I recently came across a post about an eight-year-old weightlifter in Canada who is one of 87 under 13 year-old competitors in Canada. The Post went on to note that there are 400 youngsters in this age category in the U.S. This is a significant number and it set me to thinking that this might not be the best pathway for these children either as weightlifters or as athletes in general.
Children are not short adults
Children are quite different from adults, and although the occasional virtuoso in some field is discovered, the majority of children are not capable of doing the things that adults can and should not be evaluated by the same measurement scheme. Pre-adolescent children are still very much in a stage of development and their activities should reflect that.
Keeping this in mind I held technique competitions for under 13 lifters as part of the Los Angeles Fit Expo for 3 years. Although the number of participants was not great, the event was well received but eventually had to be discontinued for reasons I’ll touch on later.
The Format
· Each athlete took three snatch attempts and three clean & jerk attempts.
· The weight had to be increased after a successful lift
· There were three officials
· Each official would judge each attempt and provide a score of between 5 and 10 points.
· Each lift could therefore achieve a high score of 30 points. A missed lift would score 0.
· The highest single snatch score was added to the highest single clean & jerk score for a possible total of 60 points.
· Boys and girls were competing in the same event.
The Benefit for the Developing Athlete
An emphasis on developing biomechanically sound technique enables the young athlete to concentrate on developing motor skills and the nervous system. At this stage of life the nervous system is primed for development and once developed will provide athletic benefits for the latter stages of the sports career. At this stage the muscles and much of the connective tissue structure is not in the appropriate hormonal environment to respond to the lifting of heavier resistances. Training the athlete to perform correct motor pathways with submaximal weights is the most appropriate strategy to employ at the pre-adolescent stage.
The Benefit for the Developing Coach
All weightlifting coaches will have to teach technique and at some point must learn how to do so. Working with youngsters whose primary immediate goal is technical mastery is a great training activity for coaches. It requires that coaches develop the sound technical eye, and to develop effective approaches for teaching. Coaches, by nature, should be competitive individuals and that focus would benefit the athlete greatly if it were directed at technical mastery.
The Drawback
The most difficult part of conducting the technical competitions was the availability of officials with a sound technical eye. Within any given LWC, the individuals with the best coaching eyes are inevitably the coaches, but I believe that we could open this up as a niche for those supporters that would like to get involved in a slightly different way.
Other Sports Do It Regularly
Subjectively judged sports develop judging personnel to evaluate young athletes on a regular basis. Gymnastics, diving and cheerleading are evaluated solely on subjective merit. Weightlifting could do so as well.
And so…..
Technique competitions would go a long way toward developing our young athletes properly so that they are balanced and ready to begin the more rigorous training necessary for weightlifting proficiency when they reach adolescence. It would also develop a number of coaches who are proficient at coaching technique and a number of judges who could evaluate proper technique. I will consider implementing this type of competition in my local meets with the intention of having it carry over to a large group of our competitors in the future.