Fit 2 Finish: Keeping Your Soccer Players in the Game

FIT2

FINISH

Keeping Your Soccer

Players in the Game

Wendy LeBolt, PhD

FIT 2 FINISH

Keeping Your Soccer Players in the Game

© 2015 Wendy LeBolt, PhD.

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Published in New York, New York, by Morgan James Publishing. Morgan James and The Entrepreneurial Publisher are trademarks of Morgan James, LLC. www.MorganJamesPublishing.com

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ISBN 978-1-63047-214-6 paperback

ISBN 978-1-63047-215-3 eBook

ISBN 978-1-63047-216-0 hardcover

Library of Congress Control Number: 2014937576

Cover Design by:

Chris Treccani

www.3dogdesign.net

Interior Design by:

Bonnie Bushman

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In an effort to support local communities, raise awareness and funds, Morgan James Publishing donates a percentage of all book sales for the life of each book to Habitat for Humanity Peninsula and Greater Williamsburg.

In memory of Donald C. Paup, PhD:

teacher, mentor, friend, coach and

champion in sport and in life

Table of Contents

Foreword by Diane Drake

Introduction: Fit for the Game

1   Kids and Fitness: What Does the Game Require?

Soccer’s physical demands: the fitness kids need for healthy sport performance

2   Sport Anatomy and Physiology: What Makes the Body Work?

Movement starts with the basics: structure and function in the young growing body

3   Fitness Prescription for Sports: Meeting the Demands

How to structure a fitness plan with proper progression for your athletes

4   Fitting Fitness into the Practice Plan

How to build fitness training into sport-specific drills, skills and games

5   Flexibility, Stretching and Recovery

Proper techniques and sound principles for flexibility training and maximizing recovery

6   Fueling the Athlete for Performance

Healthy nutrition for athletes’ demanding schedules, plus special dietary considerations

7   Beating Injuries to Keep Your Athletes in the Game

Recognition and prevention of common injuries and managing healthy return to play

Conclusion: Fit to the Finish

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Appendices

Appendix A:   Target Heart Rate Calculation

Appendix B:   Overtraining Signs, Symptoms and Prevention

Appendix C:   Eating to Be Your Best

Appendix D:   Nutrition Fun FAQ Quiz

Appendix E:   Gluten-Free Recipes

Appendix F:   Care and Management of Common Injuries

Appendix G:   Communicating with a Health Care Professional

Appendix H:   First Aid and How to Pack Your Med Kit

Resources

Glossary

Foreword

Dr. Wendy LeBolt and I first teamed up almost 15 years ago when I was the coach of her daughter’s U9 team. Fast forward about 6 years, and we were working side by side with a couple of my youth club teams. She brought ACL prevention training that I knew those girls needed. Dr. LeBolt also kept a close eye on the George Mason University team where I have been head coach since 2004. Observing training and talking with my staff landed us in deep conversations about the health of prospective players and injuries that were overtaking them. She queried me about the college game; I asked her about the youth game—because now I had a U9 of my own who loved the game. Like every parent, I wanted to keep her healthy. Like every coach, I wanted to help her succeed. Injuries were the one thing she needed to avoid, and Dr. LeBolt knew about preventing injuries.

Injuries in youth sports are growing at a frenetic pace, and they are impacting players who come to me at the college level. Not just ACL injuries, but major overuse injuries. Fully one third to one half of my incoming freshman class—Division I players who are among the best in the country—is injured when they arrive at GMU. Most are overuse problems that need to be addressed; improper training and preparation at the youth level have landed them there.

Dr. LeBolt nails the cause in Fit2Finish: the game alone doesn’t provide the proper environment for healthy training adaptation. But many youth coaches lack the proper knowledge to train the youth soccer player. My time on the sidelines of youth games has made this very plain. Add to this the trend in the environment of youth soccer in this country—funded from the bottom up, not the top down, so you have to pay to play—which leaves coaches feeling scrutinized by the parents paying. I constantly hear coaches criticized for doing overall fitness training that may appear non-soccer-related. Expectations are for more games and more playing time. More training, more coaching, more games and more stress leads almost inevitably to more injuries. We are overdoing it! Are we surprised? This is America, home of the supersized McDonald’s fries!

As coaches of elite players, we operate under the SAID (Specific Adaptations to Imposed Demands) principle—meaning activities should replicate the demands of the game, and training design requires gradually adapting to these demands. Supersizing does not make them better or faster at the elite level, and certainly not at the youth level. Development takes time and special care when the bodies we are training are still growing. Fit2Finish translates the SAID principles for the youth game and the youth coach. Dr. LeBolt spells out the importance of proper training using activities designed to develop overall fitness, while keeping in mind developmental needs. Plus, she makes them fun.

She zeroes in on three negative effects of the current train only with the game approach: sidedness, patterns/habits and repetition. Sidedness, players defaulting to favor their strong side under pressure, is human nature. This makes the weakness even weaker and invites injury. Patterns of habitual movement require compensation, which leads to imbalance and often injury. Finally, repetition of what works, while it may bring short-term success, opens the door to perpetuating the imbalances. Perpetually calling on the acting muscles overtrains them at the expense of the stabilizing and supporting muscles. This repetitive use without proper recovery can be a source of imbalance and excessive fatigue, especially in growing athletes, and ultimately a cause of injury. This is not a good long-term strategy. And we want these kids to keep playing strong. I sure do; I want ’em in my program! Balanced training with proper recovery is key. Dr. LeBolt steps you through the process of developing this with your kids and your players on your training fields.

Fit2Finish will serve as a bible to many parents of budding young stars. As a soccer (fútbol) mom, an American football mom, a club coach and a head college coach, I wear many hats. I see where youth sports training is getting derailed. Dr. LeBolt gets us back on track. Your child looks to you as a parent and/or coach to get a strong, healthy start. The fact that you are reading this book shows that you care about doing this right. Invite Dr. LeBolt to show you how to watch your athletes move, recognize deficiencies and train them back into balance and strong performance. This is a resource you will come back to again and again as they grow up in the game. It’s a user’s manual for youth coaching at every level. I plan to keep a copy handy.

—Diane Drake

Head Women’s Soccer Coach, George Mason University

Introduction:

Fit for the Game

When I was growing up playing sports, nobody ever got hurt, at least not seriously. I don’t remember a single teammate ever complaining of knee pain, shin pain, heel pain or hip pain. Today nearly all young athletes eventually experience at least one of these maladies. What has changed since the good ole days?

Plenty. For starters, more are kids playing. More than 44 million American children play competitive youth sports, according to a 2008 survey done by the National Council on Youth Sports. Girls’ participation continues to rise but still is somewhat less than boys’. There are more sports, more games and more competitions all year round. Sometimes multiple sports overlap in the same season. We’re starting children younger and younger, placing them on teams coached by well-meaning volunteers, usually parents, who may not recognize how entrenched they are in a culture that celebrates—often worships—the champion. Today is all about the more. We want to give our kids more of what used to be so good for us. And so we have. But it hasn’t always been so good for them.

Yes, we want them to be active and healthy. Soccer seems the perfect game for this, and we can start them young. But youth soccer today demands a great deal, especially as they move up through the competitive ranks. Simply for their survival they need to be fit.

Do you think your young soccer players can become fit for the game just by playing it? It makes sense in a way. Certainly the game puts all the right demands on them. It’s the most specific training they can get, right? They run and jump and stop and start and pass and kick and shoot and tackle. The game has all of these. Doing them must be the way to train them. Right?

I used to think so until I began attending my kids’ games and then started coaching them. That’s when I saw kids limping, hobbling and on crutches. Some wore braces to protect their surgically repaired joints or to keep from having surgery. At first I thought these kids’ injuries were isolated events or just their bad luck, but soon I learned that this was widespread, affecting what seemed like legions of kids. Injury rates were on a steep climb. Some injuries, like anterior cruciate ligament injuries in girls, were even being called epidemic.

Parents from those teams, who knew my training and teaching background in health, fitness and sports medicine, begged me to address these issues for the sake of their kids. I had three young soccer players of my own, so I understood the issues and concerns both as a parent and as a coach.

Sports are still good for our kids. Or they can be. But unfortunately there is no going back to the old days. Sports done well offer physical, mental, psychological and emotional benefits to our kids in a real-life, low-risk, right-sized setting. So, if it’s so good for them, how come they are getting hurt? Dropping out? Or stuck on the sidelines?

Risks come with taking the field. This has always been true. But I believe the benefits far outweigh the risks. They did for me. I now see how formative my youth sports experiences were. The playing field is where I tried on life to see what fit and what didn’t. The value of sport is way too important for our kids to lose out on.

I wanted them to play, and play healthy, but how? I waded into the environment of youth sports today with a divining rod and asked:

•   Why are so many kids getting injured?

•   Why are so many kids dropping out?

•   How can we get and keep all the kids playing?

•   What can we do to keep the kids playing who want to play hard?

•   How can we prepare kids for what the game today asks of them?

This handbook is the result of asking those questions. The examples I use are from my experience working with soccer athletes of all ages and at a variety of playing levels. They come from the ranks of rec leagues, club teams, elite teams and college play. The need for a foundation of healthy fitness is the same for each because their bodies are what’s in play and at stake.

I do not set out here to right the culture of youth sports. Many voices are speaking on that subject and participating in that conversation with a lot of energy. (See Resources section for a reading list on this topic.) I am, rather, on a rescue mission. We must address the too much, too early, at too high a price. While we go about changing the culture, the kids who are currently in it need saving. And so do those who will come after them.

We need to do the following:

•   Prepare kids physically for the appropriate level of play

•   Balance the demands on kids to allow their bodies to strengthen and grow

•   Do this within the time kids have apportioned in their often over-committed days

And by the way, I refuse to lose the fun. Why? Because without the fun, they won’t want to do it, and they certainly won’t keep doing it. And that’s my ultimate goal as a fitness professional, trainer and coach, but especially as a parent: to help kids develop bodies they will use well their whole lives, not just because it’s good for them but because they want to. Our bodies were loaned to us for just one lifetime; we need to treat them that way.

In the chapters that follow, we will:

•   Address the demands of the game on your players

•   Identify weaknesses and imbalances that make them injury-prone

•   Look at the basic anatomy and physiology that create movement

•   Design a physical training plan appropriate for your players

•   Learn to implement training within your current practice setting (see video links in Fitness Games chart, chapter 4, and in Resources section)

•   Incorporate rest and nutrition for growth, performance and recovery

•   Address possible injuries and the means to facilitate safe return to play

•   Adopt