The Journey Of Sporting Development

The Journey Of Sporting Development

By Daniel Ferguson

The Journey

Why develop? Why grow? Why strive for progress? Because the journey of development is a beautiful thing. Seeing where you started, when you first made that jump, to then seeing where that lead you, is a beautiful thing. The process of being a better you everyday, is a beautiful thing.

Young Terry...

Young Terry always wanted to be good at tennis. "Good" to him reflected being able to hit the tennis ball with power, hold a rally and serve over the net. When he first began he would miss the ball, hit the net and lose every point against his older brother. Why did he want to develop? Because his older brother was awesome at Tennis and competed for his local club: he wanted to make him proud. Young Terry's parents fortunately paid for him to get weekly lessons. It took time, many low moments and barriers to overcome for him to develop to where he wanted to be, but he eventually became what people would call 'decent'. 

Young Terry now likes to look back at when he first started and is proud of how far he has come and developed. He can now take a point or two off his brother and he plays a lot with his friends. Now Terry never got to the same level as his brother, but on his own journey, he continued to improve: because he loved the journey of development.

What is development?

A process that results in growth, progress, improvement and positive change to an existing environment or individual 

Why develop?

Development is very important, here's why:
  • If a young child is given freedom and facilities to develop, avoiding early specialisation, they are likely to be prevented from burning out and over-training. 
  • If an athlete is appropriately challenged and focuses on the thrill of the journey of development, they are more likely to continue in sports, increasing retention rates
  • Life skills will be gained such as social skills, patience, resilience, consistency and much more via a journey of development, not just important in the sporting world, but in the working world too
  • We all have potential, we all have a chance to be better each day, why not see how far we can take that every now and then?

How to develop

Now you may know what it is and why you should or want to develop, but how can we? Here are some pointers:
  • Deliberate Practice: making sure you are constantly putting effort into developing by consistently practising with a certain intention, for example, you want to develop your dart throwing? Everyday for a certain amount of time, practice the throw and practice a certain element of that throw (i.e, body positioning)
  • Increase the challenge point: ensure things are challenging: let's say you notice you are beginning to get very good at a skill, what can you do to make it more challenging and progress this skill even further? For example, you have got good at passing in Rugby, can you now practice but with pressure from an opponent?
  • Time: give yourself time, the journey of development never ends and takes a lot of time, remain patient in your practice and build your skills and abilities over time, you don't become a master overnight...

I hope you have enjoyed this blog about development in sport, feel free to reach out if you liked it or have something to share about the journey of sporting development



Find Daniel Ferguson on:
LinkedIn: Daniel Ferguson
Instagram: @danferguson_sp
Twitter: @DanFergusonSP

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