- May 16, 2011
- 107
- 154
I'm creating this thread to discuss something I have noticed more and more in this industry. This sport that I love and have been in for a while has become more focused on getting rings and globes and not us enjoying our common love for the sport. I remember the days before events like the summit and worlds where people competed for the joy of competing! Now a days with social media the sport has turned more into a status thing. It's like if you aren't on a level 5 team that is globing each year then you really aren't a part of the sport. My team just got back from the summit it's our first year going after a bid to the summit we received a wild card bid back in November and my athletes where over the moon as our team goal was to go to the summit! We competed this past Friday and hit a zero deduction routine we got 5th out of the 13 teams and missed moving to day 2 by less than two points. My athletes and their families where very happy and so was I as a coach! Today I found out that an athlete who left our gym a few years ago texted one of the athletes on my team and said "did your team make it to the REAL day at summit?" I assumed by "real day" she meant finals. So it made me think is this what we as a industry and coaches are teaching these young athletes? Unless you are making it to finals, getting a ring, are a level 5 athlete, and so on than you are some how less than. Lots of athletes in this sport will never make it to the summit or to finals at worlds or even on to a level 5 team. Should we make those athletes feel like their accomplishments are somehow just quite not good enough because they didn't get a ring at the end of their journey? I wish there where more focus on the little guys in this sport and not so much focus on how many rings someone is walking around with on their hands. Because there's so much more to take from this sport than rings, globes, and titles!