Monthly Archive for June, 2023
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In the past month, Italian soccer teams have lost 3 club finals, one U20 World Cup final and one Nations League semifinal. There is no relation between these teams, different opponents, different coaches and obviously different players. However, they are united by failing to make it over the final hurdle.
Italian soccer has failed to qualify for the last two World Cups. That is 8 years, to which must be added the next 4 years of waiting. 12 years is a long time, a child has time to be born becoming a teenager without having yet seen Italy play the most important tournament in the world. It is said that soccer is the most important thing among the least important. However, one only has to remember the enthusiasm of the Neapolitans for winning the Scudetto and the Argentines for winning the last World Cup to understand that it is a generator of happiness.
If as Eduardo Galeano wrote, “Playing without fans is like dancing without music,” I wonder if in such a selfish and narcissistic age, in which every personal sigh generates a story on instagram, the footballers who played such important matches are really aware of this role of the fans and if in their souls they think they have done even a little bit more to achieve a different result.
This blog is for parents to illustrate how important it is for their children from the earliest years of their other lives to be outdoors and to be able to move freely so that they can develop the motor skills and intelligence necessary for their development.
In the early years of life a young person needs to learn basic movements, and the purpose of movement education is to teach boys and girls in a fun way to move effectively and efficiently, in a safe environment and with an awareness of what they are doing. Achieving this is as important to a young person’s education as the acquisition of language and mathematical literacy.
Specifically from the ages of three to six, children must acquire the basic motor skills (e.g., bending over legs) that are the foundation of all physical activity and from the combination of which arise the main skills of any sport. These are the years in which the following skills should be developed: stepping (gait), bending over legs, moving quickly forward, bending, pushing, pulling, twisting and twisting. Complex movements are composed of these different basic elements, and the child’s actions will be appropriate if he can integrate the different motor sequences with each other. For example, jumping is based on the movement of bending over the legs, while in throwing a Frisbee, pushing and twisting are added to this movement. In every sporting gesture, even the most complex, these basic motor patterns can be traced. Therefore, if a young person has not mastered them, his further motor learning may be impaired or reduced.
It is not, however, just a matter of teaching basic movements in a literal way, since any form of schematization results in oversimplification of motor reality and reduction of movement experiences. It is therefore necessary to provide children with opportunities to experience the widest range of behaviors. For example, from the age of two they can already be taught to ride inline skates, ride a bicycle or climb if parents are willing to teach their children how to do so. This finding highlights the decisive role that adults, in this case parents, play in fostering or hindering motor development, including the psychological and social implications associated with it. Overprotected children who is three years old do not get on the swing by themselves or walk little because it is more comfortable to carry them in a stroller or leave them at home to watch television are examples of how one can daily develop reduced motor skills and develop a sedentary lifestyle.
It can be said that in the course of development the child is the main architect of the construction of its cognitive processes whether they are typically motor, cognitive-affective or social. Underlying this developmental path are certain factors that constitute the causes of development. The first refers to the maturation of the nervous system, which is necessary for more advanced forms of autonomy to take hold. However, this is not the only factor since acquired experience and social interaction represent two other equally necessary developmental factors.
In the first case we refer to the actions and repetitions of actions, the exercises that the child performs independently on the environmental reality in which he lives and the perception of awareness that results from them. In this way he becomes acquainted with the properties of objects, experiences them, and relates them to himself, thus enriching his knowledge of the world and how to relate to it. Think of the different ways of getting on and then off, for example from a sofa, which the child enacts through a large number of repetitions. He thus rehearses basic motor patterns, each time differently from the one before, spontaneously makes them up in different sequences, and through repetition comes to develop a specific motor skill. This learning process can be accelerated through social interaction, which occurs essentially through language. In this regard, interaction with an adult who observes the child in this action will be positive if it is aimed at encouraging him and ensuring that he performs in a safe environment. It will become negative and, therefore, hinder the experience if the adult intervenes to inhibit the action or make it too easy. Consequently, the opportunity for experience and social interactions represent the context within which the child performs his actions
The decisive causal factor for development is the balance factor, which delineates an active rather than a passive child who changes through his or her relationship with the environment. This factor must be understood as achieving a balance between external perturbations and the child’s activity. It thus becomes more evident why the physical and social environment represent settings in which to exercise one’s actions. Balance and consequent adaptation are achieved through the processes of assimilation and accommodation. Assimilation consists of making one’s own the elements of novelty that enrich one’s motor and mental patterns; in doing so, data from experience are incorporated according to existing internal structures. Accommodation, on the other hand, is the process by which internal structures are changed by external experiences, allowing the child’s developmental processes not so much to be enriched by new elements but to develop to higher developmental levels. Thus, assimilation is a process of preservation and enrichment of skills while accommodation represents novelty in the developmental process.
In conclusion, the child’s motor evolution occurs through improved adaptation to the environment. The child evolves from primary movements through the maturation of the nervous system, experience and social interaction, which constitute the ground on which the balance factor intervenes. This factor allows the child to act on the environment through the motor and psychological skills he or she possesses but at the same time these same skills are modified according to situations.
Serbia is a country of 6.8 million people. In terms of population, it is about the size of northern Italy. but it is surprising how many elite sports talents this nation has.
In fact, Serbia currently has the best tennis and basketball players in the world. Novak Djokovic has returned to being No. 1, while Nikola Jokic has become an NBA champion with his team.
Expanding the comparison, Serbia, with a population of less than 7 million, currently has 4 tennis players in the top 57 of the ATP rankings. The United States, with a population of 333 million, has 9 in the top 57.
In the NBA, Serbia currently has 5 players: Nikola Jokic, Bogdan Bogdanavic, Boban Marjanovic, Aleksej Pokusevski, and Nikola Jovic. If one includes players with Serbian citizenship or or origin, the list also widens to Luka Doncic, Goran Dragic, Nikola Vucevic, Cedi Osman, and Deni Avdija.
If one widens the look to other countries of the former Yugoslavia, Slovenia, with a population of 2 million, finished fourth in basketball at the last Olympics. Croatia, with a population of less than 4 million, has two tennis players in the top 25: Marin Cilic and Borna Coric. That is an incredible amount of talent produced in this relatively small region of the world.
Purcell R, Henderson J, Tamminen KA, et al. Starting young to protect elite athletes’ mental health. British Journal of Sports Medicine 2022, 57:439-440.
New published research summarizing the issue of mental health among elite young athletes has highlighted these rather alarming findings.
- Mental disorders are a major health condition affecting young people globally.
- About half of all common mental disorders emerge before the age of 18.
- Fifty-eight percent of mental disorders in adolescents go undetected and untreated.
- Young elite athletes show significant stigma toward mental health and negative attitudes toward help-seeking, including fear of the consequences of seeking help in an elite sport setting.
- Published research on mental health in elite sport has tripled in the past two decades. In contrast, only a few cross-sectional studies have studied elite athletes as young as 12 to 18 years old.
- 16.9% currently suffer from at least one mental health disorder, with a lifetime prevalence of 25.1%. Self-reported mental health symptoms among youth athletes range from 6.7% for anxiety to 9.5% for depression,
- Girls/women are significantly more likely than boys/men to report symptoms or be clinically assessed as having psychopathology.
- Young athletes who participate in individual sports report greater symptom severity than those who participate in team sports.
- There is an urgent need for solid research development on this topic.
- Young elite athletes may face a range of life circumstances that increase their risk of developing mental disorders, including developmental “milestones” such as puberty, parenting, navigating more complex interpersonal relationships, engaging with social media as “digital natives,” and negotiating aspects of their identity formation, such as gender, culture or sexuality. Added to sui are those related to placing emphasis on sports achievements.
Novak Djokovic won again and is now the most successful tennis player in the history of this sport with 23 Slam tournaments. There were thoughts of a handover between Alcaraz and Djokovic, but the former has been under so much competitive pressure that he has been stuck with cramps all over his body.
36 years and not feeling it, he may have several reasons to keep playing.
Passion for the game - Djokovic may feel fulfilled only when he is on the court. Passion for the game could be one of the main motivations for continuing to compete.
Personal challenge - He is a planetary-level athlete, a serial winner, this continues to be a strong motivation to continue to challenge himself and constantly improve. Exceeding his own limits.
Setting new records - He may now aim to win the “Golden Slam” (winning the four Grand Slam tournaments and Olympic gold in Paris) in 2024.
Be inspirational - As one of the most successful players in tennis, Djokovic may feel motivated to inspire others with his game and victories. Positive role model for young people, encouraging them to pursue their dreams.
This year’s Champions League final will be played by two teams, one of which is given as the underdog, Inter, over the other, Manchester City. The reasons given for formulating this choice are many, not the least of which is that it is led by a coach who has been dominant on the world stage since several years such as Pep Guardiola.
In this situation, Inter Milan is part of that category called underdog, defined as a team that is at a disadvantage and is expected to lose. Stories of underdogs are full of mythology, cinema, and sports. So why should we be drawn to David vs. Goliath or Rocky Balboa, Cremonese reaching the final stages of the Coppa Italia or Leicester winning the English championship? Why root for Inter Milan?
First, for identification, this is essentially true for fans of this team, who have a strong pre-existing affiliation. Still others have a less intense connection but will support it as an Italian team. There is, however, a third category of people who will root for Inter because it is the underdog team, one may choose to sympathize, for the underdog team with which one has no prior affiliation. Since the success of underdogs is by definition unexpected, this can increase the excitement of rooting for them. In other words, people may root for Inter for the simple reason that unexpected victories are more emotionally satisfying than expected victories; conversely, expected defeats are not as hard to bear as unexpected defeats. Being on the side of those who might get a less likely outcome is personally more emotional than choosing the opposite side.
However, the first ones who will have to manifest this mentality are the Inter players and staff. They must be their own first supporters. I conclude with a thought from Marcello Lippi upon his arrival at Juventus: “In my career I have never won anything, you have not won anything for ten years. It will be time for things to change. We will be in front of a big set table, where every cup is a dish. No one will be more hungry than we are.”
The saying “A winning team does not change” will certainly not apply to this year’s Napoli, which dominates the Italian league. It has been official for days that Spalletti will no longer be its coach and it is likely that some players will leave the team.
These are hard facts to comprehend for those who have the idea that the goal of an absolute level club is to constantly improve. Thus, to attract in the immediate future new resources, serving the attraction represented by the enhancement of the roster of players that has been there during the championship and the quality of the work done by the staff led by the coach.
This concept has, however, been challenged by the coach’s departure and the fact that the possible transfer of important players such as Kim min-jae, Zielinski, Osimhen and Kvaratskhelia is being discussed.
Spalletti praised his players for their progress in the Champions League. “The quality of our soccer allowed us to stand out,” he said. “It was motivating for the players because they were facing a deserving Champions League finalist and they had to show everything we had achieved during the season.” He left, though, and the explanations certainly involve the stress accumulated during the championship, having received the confirmation via e-mail with a pec, the extreme difficulty represented by repeating this victory. My impression is that the necessary was not done to keep him in the lead of Naples.
The joy and enthusiasm of the fans will continue for a long time, as is only right when such a success is achieved decades after the victories won by Maradona’s team. If before today such an outstanding achievement had only been achieved thanks to the role played in Napoli by a sports legend, one cannot help but show gratitude to today’s team that has made it possible to unite the present with the past, giving a glimpse of what the future could look like.
The first games of the new season will be experienced with this state of mind, and it will be very positive for the city and its fans. The players and the entire team, however, will have to give thanks for this enthusiastic support and make these emotions their own by transferring them into the game, showing that they want to continue to nurture them through their desire to continue to amaze the world.
While it is true that the result of a single race does not define the value of an athlete or the success of a career; it does happen, however, that athletes often cannot handle the pressure they experience when they are favored and consequently worsen their performance and lose the race.
They often bring us the problems themselves. We work hard to achieve a high standard of performance and when we have achieved it, we are afraid of the idea of being the favorite, therefore, we worsen the performance level to get out of this stressful situation. But the story doesn’t end there, because a minute after losing we get depressed or angry with ourselves for not delivering the performance we are capable of.
In essence we have gone out of our way to be dissatisfied because we have not had the courage to do what we know how to do knowing that it may not be enough to win.
The solution would be simple: focus on your commitment and performance rather than the final outcome.
The problem is that one would like to have the certainty of success, which a priori is not possible to have. If you do not accept this rule, competitive stress takes over caused by the race, which is the external trigger and determines your inability to compete at your best.
What to do:
Breathing and relaxation: Practice deep breathing techniques and muscle relaxation to calm the mind and body. You can use slow, deep breathing exercises before, during and after the race to reduce anxiety.
Build your pre-race routine: Develop a pre-race routine to help you focus and relax. This routine can include activities such as listening to music, visualization, or stretching.
Talk to a sports psychologist: A professional can help you identify your specific concerns and provide you with personalized strategies for managing performance stress.
Accept and learn from defeats: Defeats are part of sports. Accept the outcome, analyze what went wrong and learn from mistakes. Use these experiences as opportunities for personal growth and development.
Remember that every athlete experiences stress differently, so it is important to find the strategies that work best for you.
Human beings were born to run, running is a sport, all should be sport persons. This syllogism allows us to illustrate a discovery that has brought new light on the relevance of movement to human beings and their evolutionary development. It has already been 20 years since the results of research were published in 2004 in Nature, one of the most prestigious scientific journals, stating, on the basis of fossil findings dating back 2 million years, that endurance running played a significant function in the development of our species. No other primate has, in fact, developed this skill; one of the evidences lies in the long tendons connected to short muscle bands that are able to generate force economically, thus saving 50 percent of the metabolic cost of running.
The hypothesis is that Homo developed resistant running to hunt animals and to carry off prey carcasses quickly. Bramble and Liebermann, authors of this study, argue that resistant running made possible a diet rich in fat and protein responsible in Homo for the development of a large body, small gut, large brain and small teeth. Today we know that in our modern society endurance running is no longer necessary to secure daily food for ourselves and our clan, it has changed function: for many it is a ‘recreational and wellness-promoting activity, while for others it has turned into a competitive sporting event. We must not forget, however, that millions of years ago it was one of the sparks that formed the basis for the evolution of the human being we are now.
Movement and running have not only been the foundation of the development of the human species but play an equally important role in the development of each individual human throughout his or her life span. Observing children, one can easily see that they rarely walk and much more often run. Children are tireless athletes, from the time they crawl they are in constant motion, going in and out of rooms, getting on and off sofas and armchairs, they love to throw themselves on the floor and get back up, they like to go on swings because feeling the speed is exciting. From the time one is born until the first three years of life, one is faced with a continuous evolution toward physical and psychological autonomy, culminating in knowing how to run and move in environments where there are no adults. This conquest of the world happens only because of young children’s ability to be able to move more and more freely and in knowing that when they return to adults, they, are there and continue to love them even though they had moved away.
The adult’s task is, therefore, to foster this development by providing emotional support to the child but also by teaching the child how to learn and how not to get hurt. In these moments, the adult acts as a teacher who educates the child to take risks that he can control. He or she may, for example, teach a child to ride a bicycle on two wheels as early as age two; this activity involves the risk of falling, and the parent must minimize this eventuality. This mode can be applied to any other attempt at autonomy in movement; the adult who forbids and yells for fear that the child will hurt himself may, on the contrary, inhibit his motor development and help him develop a sense of fear attached to any autonomous action he takes. In addition, those children who are left alone to watch television for hours or who are still being carried in a stroller at age four are examples of how a sedentary lifestyle can develop. Moreover, it must be equally clear to the adult that any new learning requires, on both sides, time and dedication; one explanation or a few rehearsals is not enough; one must insist and stay with the child until he or she has learned.
The adult must, therefore, also be educated and not left alone, since he is often afraid that the child will fall and hurt himself and does not know that this attitude of his is contrary to the natural maturation of a function, such as walking. In fact, children learn through dozens and dozens of attempts, and it is enough to observe how much joy they express when they are able to stand on their own feet or take their first steps, to understand that they are composing the first simple sentences of what can be defined as motor literacy, of which sports champions represent the culmination and finest point of evolution that human beings can achieve.
Movement is, however, not only the basis of development in the early years of life but also enables the young person, child or adolescent, to manifest those specific skills that will accompany him or her throughout their entire existence and form the motivational basis for continuing to be a sportsperson in adulthood. The skills identified are the following: deriving pleasure from motor or sports action, moving with thought, knowing how to take calculated risks, and knowing how to live in a group.
Taking pleasure from movement or sports action is extremely important as it fulfills one of the crucial motivations, which is to learn to get excited and expend energy through movement. Developing a physically active lifestyle, on the other hand, is a primary component of human life that in recent decades, unfortunately, has been waning, pushing humans toward an increasingly sedentary lifestyle. Conversely, motor activity as well as sports make it possible to recover a physically active lifestyle, and for this to happen, it is necessary that the activity be carried out with respect for everyone’s motivation and skills and be included in the school curriculum.
Moving thinking, on the other hand, requires learning to serve one’s thoughts during the activity being performed. Teaching young people to be psychologically autonomous is the goal of every educator. This attitude must be built up from the time they are children by having them perform exercises in which they have to make decisions, reinforcing not only the correctness of their choices but especially the ability to make choices. Therefore, young people must not only be taught to act in accordance with the instruction they have received, but situations must also be created in which they are confronted with motor or sports problems that they will have to solve.
Moving with thought is well related to knowing how to take calculated risks. It means being confident in one’s motor skills and being convinced that one knows how to deal with a given motor situation because one has done it before or because it is similar to others already known. At the same time it implies being aware not to face situations that one considers too difficult or that may put one’s physical safety at risk. The young person through motor and sports experience, which should have been and is rich and differentiated, learns to decide quickly what/how to do but also to stop.
The last dimension to be developed concerns the ability to live in a group. Feeling part of a certain social context, the school group, the sports group or the group of friends is one of the primary needs of every young person, and sharing one’s motor experiences with other peers plays an important formative function. Only living in a group teaches one to respect its rules, to cooperate even in a competitive environment, to learn to put one’s personal goals before those of the team/group, and, in more global terms, teaches one to live in one’s social context by playing a positive role toward oneself and others.
In conclusion, underlying the establishment of Homo Sapiens was the ability to develop the ability to run and thus to hunt prey by chasing them for long periods and to move rapidly in arid and hostile environments. This allowed the spread and development of human beings as we know them today. Moreover, each individual repeats in part the history of humankind and through the process of motor literacy becomes autonomous and copes with the world around him. In this area adults, play an essential role, they either promote this process of motor and psychological independence or they can if not inhibit it at least impair it.
In summary, let us not forget that man was born to run even though unfortunately we live in the age of the stroller, play stations and social media.
Bramble, D., e Liebermann, (2004). Endurance running and the evolution of Homo. Nature, 432, 345-352.
