things and be

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Speaker 1: supportive of that. And the number one piece of advice

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Speaker 1: I can give you is like, don't push your kid

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Speaker 1: into doing stuff it's got if they're good at it,

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Speaker 1: it's got to be their choice. So if your kid

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Speaker 1: gets to sixteen and he's great at swimming and he

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Speaker 1: or she like wants to train, you know, every single

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Speaker 1: day or price the day or whatever the norm is

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Speaker 1: for that sport, if he's making that choice and you're

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Speaker 1: not pushing them, you don't go for it. But like,

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Speaker 1: if the behind the scenes driver is the parent or

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Speaker 1: coach or teacher, whoever it is, it's not gonna work.

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Speaker 1: So don't don't push your kids to do anything. Steve,

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Speaker 1: I cannot thank you enough for for being willing to

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Speaker 1: hop on a call. This has been awesome. Keep up

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Speaker 1: the great work and uh man, I will hopefully circle back.

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Speaker 1: I'll be able to chat again soon. Thanks a lot,

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Speaker 1: and enjoy talking. That's Steve Magnus, world renowned expert on

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Speaker 1: health and mental performance. Thanks for listening to the Reform

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Speaker 1: Sports Project podcast dom Nick Boncourt and Our goal is

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Speaker 1: to restore a healthy balance and perspective in all areas

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Speaker 1: of sports through education and advocacy. For updates, please follow

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Speaker 1: us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, or check out our

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Speaker 1: website by searching for the Reform Sports Project