Sportz

How to buy sports equipment?

2019-09-22T16:36:00.000-05:00

Sports Help in Buying Equipment

Sports help is one of the most searched trends on the internet. There are millions of sports fans in the internet community who want to pursue sports. Sports, is a global phenomenon, fulfilling sports needs of many around the world.

With so much user-base associated with sports, many portals have come up with sports related services like sports guides, which are quite interesting feature for sports lovers. These services are accessed on a large scale, with more and more people getting involved into web surfing for sports utilities.

A large number of users are up for sports gear and equipment shopping on the internet, as it is an emerging trend to shop online. More and more portals are providing sports help along with equipment help, to promote sports and their products at the same time.

Such sports guides are, however more promotion related and hold less value for those who are learning sports and want to take these tips seriously. But this content is useful in facilitating the buying decision. Such equipment guides are good source of information to find appropriate equipment as per your need.

If you want to buy equipment, one other way to find a good solution is visiting a portal which employs online facility to ask others. You can get valuable output from this portal, if you ask others to give their input when you are going for a specific sport gear.

Many sports guides out there are member of sports sites like Bettor, and who give you better sports advice on which gadget to go for. You can discuss your concerns and problems through this interactive media. This media gives you opportunity to fill in on latest sports equipment trends and research which one is considered to be the best of all.

You can also get some sports help on basics and tips to improve your weakness in particular sports. Also, discussing some perfect players in the field and reading about their latest strategies to win the games can be a healthy contribution towards your understanding of that game.

This new media technology has made it really easy for us to access information we want to learn. It has simplified following sports and has made it interesting than ever before. Therefore, we see the joys of sports and everything associated with it resonating with more vibe around the world.

Each match, whether it is local or international has its special hype, there are forums discussing conditions, players, their performances and scores before and after the matches in the online world. Also critic analysis, as to which ranks should be ranked on top and which one should work on improvement are exciting to reach and understand.

All sort of media technology facilitate buying decisions of this sort, as the more you get to know each sports category the more deeper insight you would get into sports equipment. Also, watching gadget reports and reading interviews of players about the game can also broaden your knowledge base on a particular gear purchase. Thus, you can get the best gear, utilizing all such options.

sports guides, sports help

Allow your children to join a teen sports league.

2011-11-03T17:08:00.002-05:00

Joining a Teen Sport League

It is a nice opportunity for youngsters that the sports are pretty organized on domestic and local level. The schools and community centers focus sports as a healthy activity for the children, especially teens. The potential and need for a physical activity is significantly channelized through sports.

Various school and off school sports league games are arranged to facilitate sporting needs. Normally the teen agers are interested more into sports like soccer, basketball, baseball and cricket. This is due to the fact that team sports are more fun as compared to individual sports.

A sports league is usually responsible of planning and organizing sports events. They are also responsible for setting rules and regulations, making decisions and scheduling sports. It is very interesting for a teen to be a part of such organized sports. There is surely a lot of stuff to learn in this respect.

The teens though have to follow strict schedule sports trainings after school and even in the summer, but they help their physical and mental grooming and make them tougher to achieve more. Those who have a strong interest in sports can further pursue sports as a career by joining college level sports teams.

The best option available to a teen ager if he does not want to be a part of school sports league, is to join sports leagues for local community center. Though it is a bit expensive but it can definitely give a nice exposure and would bring in a lot of opportunities to excel

Similarly, at a local community center more sports options are available like bowling, swimming, golf, BMX biking etc. These however require private instruction which may be a little more expensive than your expectations.

Also, the costs can be high for sports which include expensive equipments. One should check for these costs before entering. This would ensure the feasibility and future of your child in that sport. As at community centers either the best players or the one who contribute more are given a chance to play the sports.

Furthermore one important part in sports is that is a collective or individualistic sports orientation. It means that you have to decide whether the teen ager is more comfortable in team sports or an individual sports.

Few children have more esteem and self expression needs, and they are not much inclined to collective goals. Such children should be given a chance in individual sports. The team sports can end up destroying their self esteem, or having social problems and conflicts, which they would not be able to confront.

Thus, with time entering sports at a local level has gotten very easy for teens. We are able to participate in schedule sports events easily and conveniently. With a careful decision making and proper guidelines, we can come up with more teen agers excelling in sports than ever before.

Besides all, you should have adequate amount of knowledge, so that you can not only understand what is happening in a game but also respond, with a positive strategy, in order to win and conquer the sports of your choice.

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Sports social network medium.

2011-11-03T17:02:00.000-05:00

Sports Social Networking Medium

Social networking now has become the leading and well-liked medium for the people round the globe to get connected and interact with the persons of alike interests. With a number of such sites thriving since past few years hordes of people across the world are getting acquainted with each other and interact on various topics of their interests. People, who carry equal interests in various fields or sectors also, have substantial platforms for respective fields in social networks. In line with this, social networking has also become a part of sports world. Sports Social Network is an extensive medium for sports lovers and fans to create as well as join teams to play different sports and athletic games. Sports lovers, who want to make relations with other sports bodies and get linked with them to discuss various plays and players and to update themselves regarding the happenings in sports world, can pick up various games and can share information and various content about any particular sport or about sports, in general. Here sports lovers also can challenge a team and a play along with joining and creating a team.

Sports Social Network allows sports lovers to create and customise their profiles, form their own accounts along with uploading their favourite sports videos and photographs and writing blogs on sports. Sports Social Networking sites are the wider and easier mode for sports Participants, team-mates, challengers and organizers to find each other online and communicate. Along with joining teams, people here can also join groups and can plan kinds of sports events with other group members, moreover, can hold various sport activities and find many places to play. In addition to all this, sports lovers can talk in the forums through these Sports Social Networks.

All the latest happenings in the sports world also can be known through the customised sports news on sports social networks that encompass, latest and best news about different sport teams, players, as well as any relevant news regarding sports world. Through Sports Social Network, sports lovers can get assistance to organize pick-up games, find other players and keep track of the game events, such as practices and tournaments.

Sports lovers of various sports can communicate with each other through messages, and also by sharing their individual knowledge, views, ideas pertaining to sports, through sports social networks, which carry a wide passion in the life of sports buddies. Sports social networks also include sports such as, BMX biking, rock climbing, river rafting, wake boarding and kayaking, swimming, car racing. There are many such specific sports social networking sites, which allow networking for a particular sports form.

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Sports management.

2011-11-03T16:54:00.000-05:00

Sport Management

Abstract
In this article the problem of sport management is discussed. Firstly, a brief definition to the notion of Sport management is given followed by an excurse to history. Than the background and origin of sport management is discussed the second part of the article is dedicated to the current situation and prospects of sport management. A special attention is paid to the educational sphere and career opportunities that potential employees may have in the field of sport management. Finally, the article is concluded by prospects of sport management.

Introduction
Sport management existed for quite a long period of time and it always accompanied sport as its essential part. Naturally, it had different forms and differed from the notion of sport management as it is defined nowadays but such activity is known from ancient times. At least ancient Greeks practiced such an activity and probably they may be called one of the founders of sport management. This fact proves the importance of sport and sport management for people of all times. It was and it remains to be as important for people as their health sine sport provides health for people and sport management provides effectiveness of sport for all its participants. Nowadays sport management becomes more and more important because as many other things in the modern world sport is business and consequently it needs effective management that, in its turn, demands the preparation of well-qualified specialists in this domain. At the same time sport management is not only business. As sport so sport management are social phenomena for it involves not only professionals, for whom sport is their main source of earnings and actually it is their life, but also there is a huge category of amateurs, for whom sport is just a hobby but they still need sport management to practice sport as effectively as possible. So, taking into consideration the role of sport and sport management in the modern world, I would like to discuss this phenomenon in my article and focus my attention on the notion of sport management itself, its history, and prospects for all those who either on their way or already work in this field.

The Notion and Role of Sport Management
First of all, it is necessary to start with the definition of sport management. In order to understand any phenomenon, we have to know what is implied by its definition and interpret it correspondingly. Speaking about sport management, it is possible to say that there may be different interpretation of this notion but the main point of all definitions remains practically the same, in other words it may change its form but its content, its basic principles remain the same.
On analyzing different points of view on sport management, it is possible to make a general conclusion and give certain conclusion what it actually is. On doing this, I would prefer to define sport management as follows: "Sport management is a goal-oriented social process within a sport enterprise using pragmatic self-determined goals involving the selection of appropriate strategies and provisions for directing the work of the sport enterprise, and the control of performance in an effort to meet the objectives of the organization." (Parkhouse 1996:47). Such a definition provides probably the best description of sport management and its main characteristics which permit to understand the essence of this phenomenon.
Naturally, there may be different view on sport management but it is obvious that any sport organization have to have its goals to achieve. The latter may be done only with the help of sport management that can organize all the staff of the sport enterprise and mobilize all its forces for achievement its goals. At the same time, simply to organize the work of a sport organization is not enough. It is necessary to control the fulfillment of the main tasks each department or even each person within the organization has to do.
But such a definition helps to realize what sport management is at large. At the same time it is necessary to take into consideration the position of those people who work in this field and for all those people who are currently working or are going to work in this sphere sport management is not just a profession it is rather a set of different professions, basically of administrative character which provide a person's ability to fulfill his or her duties as a sport manager.
Obviously, management remains management even in such a specific domain as sport, particularly if we speak about professional sport which nowadays is more than sport. It is a great business and it is enough to have a look at such monstrous sport associations in North America as NHL, or NBA, for instance, it will be evident what kind of business it is and how profitable it may be, naturally on the condition if the management is effective, well planned and the execution of the main tasks is thoroughly controlled. At the same time we should remember that sport or any sport organization is more than a commercial enterprise it is also a social phenomenon since very often sport plays very important role in the life of certain groups of people or even whole countries. For instance, in the ancient world, namely in Greece, any wars were forbidden during the period of the Olympic games. So the organization of the Olympic games played a significant peacemaking and consolidating role in the ancient Greek society.
Unfortunately, nowadays we can hardly find an example like this but still sport remains very important for any human society and proper organization of sport events as well as effective functioning of numerous sport enterprises remains extremely significant for people in any country in the world.

Sport Management: Education and Career Opportunities
Taking into consideration the role sport and consequently sport management play in the modern world, we can presuppose that sport organizations need a great number of well-qualified specialists that could be provided only by professional education of such specialists on the highest level. The current situation actually proves that the growing demand engenders the growing offer of sport management education which matches the basic demands to specialists in this field. But it is necessary to point out that such a trend has appeared recently, within the last fifty-sixty years.

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Encouraging children to participate in outdoor sports.

2011-11-03T16:41:00.001-05:00

The Need to Encourage Outdoor Sports

Children of today have become very close to video games and computers. Children prefer to sit in front of their computers and play games during their spare time. As such they have very less time left with them to take part in outdoor sports. Due to this situation they miss the benefits which outdoor sports can provide them.

It is important to be tech-savvy to be in the loop of today's life moving at faster pace. However, it is also vital for children to take part in outdoor sports. Sports play an important role in growth and development of child. Therefore, parents should take the right steps to encourage outdoor sports in children.

Benefits of Encouraging Outdoor Sports

Have a quick look at benefits of encouraging outdoor sports in children.

Outdoor sports are essential for physical growth and development of children

Taking part in outdoor sports help to reduce laziness in children

It is observed that children are getting addicted to TV, video game and computer. Therefore, it is necessary to encourage them to take part inoutdoor sports to reduce such type of addiction.

Outdoor sports make children active

Outdoor sport help children to stay fit and healthy

Encouraging outdoor sports in children will help to prevent disorders like obesity in children

Some children may be excellent at outdoor sports, so encouraging them to take-up sports can help to polish the hidden talent

Outdoor sports also help to improve social skills and develop team spirit

Taking part in outdoor sports help child to improve his or her confidence level

Outdoor sports also reduce stress related to studies and help children to experience free, fresh and open environment

How to Encourage Outdoor Sports?

Importance of Outdoor Sports

Tell your child the importance of outdoor sports. Let your child know about all the benefits of outdoor sports. Make them aware that they can also make career in sports. In India, favourite sport of children is cricket. However, you need to tell your children about other outdoor sports also. There are many other sports like football, hockey, basketball, tennis etc.

Proper Training

Proper training is essential to motivate children to take interest in outdoor sports. Good coaching can help to develop the hidden skills. Such training and coaching will boost child's interest in sports.

Set Examples

It is very essential to set examples before your child to encourage outdoor sports. You can tell your child about the popular sport personalities and their achievement. It is important for them to know that these sports personalities have done a lot of hard work to achieve more in life. You can also tell your child how their achievement in sports can make nation proud if they play for the country.

Reduce Study Stress

Tell your child that outdoor sport will help them to reduce stress related tostudies. Indoor activities like computer games will only spoil their eyes. Instead of sitting whole day in a room they can breathe in fresh air of playground. It will also improve their health. It will add to their enthusiasm, increase confidence level and they can concentrate on their studies properly.

Reward Achievements

Reward your child on his or her achievement in outdoor sports. This will encourage them to achieve more in sports too. Rewards will motivate them and help them to take part in sports with more interest. You may not know, your rewards may bring-up a talented sports person.

It is very necessary on part of parents to encourage children to take interest inoutdoor sports. However, parents should not force them to do so. If they are talented and interested in outdoor sports parents should give them proper coaching. Parents should also encourage children if they want to choose outdoor sports as their career.

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Shredding Stereotypes: Extreme Sports.

2011-11-03T16:31:00.000-05:00

Shredding Stereotypes: Modern Perceptions of Extreme Sports

As humanity has continued to evolve and adapt to the rise of new technology, so have our pastimes. In the late twentieth century, the combination of sport and technology began to give birth to a new breed of recreation: the extreme sports. Simple stick and ball games have changed over time with the advent of better equipment, but this new breed of sports is different in that the participants rely on specialized technology to achieve feats that the human body is ill-equipped for on its own.

Skateboarders reworked the existing technology of frictionless, high-speed travel that previously resided amongst skiers, who in turn began to notice an invasion of younger people at their resorts mounted on snowboards. The offroad motorcycle improved steadily in the last half of the century until it was capable of tolerating extreme force, giving athletes the ability to launch their two-wheeled machines off of dirt mounds and specialized metal ramps to astounding new heights and distances. Many offshoots and evolutions of old sports were enhanced by new technology, adventurous minds, and the idea that there was plenty of territory left to conquer in the area of recreation.

However, these sports came as somewhat of a shock to an older, more traditional population. Young skateboarders and surfers in the 1980s carried themselves with a radical flair, both on and off their boards, evoking both excitement and outrage from the established authorities. Snowboarders descended in droves on established ski resorts, and the patrons there reacted with disdain and sometimes outrage, regarding the new form of sport as an unwieldy and dangerous adaptation of their own. Motocross riders watched skeptically as a segment of professional racers, disillusioned with sponsorship and professional racing politics, split off from the racing scene and began performing aerial tricks on their bikes.

The general attitude of disdain evinced by a population that grew up playing more traditional sports fueled the new breed’s rebellious spirits, until many of them broke with societal norms in their quest to shock the majority with dangerous maneuvers and equally dangerous lifestyles. Their attitude of rebelliousness was arguably necessary to keep their lifestyle from being affected by the forces compelling them to “get back in line,” as it were. These deviant sports were viewed by the general public as the pastime of deviant citizens, and when one is stereotyped unjustly, they may exemplify that stereotype to validate their labeler’s suspicions, and in turn be somewhat validated by that irony.

Unfortunately, the people who stereotyped extreme sports began to see all participants of these sports as deviants, when in fact the second wave of athletes had already risen. Younger people, inspired and curious about these new sports, had begun to take up the mantle of their older, wilder counterparts. These newer participants dreamed of professionalism, of making a living doing what they loved, as other professional athletes had in the past. On their rise to such a level, however, they encountered roadblock after roadblock: laws making their sports actual crimes, facilities banning their new form of sport, resorts denying entrance to their kind. Extreme sports were once considered a harmful and destructive fad, and only recently has the general public begun to grasp the merits of both the sports and athletes involved. What was once perceived as an offensive pursuit is becoming recognized for the true spectacle it is: one of hard work, dedication, blood, sweat, and tears.

There is no doubt that these new sports can carry painful and even deadly consequences for their athletes. “I always call extreme sports good for business,” says Dr. William Roberts, president of the American College of Sports Medicine. “They produce injuries that generate more income for me than any other sport.” (Tresinowski et al. 1).

Injuries are a fact of life for professionals in extreme sports. Broken bones, bruises, even paralysis or death can result from mistimed trick or faulty equipment. Why, then, do these athletes choose to risk life and limb in order to participate? For most, the answer is simple. These sports provide a feeling that cannot be obtained in any other way. Adrenaline rushes, confidence in one’s ability, even spirituality are all attainable through extreme sports.

Perhaps it was best summed up by big wave surfer Mike Parsons, in this quote from the book Being Extreme by Bill Gutman, Shawn Frederick, and John Butman:

“The ocean for me is a totally spiritual thing. It doesn’t matter if it’s small or big surf, just being in it is the important thing. It’s my place. You can have all kinds of problems and worries, and the second I begin surfing, I’m completely focused on that and the rest of the world goes on hold. It’s almost like someone going to church. Without a doubt, the ocean is my church,” (99).

The rest of the world goes on hold for participants in extreme sports. A skilled athlete must use every ounce of concentration, muscle memory, and attention they have to complete the maneuvers they attempt, and this allows for no distractions. As a motocross rider myself, I can personally vouch for this “clean slate” feeling. All of my worries, troubles and preoccupations evaporate the instant I soar off of the first jump on a motocross track. My attention is focused entirely on the next set of obstacles; my mind makes infinite tiny decisions every second, and as I progress, its capacity to make these decisions increases. A well trained extreme sports participant does not think; they simply react, and it is perhaps this channeling of the primal “fight or flight” instinct that can make the experience so entirely rewarding for us.

Recent studies have helped to corroborate this, as they show that extreme sports athletes have higher sensation-seeking needs than the average person. Sensation-seekers are people who desire to experience new and/or novel sensations, or experiences that are not present in the course of everyday life (Malkin and Rabinowitz 34). Extreme sports provide the means to feel new things and experience unique sensations. Perhaps this is part of the reason that so many young people are drawn to them; in a life consisting mainly of school and work, in an environment where sexual urges are often repressed or discouraged, extreme sports offer young people a way to feel very alive.

These sports are also gaining athletes’ participation due to the dramatic visual effects achieved in their execution. Risking life and limb results in spectacular displays of human beings leaping huge distances in a single bound, showing new degrees of finesse and skill, and generally performing feats that were once thought to be impossible (if they were thought of at all). The consequential increased video coverage results in more viewers wanting to try new things. “People are increasingly challenging themselves with activities which place their lives totally in their own hands and moving away from safer, more regulated activities,” says James Stewart, in his article “Taking the Plunge,” which appears in the Institute of Internal Affairs Public Review.

Perhaps in a society where new laws are constantly made, old laws are rarely repealed, and people follow a somewhat set course of school, college, then work, we are simply beginning to yearn for a little chaos in our lives; or perhaps it is the feeling of controlling one’s fate that results from flying through the air or sliding down a rail that is compelling more people to try these sports. As Stewart says, “These sports have less of a competitive feel about them, in many cases the only benefits come from the warm, fuzzy feeling one gets by beating one’s previous best or just by improving one’s skills”(1). That “warm, fuzzy feeling” is synonymous with control. As an avid motocross rider and snowboarder myself, I know this firsthand; the feeling of being in control, even when traveling at forty miles an hour while twenty feet above solid ground, is intoxicating and has increased my confidence in all areas of life.

This feeling may best be described as one of sheer self reliance and independence. Team sports, on the other hand, involve more of a feeling of unity and cooperation. Often times, a player will have to sit out large parts of the actual contest, such as in football, baseball, and basketball. The notorious bench has no place in any extreme sport, however. There is no one to catch a BMX rider if he fails to clear a twenty foot dirt jump, and no one to step in for a skateboarder after he’s fallen off of a rail onto concrete. Extreme sports athletes rely entirely on their own proficiency, dedication, and natural talent. This can lend the athlete a very powerful sense of satisfaction; when a new goal is met or a new trick performed, the feeling of accomplishment is not divided amongst a group. After successfully reaching a higher level of performance, the confidence and sense of achievement gained provides more than enough motivation to continue pushing the limits.

I can testify on this point personally. Recently I participated in a large desert off-road motorcycle ride. A newcomer joined our camp this year: a twenty year old that had ridden off-road motorcycles only briefly at age twelve. He brought boots and a helmet, but no motorcycle; we had four bikes and only three riders in our group, so we let him try our bikes out. The person in question rode more than anybody else that weekend. He progressed from barely competent in the high-speed, three foot wide trails to a respectable desert rider in only a few days. After each ride, he would reminisce excitedly at the camp fire about overcoming a new obstacle, jumping over bumps at higher speeds, and learning how to take corners quickly. Each achievement boosted his confidence and fueled his desire to learn more. In this way, extreme sports can be an addictively satisfying pastime.

Perhaps it is no coincidence that the rider I met in the desert had his bike taken away at a young age after his dad crashed and injured his knee on an old off-road motorcycle. Many parents still see extreme sports as a serious threat to their children and will not allow them to participate in anything of the kind. In an article titled “Flying High, Falling Hard” from People Magazine, a mother from Wisconsin is quoted, saying: “I don’t shelter my kids, but I’m not comfortable with sports with high injury rates. I want them to be safe,” (Tresinowski et al. 64). This is a perfectly logical argument; however, not very many children are perfectly logical themselves.

Forbidding a child from participating in an extreme sport can increase their desire to do so as a form of rebellion, as I witnessed in the desert recently. That particular person was responsible. He wore safety gear and had fourteen experienced riders to coach him and watch him, but still crashed at high speeds twice over the weekend. Had he been a bit more reckless and a bit more motivated to rebel, he may have been more poorly equipped and could have been badly injured. Unfortunately, this is often the case. Young children imitating professionals they’ve seen on television without parental guidance or proper safety equipment are much more likely to sustain debilitating injuries.

A better approach is given in the same article in People by another mother, Michele Soven of Longwood, Florida. Her son is an avid wakeboarder. Wakeboarders are towed on specially designed boards behind boats, jumping the wake thrown up by the boat’s propeller and performing tricks. “From the beginning, my husband and I were very involved,” says Michele. “Every injury he got, I would find out how and why it happened, to prevent it from occurring again.” (Tresinowski et al. 66)

Her son Phillip has sustained multiple injuries, the worst of which he suffered while trying to jump onto a long, wooden rail floating in the water, an obstacle wakeboarders call a “slider.” Phillip caught his board on the edge of the obstacle, shattered his nose, and split open his face. It took 58 stitches and two reconstructive surgeries to repair the damage, but Michele never once thought of trying to take away Phillip’s wakeboarding privileges. “It’s something he loves to do, so how can I forbid it? If I did, it would be more likely that he’d do it without parental guidance,” said Michele (Tresinowski et al. 65). This is a realistic viewpoint. Extreme sports are definitely dangerous, but risk can be minimized with proper guidance, safety gear, and involvement from experienced athletes and parents alike.

Samah Boulis and Andreas Rehm, Orthopedic surgeons from the United Kingdom, share this viewpoint in their article Our Experience with Motocross Accidents in Children: Patterns of Injuries and Outcomes. The article details the types of injuries common to motocross riders, and offers the opinion that the implementation of helmet and protective gear laws would substantially minimize the injuries that occur in motocross riding and racing (1).

While most if not all public motocross facilities do require riders to wear helmets, few go beyond that basic safety. The additional stipulation that riders be required to wear protective boots, gloves, pants, jerseys, body armor, and neck braces would substantially reduce motocross related injuries. Again, I speak from my own experience; I have never broken a bone while riding motorcycles, and have ridden one thousand hours or more-always with the proper safety gear. After many high speed and high altitude crashes, I have still never suffered anything worse than cuts and scratches. My safety gear has been destroyed and replaced many times, saving my body in the process.

The public has begun to recognize that with such safety gear, extreme sports can be participated in with some degree of safety. Extreme sports were once thought of as something close to a death sentence, even with gear, but that has been shown to be untrue in recent studies of sports related injuries. The percentage of people injured in extreme sports is often the same or even smaller than the percentage of people injured in conventional sports such as football. In a list that compiled the number of injuries based on the time spent playing or participating in a sport, the only extreme sport even close to the top of the list was snowboarding, ranked third behind boxing and football. Skateboarding sits at twenty-second, and BMX biking at twenty-fourth (Tresinowski et al. 64). The myth that extreme sports resulted in more injuries than traditional sports has been effectively broken by professional researchers in a number of studies such as this one, and that data is trickling down to the public awareness with increasing momentum. Parents are now becoming aware that their child is just as likely to break a bone while being tackled by a linebacker in a high school football game as they are to break one while jumping down a set of stairs on a skateboard.

Unfortunately, the average citizen’s change of perception is not always mirrored by official groups. Signs proclaiming “No skateboarding, No bicycling, No rollerblading” are still a common sight in any city. This is perhaps best illustrated by the outright ban on skateboarding that occurred in Philadelphia’s LOVE Park, a kind of Mecca for modern skateboarders. Jeremy Nemeth’s paper Conflict, Exclusion, Relocation: Skateboarding and Public Space details this incident. Policy makers in Philadelphia decided to restructure the park in time for a citywide festival, both physically and legislatively. The legislative portion instituted an around-the-clock police patrol in and around the park to enforce a new zero-tolerance ban on skateboarding. If any citizen was caught skateboarding, they would have to pay a three hundred dollar fine and could even be imprisoned. Skateboarding became a crime (297).

This did not sit well with the resident skateboarders of Philadelphia, who assembled for a march on city call on October fifth, 2003. They accomplished nothing with their mass protests, however, so instead began a campaign. Non-profit groups formed, dedicated to regaining the right to skate in LOVE Park. After a long stalemate with city officials, a bargain was struck; the city would build a street-style skate park for skaters to use. While this satisfied some, many skateboarders continue to fight for their right to skate at LOVE Park. In a newspaper poll taken in 2004, ninety-two percent of two thousand resident Philadelphians polled supported the skateboarder’s fight to return to LOVE Park (Nemeth 304). This instance suggests that the average citizen is starting to accept extreme sports, and again illustrates that institutions are not always doing the same.

Some might argue that such laws are made due to the damage caused to public property by extreme sports. While it is true that skateboarding and BMX riding can damage public architecture, it is not true that the athletes involved are generally careless of this fact. Philadelphia city officials estimated that skateboarding had caused approximately sixty-thousand dollars worth of damage to LOVE Park. Shortly thereafter, the city gave the park an eight-hundred-thousand dollar facelift (Nemeth 301). This should adequately answer the question of whether or not the city had the funds to deal with such intense use by skateboarders. If the city could afford to spend eight-hundred-thousand dollars to update the park, they could afford sixty- thousand dollars to repair it.

However, the skateboarding community went even further to show their dedication to regaining the privilege of skating in LOVE Park. A skateboard shoe manufacturer, DC Shoes, offered to pay one-hundred-thousand dollars each year for ten years to the city for maintenance of LOVE Park if skaters were allowed to return. The city refused (Nemeth 303). How is it that city officials claimed they refused skateboarders the privilege to skate based on the damage the sport caused, yet continued that refusal even after paying roughly thirteen times the estimated cost of the damage to update the park? How can the cost of damage, at sixty-thousand dollars, when compared to one-hundred-thousand dollars a year for ten years from DC shoes, be considered a legitimate reason to continue excluding skaters from LOVE Park? It seems that not all prejudice against extreme sports has faded with time. Skaters continue to lobby for access to LOVE Park, and the city continues to refuse them (Nemeth 304).

Skateboarders have a similar complaint in Bronx, New York. Street skating is nearly a crime in the Bronx, making it very difficult for skaters to progress and practice what they love to do. “...We aren’t harming anyone, and we aren’t doing anything bad-just skateboarding,” says Chris Seise, a Bronx skateboarder (Mcdonald 1). There is a park in the area called Mulally’s, but the park requires that a skater’s parents sign a waver before they are allowed to skate (Mcdonald 1). This makes access difficult for the skaters whose parents do not approve of their child’s chosen sport, and may lead to more illegal street-skating by children under eighteen years old who cannot use the park. If the city would provide a public skate park utilizing street obstacles like benches and handrails, the unnecessary commitment of city resources to the prevention of street skating could be stopped.

Another less harmful discrimination is often perpetrated by participants of “classic” or “ball” sports, such as football, baseball, and basketball. In an issue of Sports Illustrated, a journalist asked many athletes whether they considered skateboarding to be a sport or not. “Hell no. It’s a recreational activity, like fishing,” said Blue Jays outfielder Jose Cruz (Albert and Mravic 28).

Other athletes showed similar scorn. “They’re trying to make everything a sport,” said Marlins infielder Dave Berg. “Why not grocery bagging at Albertson’s? These days they even call putt-putt golf a sport. That’s just trailer-trash activity. Sure it takes skill to do these things, but is it a sport?” (Albert and Mravic 28). It is true that many extreme sports athletes view ball-sport players similarly, and that the rivalry is far from one-sided. It all seems to be a case of conditioning. Whatever activity is done and watched in the household is often an activity the child will later consider a sport. Certainly extreme sports and team sports are both valid athletic pursuits.

As the public demand for facilities in which to practice extreme sports grows, some institutions are finally responding adequately. In the journal Parks and Recreation, Kelly Bastone cited many such instances in her article “Going to Extremes.” Kelly writes that “Directors and managers elsewhere have also received requests to go beyond team sports and provide opportunities to skate, bike, climb, paddle, ski, and even surf...” (Bastone 60). Some institutions have chosen not to take the “LOVE Park” route, and have risen above and beyond to provide safe, well-designed facilities for athletes. Many cities are feeling the demand and responding aptly.

Reno, Nevada built a whitewater rafting park on the Truckee River, the town of Steamboat Springs in Colorado runs a community ski and snowboard slope called Howlsen’s Hill, and city Officials in Chattanooga granted permission to a group of rock-climbers when asked if they could begin climbing a limestone support column on one of the city’s historic bridges (Bastone 63-65). Many cities are welcoming extreme sports athletes with open arms. Word spreads quickly in the athletes’ world, and once a town is known as a good destination for a sport, its economy reaps the benefits as adrenaline-seeking tourists spend their money while visiting (Bastone 64).

In Kelly Bastone’s article, one city stands head-and-shoulders above the rest. Oklahoma City’s director of parks and recreation, Wendel Wisenhunt, is quoted, saying “"We were hearing that our emphasis on stick-and-ball sports just wasn't serving everyone, particularly the younger population." Wisenhunt responded to the need for extreme-sports facilities in dramatic fashion; in 2005, at a cost of seven-hundred-thousand dollars, the Mat Hoffman Action Sports Park opened in Oklahoma. Oklahoma City’s director of parks and recreation worked closely with professional BMX rider and native Oklahoman Mat Hoffman to create a facility that would allow beginners to progress safely while simultaneously challenging veteran athletes (Bastone 2).

This is approach to building facilities is by far the best, as simple logic shows. A dangerous, boring skate park is a bad investment, but not many public officials have thought to go as far as to seek out the input of professional athletes to help build the courses. The necessity of doing so is obvious, as extreme-sports facilities are products of creativity and have no set boundaries, obstacles, demarcations, or other mandatory features. A football field is a football field, and can be duplicated rather easily, but skate parks, motocross tracks, and other extreme-sports arenas are unique facilities, each with their own obstacles, safeguards, unique attractions, and creators. If the city official overseeing the project acquires the help of a professional athlete to design a safe, fun, and challenging course, they are likely to see much larger attendance numbers. The local economy again feels a pleasant surge as athletes spend money in the park’s proximity, which can transform the cost of the park’s creation into a profit, in time (Bastone 63).

Another factor that is helping win over officials is the changing perception of extreme sports participants as a type of people. Skaters, particularly, were once associated with illegal activity such as drug use and vandalism; that association is now rapidly dissolving as kids and teens campaign for the addition of skate parks to their city and take pride in keeping the parks safe and legal once they are constructed (Weller 567). Once looked upon as apathetic deviants, skaters are now being respected as socially active people with strong voices in their community (Weller 568). As more and more athletes practice their sports without participating in the unsavory activities that were once associated with those sports, more non-athletes are beginning to see them as respectable public figures.

As extreme sports continue to grow in popularity, people are beginning to accept this new view of the athletes, and are realizing that extreme sports may not truly be as bad as the old stereotypes implied they were. City officials are helping to build new parks, parents are more likely to let their children choose to ride a skateboard or motorcycle, and television networks are scrambling to provide more coverage of high-flying bikers and boarders. While the public’s increased exposure to extreme sports still far from matches the popularity of older, more well-know sports, the stigma once attached to athletes participating in them is quickly eroding. For the athletes in question, this acceptance has come somewhat late, but is nevertheless deeply appreciated. No person enjoys persecution, much less so for performing difficult and skillful feats of athleticism, and extreme sports athletes are no exception. As ESPN’s X Games grows, Mountain Dew’s Dew Tour appears on network television, and other forums for extreme sports are piped into America’s living rooms, the true athletic and mental fortitude displayed in extreme sports is beginning to be so readily observable that outdated stereotypes can no longer be applied. More cities are giving in to the demand for skate parks and other facilities for extreme sports athletes to use, and more children than ever are idolizing motocross riders or snowboarders instead of baseball or basketball players. The former black sheep of the sports world are slowly becoming the main attraction.

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Visualization and sports performance.

2011-11-03T16:21:00.000-05:00

VISUALIZATION AND SPORTS PERFORMANCE

To the same extent that attending to the health needs of the body are the foundation of a good training regimen, mental focus, concentration and visualization are the keys to success. Most people are familiar with the saying that sports is 90% mental and 10% physical. Why is it then that so many athletes fail to give attention to mental training? That 90% figure should be pretty hard to overlook yet it often is. By studying trancendant athletes and sports stars, it becomes apparent that the common edge they have over competition indeed does begin mentally.

The Theory in Action

Jerry West, the NBA Logo, had such a penchant for hitting buzzer beaters he was nicknamed ‘Mr. Clutch’. In one memorable game in which his team was trailing the Knicks with a few seconds left in an NBA Finals game, West took an inbound pass and shot from 60 feet at the buzzer. Knicks guard Walt Clyde Frazier recalls thinking: “The man’s crazy. He looks determined. He thinks it’s really going in!”. Of course, it did go in, sending the crowd reeling and the game to overtime. One time, when asked about his ability to frequently hit the big shot, West revealed the root of that confidence Frazier witnessed. West explained that he had already made those shots time after time in his mind. Jerry West, like so many other legends the such as Michael Jordan, Larry Bird, Phil Jackson, Tiger Woods, Wayne Gretzky and countless others, realized the power of visualization.

What is Visualization?

Visualization is known as guided imagery, meditation, and by many other names. A popular visualization for athletes is the mental rehearsal of sporting events while ‘intending’ a desired outcome. Amazingly, research has revealed that visualization can actually enhance performance to nearly the same extent as physical practice. A study conducted by Dr. Blaslotto at the University Of Chicago is an intriguing example.

The goal of Dr. Blaslotto‘s study was to determine the effects of visualization on sports performance. As a performance measure for this experiment, the researchers chose the free throw percentage of a group of basketball players. First, to establish a basis for the study, the current free-throw success rate of each of the subjects was tested and recorded. Three groups were then established, and the athletes were assigned to one of the groups at random. After 30 days of testing and retesting, the results were as follows:

The third group, who neither physically practiced or visualized shooting free-throws, showed no increase in percentage.

The first group which physically shot free-throws for an hour daily, collectively improved thier free-throw shooting by 24%.

The second group, which practiced daily by visualizing shooting and making free-throws, collectively improved thier free-throw shooting by a shocking 23% without having physically shot a basketball!

Another similiar study was done by the Cleveland Clinic Foundation exploring the effects of visualization on muscle strength. The results of that study also astonishingly revealed increases to muscle strength through visualization, further reinforcing the fact that mental training is actually as impactful a tool in performance enhancement as physical training.

How does Visualization work?

With each experience, a neural pathway is formed. Neural Pathways in short, are clusters of neurons in the brain that work together to create a memory or a learned behavior. Dr. Blaslotto explained, “As your brain conceives of an act, it generates impulses that prompt neurons to ‘perform’ the movement being imagined by transmitting those impulses from the brain to the muscles.” This in turn creates a habit, or neural pathway in the brain, programming your body’s actions as if you physically performed the activity.

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Youth sports: life lessons.

2011-11-03T16:13:00.000-05:00

Life Lessons Learned through Youth Sports

Playing sports as a child can be one of the more enjoyable memories of childhood. If you ask your son or daughter what they love the most about playing sports, they will likely tell you that playing sports is fun. If you ask adults, while you may hear that it was fun, odds are you will also get a list of the things that they learned through their participation in youth sports. Some benefits can be seen, others felt, while many occur without even being noticed. The list is long, but just to name a few:

Confidence: When players experience some degree of success and personal improvement, they can feel good about their performance. They can see that their skills and abilities improved significantly and they performed well. This success leaves players with a feeling of strong self-confidence that can carry over in life and in all they do.

Improved Socialization: Sports provide an opportunity for children to learn to interact and function within a society. Players meet a variety of kids from different backgrounds. Kids play on the same team, wear the same uniform, and share the same objectives and experiences. Sports provide kids with an opportunity to meet, and develop close relationships with their peers.

School Improvement: Students who participate in organized sports tend to work harder in school and have greater educational and occupational aspirations. Sports help kids learn to distinguish between effort and ability. Sports increase self-discipline and the awareness of the value of preparation because kids can see the difference in their performance.

Teamwork: One of the most valuable aspects of playing a team sport is learning and understanding the value of teamwork. On a team, kids learn about cooperation, camaraderie and give-and-take. They learn to work together to achieve a common goal. Teamwork also strengthens the idea of good sportsmanship as kids learn to support teammates who do well or struggle.

Improved Self Esteem: Childhood can be a difficult time, with many kids experiencing low self-esteem at one time or another. Giving and receiving encouragement and respect from teammates can help children feel good about themselves.

Character Development: You may think that a sport is just a game. But soccer, for example involves more than just kicking a ball up and down the field. When your young child plays, he or she begins to develop their character in new ways. Work ethic, time management skills and conflict management abilities can all be developed and strengthened while on the field.

Competitive Experience: Children can gain experience with a competitive environment through involvement in sports, which will help them navigate the challenges and rewards of competition in other areas of life. Kids learn how to win, and perhaps more importantly, how to lose. This experience will benefit children during their education, as well as in their careers as adults.

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