Multisport Athlete Study

I have been reading on the internet a lot about multisport athletes. The slant on the web seems to be it is one or another.  Is it possible to focus on a sport year round and still be a multisport athlete? One article in particular really caught my attention.http://www.getsportiq.com/2015/06/the-era-and-myth-of-the-one-sport-prep-athlete/

In the beginning of the article the author poses the idea that the multisport athlete is dying. “The multi-sport high school athlete is gone; we all know this. It’s a thing of the past, like black and white TV. It’s the era of specialization, of kids “focusing” on one sport, often because they (or their parents) are chasing (often unrealistically) a scholarship, or because coaches have made it too difficult to do other sports.”

I talk to athletes all the time about the amount of pressure coming from coaches to have the athletes commit to playing one sport. It feels like the athletes have to choose at a younger age. Ericsson’s idea of the 10000 hours was a catalyst for parents and coaches to begin to specialize. My question is why can’t an athlete specialize in one sport but still play multi-sports? First let’s define specialization so we have a basis to look.   “Sport specialization is defined as students limiting participation to one sport which is practiced, trained for, and/or competed in on a year-round basis” (Hill, 1991, p. 186)

Secondly, I decided to find the answer through a quick questionnaire of the women players in our top volleyball league in Canada, in the Canadian Interuniversity Sports (CIS).. For the purpose of this blog we will assume that these athletes are a good cross section of our top volleyball players in the country. For those readers outside of Canada, the CIS is our equivalent to Division 1 university volleyball. We will assume that they are a good cross section of our top volleyball players in the country.

I sent the questionnaire out to the 38 teams in the CIS that offer scholarships in volleyball. I sent the email directly to their head coaches to see if they could help me. At this point in the process I have received email and statistics back from 12 of the institutions. That is a total of 180 athletes. The distribution of the teams that replied was a good cross-section of the whole country. This is the breakdown of the replying teams from the questionnaires; 5 of the teams participate in the Canada West Division, 3 of the teams were from the Ontario division, 2 from the Quebec division and 2 from the Atlantic conference.

 I asked the head coaches of the programs to answer these three questions.

1.       How many players on your team played more than 1 sport in their last two years of high school?

2.       What were the sports?

3.       How many played club volleyball?

I was very surprised by the result.

We found that 83% of the athletes played more than one sport in high school. This is also while 97% of the athletes played club volleyball

The following chart is a breakdown of the different sports the athletes played.

SPORT	PARTICIPANTS	PERCENTAGE OF ATHLETES PLAYING THE SPORT
Basketball	75	41.32%
Soccer	58	32.22
Track	41	22.77
Softball	25	13.88
Badminton	22	12.22
Ringette/Hockey	12	6.66
Beach Vball	15	8.33
Swimming	14	7.77
Lacrosse	6	3.33
Rugby	6	3.33
Ski/Snowbarding	8	4.44
Tennis	5	2.77
Ultimate Frisbee	4	2.22
Figure Skating	3	1.66
Cross Country	2	1.11

Water Polo	1	0.05
Field Hockey	1	0.05
Flag Football	1	0.05
Sailing	1	0.05
Gymnastics	3	1.66
Golf	1	0.05
Dance	1	0.05
Trampoline	1	0.05
Martial Arts	3	1.66

With looking at the high percentage of athletes that play club volleyball it is simple to say that if you want to play high level university volleyball you must play club volleyball.  I would believe that this would be a common thought out in the Canadian volleyball community. 

The second point I derive from this is that it is still very important to sample other sports in your high school career. In discussion with my athletes at Brandon University, most felt they made the decision to play volleyball at the elite level.  Volleyball was going to be their primary sport. They said that they identified themselves more as a volleyball player than any other sport.  They chose to play the other sports for a mental break from volleyball, for companionship with other friends who they have been playing with for years, and also because they enjoyed the other sports.

Using the previous definition we quoted from Hill the athletes from Brandon University specialized in volleyball.  Most of them played high school volleyball from September to November, then they moved onto club volleyball December to May, and finally provincial team in July.  They often overlapped their season of play so they could participate in the other sports.  The athletes stated they took their secondary sports seriously; they practiced hard and set high goals in those sports as well.  It was another chance to compete.

As a university coach, when out recruiting,  I ask what other sports they play as well.  I find that multisport athletes are able to pick up new movement patterns faster than single sport athletes, but I have no true data to prove this other than years of observation.  Multisport athletes have a strong grasp of the creation of space and the understanding of locating trends of oppositions.  They also tend to have more of a growth mindset as they try to become strong in multiple sports.

I believe that athletes in high school should be allowed to sample other sports during their school years, but their main focus needs to be on the sport that they want to excel in.