Children and Sports Training:
How Your Future Champions Should Exercise to Be Healthy, Fit and Happy

by Józef Drabik

All children are different. The needs of boys and girls in sports training are dramatically different. Children and Sports Training tells you the practical consequences of these differences.

• Learn what exercises can help a 12-year-old girl reach her full potential but will harm a boy the same age
• Learn how to match the right sport with the right child, the right training program for the age and gender of the child.
• Learn the “sensitive ages” for development of movement abilities (endurance, coordination, speed, strength, flexibility).

Józef Drabik, Ph.D., is a Professor of the University School of Physical Education (AWF) in Gdansk, Poland, where he was substantially involved in establishing the Center for Promotion of Children’s Health and Fitness.

Dr. Drabik’s publications aside from this book include 120 articles, papers, books, and other works, but he is much more than a theoretician. He has worked closely with children and youth throughout his career, both as a coach and p.e. teacher, and five times led his school’s cross-country ski team to national level competitions.

His diagnoses and prescriptions come from working with real children with real needs and real abilities. He is very aware, in eminently practical ways, of what is possible and not possible, both for coaches and for children.

Dr. Drabik’s training and instruction certifications give some hint of his breadth: Kayak Coach (1st Class); Cross-country Skiing Instructor; Basic Skating Instructor; Team Handball Instructor; Volleyball Instructor; Track and Field Instructor; Theory of Sports Lecturer; Coach Courses Lecturer; and Postgraduate Courses Lecturer.

Table of Contents

Foreword
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction—Why Children Should Exercise

PART 1—BASIC CONCEPTS
1. The Concept of Physical Fitness
2. Biological Development and Sports Training
3. Recruitment and Selection for Sports
4. Training Loads and Children
5. Stages of Children’s Sports Training

PART 2—MOVEMENT TRAINING
6. Coordination
7. Endurance
8. Speed
9. Strength
10. Flexibility
11. Technique
12. Tactics
13. Sample P. E. Lessons
Appendix A: Balancing Volume and Intensity of Work
Appendix B: Selection
Appendix C: Endurance Development
Glossary
Literature Cited

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Testimonials

“This book represents the cumulative knowledge and experience of the author and many of his colleagues related to the progressive preparation and training for children in organized sports. Unfortunately, much of the extensive experience of the Eastern Bloc countries and the Soviet Union itself has never been published or shared with the rest of the world.

“[…] a significant contribution to our knowledge of progressive sports training in children and, in particular, shares the author’s concept of the `sensitive ages’ for enhancement of muscle strength, speed, endurance, coordination, and flexibility.

“[…] written in a careful and simple progression of ideas which should be comprehensible to anyone who has had a secondary school level of scientific training and who is also involved in physical education at either the community-based or school-based level.

“I strongly recommend this book to anyone dealing with or responsible for progressive sports training of young athletes. The truism that children are not simply small adults is especially borne out by this small gem of a book.”

Lyle J. Micheli, M.D., Director of Sports Medicine at Children’s Hospital, Boston; President of the American College of Sports Medicine; Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, Boston, Massachusetts

“I read it with pleasure and I think it is worthwhile for teachers of physical education. It also reveals a lot of research that is not published in English, German, or French.”

Han C. G. Kemper, Professor of Health Science, Director of Department of Health Science, Vrije University, Amsterdam, editorial board member of International Journal of Sports Medicine and Pediatric Exercise Science, Amsterdam, Holland

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