The middle school years can feel like a turning point in youth sports—and for good reason.
Between ages 11 and 14, kids go through rapid physical growth, emotional swings, and increasing social pressure. Competition starts to matter more. Comparison becomes louder. And what once felt playful can suddenly feel heavy.
For parents and coaches, this stage often brings big questions:
How much should we push? When should we hold back? And how do we support growth without burning kids out?
In Episode 18 of Inside the Wave, host Perry Wirth, owner of Utopia Martial Arts, continues the youth athletic development series with returning guest Chandler Lewis, Certified Mental Performance Consultant and competitive swim coach. Together, they break down what’s really happening during the middle school years—and how adults can help kids navigate this phase with confidence and clarity.
Part 3 of the Youth Development Series
This episode is the third installment in a four-part series focused on athletic development and competition at different ages:
- Ages 3–6: Play-First Foundations
- Ages 7–10: Skills & Mini Milestones
- Ages 11–14: Middle School Development (this episode)
- Ages 15-18+: High School & Beyond (upcoming)
Each stage builds on the last, and the middle school years often determine whether kids continue enjoying sport—or begin drifting away from it.
Understanding the Middle School Athlete (Ages 11–14)
At this age, development becomes uneven and unpredictable. Kids may grow taller before they grow stronger. Coordination can temporarily decline. Confidence can fluctuate daily.
Chandler and Perry frame this stage using the PIES framework:
- Physical: Growth spurts, awkward movement, changing strength levels
- Intellectual: Better understanding of rules, strategy, and cause-and-effect
- Emotional: Increased sensitivity, frustration, and self-awareness
- Social: Peer approval, comparison, and group placement matter more
Recognizing these shifts helps parents and coaches respond with patience instead of pressure.
Athletic Development Without Rushing the Process
One of the biggest mistakes during ages 11–14 is pushing training volume or intensity too early.
In this episode, Perry and Chandler emphasize:
- Skill quality matters more than load or speed
- Strength training should focus on movement patterns and control, not max effort
- Athletic development should feel challenging, but still fun
- Kids don’t need to specialize yet to succeed later
The goal isn’t to create the strongest or fastest 12-year-old—it’s to build a capable, confident athlete who still wants to train at 16.
Competition, Confidence, and Controllables
As competition becomes more serious, kids begin tying results to identity. That’s where adult guidance matters most.
This episode introduces practical tools for competition readiness, including:
- Focusing on process goals instead of outcomes
- Teaching kids to control what they can: effort, preparation, mindset
- Helping athletes reflect on performance without harsh self-judgment
- Normalizing nerves, mistakes, and emotional swings
One key takeaway: kids already know how they performed. What they need from adults is support, not post-game coaching.
What Kids Need From Parents During This Stage
One of the most powerful moments in the conversation centers on what kids actually want from parents before and after competition.
The answer is surprisingly simple:
- Let coaches coach
- Avoid analyzing results
- Offer reassurance and consistency
- Ask reflective questions like, “What are you proud of?”
Statements like “I love watching you compete” help remove pressure while reinforcing effort and enjoyment.
Why This Episode Matters
The middle school years are where long-term athletic values are formed.
How kids experience sport at this stage influences:
- Confidence under pressure
- Willingness to take risks
- Relationship with training and authority
- Whether they stay active long-term
Handled well, this phase builds resilience and independence. Handled poorly, it can lead to burnout or disengagement.
Chandler’s perspective—grounded in both coaching and sports psychology—offers parents and coaches a roadmap for guiding kids through this critical stage with intention.
Where to Listen
🎧 Stream Episode 18 Now:
Connect with Chandler Lewis
- Instagram: @chandlerlewis2323
- Swim Program Contact: [email protected] – official Walter Schroeder Aquatic Center email
- Championship Mind Website: championshipmind.com
About Utopia
At Utopia Martial Arts, we believe sports are more than competition—they’re tools for personal growth. Our programs help kids of all ages build confidence, focus, and resilience both on and off the mats. Inside the Wave extends that mission, bringing real conversations with coaches and experts who share practical ways to help kids thrive in sport and in life.
Join the Conversation
If you’re raising or coaching a child between ages 11 and 14, this episode will help you navigate competition, growth, and confidence with a long-term perspective.
Listen now, share with another parent or coach, and stay tuned for the final episode in this series covering high school athletes and beyond.
Transcript
Perry: All right. Welcome to inside the wave. I am with Chandler Lewis for our third episode of our four part series on working and parenting child athletes through different age groups and phases through life. So he started at three to five years old and this episode, we’re going to, uh, 11 to 14. which is fun, it’s like those middle school years. What were your middle school sports? Were you swimming already?
Chandler: I think I quit everything in eighth grade. I was playing basketball at a pretty high level, tennis and swimming.
Perry: You’re tall, I feel like that works for you.
Chandler: Yeah, like I did a you. Okay. And I tried to balance between basketball and swimming. But it was eating. Obviously, my skills were getting neglected in basketball. Because I wasn’t my main goal was to go to some practice. So my coaches in basketball were like, you need to come to more practices. And then my coaches in swimming were like, you need to come to more practices, you’re suffering. And so it was like, I’m trying to manage the two, but you can’t really manage the two at a high level.
Perry: Yeah, it’s tough, especially when you get to those sports that do have year-round Athletics like club teams and whatnot like I played football and football didn’t really have that It’s like you have your football season and then it’s like lifting in the offseason, right? I wrestled wrestling is more than now, but it wasn’t that big back then who’s uh If it was your choice, what would have you did you choose was it your choice it was definitely my choice I mean the reason why I chose it because I was better at something than I was basketball Like was it your choice or do your coaches make you choose? It was definitely my choice.
Chandler: Because I loved practice for swimming. I loved to train. I liked going to swim practice. I liked basketball practice, but I enjoyed swimming more. And at some point, I knew that I would have to make a decision to choose one. Um, and I was like, fuck this. Yeah. I’m playing basketball anymore. You know, I, I slowly got built out of the rotation and I was playing less minutes and I was like, fuck this. Yeah.
Perry: Um, so then you wanted to go start swimming at Schrader or you, you were, you just continued swimming there?
Chandler: So I swam for a club that was in the Cedarbrook region called Ozaki Aquatics. Okay. Which is, has numerous of athletes at the high level. Like they’re very, they’re very good as well. Um, and then I switched to Schrader my freshman year in high school.
Perry: Nice and then you’re a a bulldog. Yeah, I was yeah, very cool So I’m excited to dig into this. We’re gonna do like similar format that we did last time We’re gonna go through our acronym that we use at our Academy pies physically intellectually emotionally and socially to understand where the kids are at and then we’ll talk about athletic building blocks how to approach building athletes at that age and then dig into competition, how to support them in competition, tips for the parents, things like that. So let’s go to pies first and our first one, P physical. Man, I feel like kids at this age, they are like relearning their bodies because they are man awkward, like they don’t realize like how big they’re getting, how fast they’re growing. It’s changing at lightning speed and you kind of get that. Awkwardness. What are your thoughts?
Chandler: Yeah. I mean, for you’re taller than me.
Perry: Were you like, were you like shooting up or you’re already super tall guy at like eighth grade was my growth spurt, man.
Chandler: Like, and it was like awkward and you know, like I had like hit pain and, um, I see that similar cycle with like a lot of boys that I coach. Yeah. And on the opposite side, I see with a lot of girls, like you’ll see a 12 year old girl that’s like six foot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then they’re next to like five foot boys, 4’11 boys. Then eventually you go back at 14, that boy is 6’1″.
Perry: I was just talking this to one of our girls at our academy is a wrestler at Webster. And I was talking to the parents around just like how big of a difference kids are at that age. Like kids that haven’t started going through that transition are still like so small. And then there’s ones that are like starting to be strong and like put on height and put on weight and put on muscle.
Chandler: Yeah, that’s what, I mean, that’s for, for me as a coach, it’s like the pre puberty, like time, you really don’t know what’s going to happen. You really, you really can’t like, you can’t put a lot of stock into an athlete at 11 years old, pre puberty. We have no clue, especially on the boy’s side. It’s like late developers or happen all the time on the girl’s side. Um, there’s, you can kind of get a sense in their earlier age, like at this 11, 12, you can really get a sense that this kid has great skills, even though they’re pre-puberty, you can tell that the kid is gonna develop. On the boys, it’s hard to kind of judge.
Perry: Now as a parent and coach, supporting kids that are in this super awkward stage as they’re going through it, the big things I look at is essentially, creating drills for them to relearn how to use their body, right? Like working on balance, working on posture, jumping, landing, acceleration, just like movement. What sort of stuff do you like working on with this age group, knowing how clumsy they can be because they’re so like just awkward at this stage?
Chandler: Yeah. I mean, in the water, it’s, for us, it’s still skill development. Like, it has to be skill development. And those building blocks of those skills in the water are, like, critical at this age. Most people in the swimming community think the opposite. Like, it’s time to train. Like, we need to increase their engine. And I’ve always felt, and our club has felt, that this is more of the age of building skills. Because if you have foundational skills at 16, 17, 18, you can really train. Yeah, for sure. And at 11, 12, there’s kids throughout the country that are doing enormous amount of volume of work, and they will get, like, they get fast, very fast. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I think about long-term development, and I think skill-based work is super important. So if we can build foundational skills in the water, you know, like long term, what’s going to happen? We don’t know, but we know that skills are going to be better off than like, let’s build the engine. When it comes to like outside the water, like my experience with kids outside the water, it’s like the 13, 14 year old boys are so awkward to even walk.
Perry: And man, you have to say it’s like redeveloping all those movement patterns. It’s really funny. There’s always this meme that goes around. It’s like you want to see the best squad in the world. You know, watch a two year old squat. It’s amazing. But man, you want to see the worst squad in the world? Ask a boy in puberty to do a squat. It is the most atrocious thing. Like, and if you put weight on that, they’re going to get crushed and die. Like, man, like toes are super splayed out, like heels are flying off the floor, super hunchbacked. I’m like, Oh God, we have to retrain all your movement patterns because You’re in a new body.
Chandler: Yeah. I start, I used to start now, uh, in my position, I don’t, I don’t really coach kids in the weight room anymore. We go to outside sources, but I used to take on kids at 13 years old, just strength train. And that was the biggest thing with the boys. It’s like, they want to throw on weight. They want to get to the next movement.
Perry: You get a PVC pipe.
Chandler: And it was really important to me that I’m like introducing movement patterns that are solid and good. for the same idea that we do in the water for long-term development.
Perry: I haven’t remembered. Cedarburg was actually… Cedarburg football, I think it was pretty cutting edge back when I was in high school. I don’t know what they were doing. They must have been going to seminars out on the east and west coast to get the latest and greatest, but we had a lot of good, you know, we had a lot of GPP style training back then when we were doing like Tabata’s and hit workouts, but most of it was just body weight stuff. Like, Hey, you’re going to do burpees and squats and pushups and stuff like that. Um, like looking back and I’m, that was 2000, I graduated 2006. So to like be doing that sort of stuff back in 2004 or five, um, was pretty unheard of. Um, And they did a good job with it, I think. But it is different. You can’t just be an adult and take your developing teenager and be like, oh, we’re just gonna do the same exercises. Especially if you’re talking about barbell-loaded stuff.
Chandler: Yeah, I rarely ever put barbells on kids’ backs. Oh, for sure. Or think about putting barbells on kids’ backs. I’d rather them get stronger in a single leg movement than put a barbell.
Perry: Yeah, because they still need to develop that balance and all that stuff. Intellectually, they were sponges and now they’re even more sponge-like. They try to cheat the system.
Chandler: I noticed- In what way for you?
Perry: Man, they’re more worried about winning than developing skills. Um, so if your objective is to like get to the finish line and there’s three steps you should take along the way. In a practice scenario where there’s minimal resistance, they’ll skip, you know, middle steps and then they’ll go try to do it against full resistance. And they’re like, Oh wait, this doesn’t work. Um, I think though, one of the things that we do, especially at that age is introduce. uh, ecological skill development. Where we put two kids, um, in a training scenario. So we have a starting position. We tell them what the finish line is and we create constraints around it. Like you can only use your hands, right? Or you can’t use your legs. You have to stay on the ground. You can’t stand up. Um, and then we say go, right. And it’s for the kids to figure out how to get from the starting line to the finish line in the most effective way possible. Which is cool, because then the kids are fighting, but within constraints, and it just develops skills on its own. But what it really does is give kids ownership over their own learning, especially when you ask the kid right after that scenario, hey, why did that work? Or why didn’t that work? Or what do you think we can change? So I think intellectually, they love ownership over their actions and their own learning. And I think the challenge is, is how do you keep developing this intrinsic motivation to learn at this age? Man, because school’s just like stuffing it down their throats. Yeah.
Chandler: The idea of constraint, we use, I call it constraint training. Yeah. Similar idea to you. And for us, there’s, constraints are different, but I always, at this age is there has to be forced skills. Yeah. Like this is a forced skill. So for example, in swimming, a forced skill is, I’m making your hand do this. So for example, I’m giving you a golf ball, you have to hold that golf ball, and it’s naturally gonna put your hand in the water in a very forced position. So like finding forced skills. is one thing, and then finding ways for kids to learn without me directly telling them is kind of the goal. So for us, it’s stuff like, you’re gonna count your strokes, so let’s say I take 15, and on this next repeat, you’re gonna take minus one, and you gotta find a way, and we’re gonna maintain Simmerdolph kicks off the wall, and you gotta find a way to take minus one. That’s a skill that they have to think about. They’re building the ownership. But the idea of ownership in coaches at this level is super, super important, where you’re asking them the question, they’re coming back with the feedback, and then you build off of that versus just telling them. It’s like, what did you feel there? Well, I don’t know what I felt. On this next one, I want you to let me know what you are working on versus me directly telling you.
Perry: I think it’s a lot like at this age, kids just want independence and ownership, right? They’re starting to realize that they’re not the little kids anymore. I feel like this is the age where parents will start, at least in Cedarburg, start letting the kid stay home while mom goes, gets groceries, stay home alone and stuff like that. So they start getting these little bits and pieces of ownership over what they do. Man, even in this, like I just like giving ownership over the workouts like, hey, we’re going to do a workout at the end of class. Which workout do you want to do? Right? Cool. You want to do deck of cards where each suit is a different exercise. Cool. You guys pick the exercise. They love that shit.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: If I tell them to do a workout and I pick the workout, they’re like, no, we don’t don’t know how I feel about this coach. But if I’m like, you guys pick it. They love it.
Chandler: That’s funny. That’s funny. I, I actually see the opposite. Oh really? Especially with the girls that I coach.
Perry: Sure.
Chandler: Um, and I think this is definitely like a, a gender thing. Yeah. Um, and, or maybe it’s the environment that we created with athletes. Uh, I’ve tried to figure this out and I’ve always gone back to like, you know, this is something that we have to teach is ownership. Yeah. Like there’s not enough ownership in the athlete. Um, One of the best girls I ever coached, I got her when she was 13, and she’s now in collegiate program.
Perry: Previous experience when she was 13? When you got her? Or never swam before?
Chandler: No, she was extremely gifted. She was one of the best in the country. for numerous years, but you know, she went on to into collegiate program and at that age of a 13, 14, all I was trying to do was build ownership with her. Yeah. Trying to build ownership, trying to build ownership, and it made her go crazy where, you know, she wanted me to tell her at all times what she should be doing versus like, hey, what do you think? That type of communication and interaction. Not just with her, but so many athletes that I’ve came across, and usually they’re high performers. They want to be told what to do, but you’re trying to build the ownership of this is also your thing, autonomy of yours.
Perry: Yeah. I mean, man, it’s something I struggle with. I could certainly well do all of my programming around like lifting and stuff like that. I just don’t want to. I want someone else to tell me what to do.
Chandler: Yeah, but it’s like guided. Yeah. We always ask the question to the athletes is what’s the role? What’s the job of the athlete? Yeah. What’s the job of the coach? You know, the coach’s job isn’t to just tell you what to do. Yeah. They’re guiding you. Yep. They’re supporting you. They’re there to help you or guide you to make decisions, but they’re not there to just make you do things. Your job as an athlete is to prepare. perform, you know, take some autonomy, act with integrity.
Perry: That’s your job as a… Ask questions, tell the coach feedback, like how you’re doing, how it felt. Right.
Chandler: It has to be a relationship between coach and athlete where both the coach and the athlete are working through communication, not just the coach telling the athlete what to do, you know?
Perry: What about emotions at this age? So we did P-I-E, emotional. What do you see with kids’ emotions at this age, especially with puberty and stuff going on? And I’m sure it’s much different gender-based as well.
Chandler: Yeah, definitely different gender-based. I think with the girls, especially 11, 12, within our program, there’s a lot of, you know, At the 11, 12 level, I feel that, especially the high level that you go to, it’s like, this is when the big emotions are coming out. And I don’t know if that’s a parental thing, but you know, the crying, the expectation level might be higher. But I feel with the 11, 12 age group is this is when as a coach, you can, you know, you want to allow kids to be frustrated, but you’re trying to guide them to be like, Hey, you know, there’s, there’s a better way to, to go about this versus crying or quitting or, you know, throwing your cap or quitting practice or leaving practice.
Perry: Um, yeah, it’s just like a lot of emotional swings, right? Like they’re, they’ll be super confident and then they’re not confident at all. Or, um, it ties to the next one, which is social, but. Um, even like emotional, social dynamics of like, man, a rough day at school with like socially with friends emotionally will show up during training all of the time. Like a kid will walk in. I’m like, man, what happened at school today? And it’s always like something with some friends during some period at school. I’m like, well, that’s why we’re here. Leave that there.
Chandler: And they’re super external. There’s a lot of comparison, a lot of comparison. And then that brings on emotions of, well, I’m not good, or I do this and they do that. I think there’s a lot of coaching opportunities at that level, where if you have a really good, solid coach that can kind of navigate that process, Kids learn a lot through that. Like this is, okay, I’m comparing myself to X, Y, Z. A good coach would step in and say, all right, let’s think about ourself. This is what happens when you think about other people. There’s a lot of coaching opportunities and parental opportunities there.
Perry: There’s a lot of peer approval dynamics at this age. I think you run into a lot of kids wanting to change sports because their friends play a sport. And I want to do that sport because that’s what our friendship group does. Man, which is a, which is a challenge too. I remember like when I was in wrestling season, I’d be friends with the wrestlers, but then when wrestling season was done, I’d be friends with different people just because I wasn’t in wrestling anymore. I wasn’t around them all the time. But man, that’s always a challenge to navigate with kids is their social clicks. Yeah.
Chandler: This is, this is usually when we have kids quitting for sure for us.
Perry: Yeah. Us too. It’s like the, one of the hardest ages, I think for a few reasons, right? Like to one where we started our conversation, um, a lot of sports pressure the kids to be like, you need it, my sport or nothing, right? Like you need to do just this for sure. Man, I have a couple pseudo nieces, fake nieces. They’re real people, but not actually my nieces, but they might as well be. And they run into this in sports a lot where it’s like, You know, they’re trying to make their own decisions around athletics. And then the coach shames them because they tell the coach, Hey, I don’t want to play anymore. And they’re trying to take ownership over what they want to do. Cause they’re in so many different activities and they’re like, I don’t want to do everything. I just want to do what I like.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: Um, and there’s all this social pressure around it, like making those decisions that makes it really hard for them versus, you know, when I, the kid that leaves my Academy. My number one rule is you just need to have something else. I don’t care if you quit jiu-jitsu. I mean, I care, but I care more about them that I do, them doing my sport. Go ahead, quit jiu-jitsu. What are you going to do instead? Basketball? Awesome. You’re going to just try out other things for a little while? That’s great. Do it. You know, will I be there to support you through it? Might you wanna come back to jiu-jitsu? Absolutely. But I’m very much, at least in our program, so we’re not crazy competitive, but we can make huge impacts on kids. I’m not the one to, you know, when a kid turns 12 or 13, be like, hey, you should consider quitting basketball so you could do jiu-jitsu year round.
Chandler: I’m just like, nah. You do what you love, man. It’s up to you.
Perry: And your guys’ program’s different than ours, right? You’re a very competitive program, right?
Chandler: One of the reasons why there’s so much drop off at the age 11 to 14 for us is because there is a lot of social comparison. And naturally as you progress in a program, especially as you get higher into the program, there’s going to be a drop off in skill, talent, but also like the way that we separate our groups. You know, like we have, three different 11-12 groups, and at the top end are 11-12s that are competing, maybe they’re going to regional or even national competitions, and they’re training five times a week, and then we’ll have an 11-12 group that’s not there yet, their skills aren’t there, and if we would do them a disservice to put them in the top-level group, Whether that’s skills or attendance or just whatever. Level of commitment. Right. Level of commitment. You can’t put kids in a group if they’re coming once a week with kids that are coming five times a week. So naturally, just the way that we displace our groups, it puts some kids in a position where they’re going to naturally decide to say, I don’t want to do this. I’m going to do this other thing. That’s just the way that our sport is set up.
Perry: You’re still giving them a chance to get there. It’s a really smart way to structure it. Martial arts, we have different levels. I teach an advanced class for our kids and the advanced class is for kids that have been doing it longer, that have developed more skill, that want to be more competitive and want to have a different level of commitment to the sports side of it. than others. And we nurture that. And then in our other program, if they want to get to that athletic side and get to that advanced class, we’ll support them in that. But if they don’t, we don’t force them. We’re going to give them every single opportunity that everyone else had. But they’ll either decide that they want to stick with it as a hobbyist, or they want to stick with it as a competitor, or maybe it’s just not for them.
Chandler: Yeah, it’s important as a business that you have that. You have to offer programming for everyone. And I always tell that to parents too. There’s a place for everyone here. We don’t want to do kids a disservice by putting kids at this level with this level. It’s not going to help your kid. But naturally, I think because these kids at 11, 12, 13, 14 are so external, is if they’re not placed in the top group, they look at themselves as less. And then the parent comes in with like, hey, well, why can’t they be in the top group or whatever? and then it just dominoes into other things that are just not, that I don’t think helps the athlete. We’ve had so many kids go through the program where at 11, 12, they were in the lowest age group, and then they just kept going, kept going, kept going, and they ended up going to Division I schools. I really value that there’s places for everyone.
Perry: I think you do a good job with those three groups in creating a social setting. for all of those kids to be supportive and successful. Where if you just have that one giant group, it’s a little bit harder because not everything social is communicated, right? It’s even just a social status or athletic status, name up on the scoreboard or what’s it called where all the times are listed? Scoreboard still?
Chandler: Yeah, scoreboard.
Perry: Yeah, like your name’s still up there, right? And getting them the opportunity to actually see their name up there. Uh, man. So that’s, that’s the pie side of things. Let’s talk about like specific athletic development. What should parents be looking for? What should coaches be doing with kids this age to help them become better athletes? Not just, I mean, we have two totally different sports between jiu-jitsu and swimming. Right. Um, And with you being a personal trainer, former personal trainer, kind of still a personal trainer, right. Um, you, you said you don’t like barbells. Like what sort of stuff do you like doing with kids? Um, at this age, what are you working on?
Chandler: There’s such a, there’s such a wide range of skill. So it’s like, I can’t. I can’t, if you’ve got a 14-year-old boy, or I would say girl, I think girls are way more advanced than boys, at least what I’ve seen.
Perry: And if you take a 13-year-old, you could have a 13-year-old that’s been done with puberty for a while, and one that hasn’t even started yet.
Chandler: Right. So it can be awkward because there’s so many levels of skill. But the introductory of strength training, I think it’s super important. I value strength training for this age group tremendously. At least getting them to love it. Yes.
Perry: Because it’s going to be super important in the next one.
Chandler: Right. Super important. And the more that they’re consistent with it and value it, the better it’s going to set them up for long-term success. And it doesn’t have to be that advanced. Twice a week for 30 minutes is great. And it could be basic, basic movements. Single leg movement, a push movement, a pull movement. Whether that’s loaded or not, at least they’re going through the basic movement patterns. But an 11, 12 year old that has never strength trained before is gonna be totally different than a 13, 14 year old that’s been strength training for a couple years. I’ve done trap bar deadlifts with 14 year olds. And they can totally do it and it’s good and it is helpful. With an 11 year old, you can do trap bar deadlift, but they gotta be foundationally good. Usually it’s gonna be PVC, learn how to hinge. But I believe that you can add loaded movements at this age.
Perry: Yeah, like, what is it? Run, jump, crawl, hinge, squat, press, pull. Yep. Sort of deal.
Chandler: Rotate. Yeah, rotate. So I set up programming like that, where it’s like, I know where people are on the trajectory and we got to find movements that are in line with where they’re at. Some kids are basic reverse lunges with no weight or step ups with no weight. And like, you better be doing that correctly. And that’s just fine.
Perry: Which is crazy because like, man, there’s days where I’m just like, I’m going to do my reverse lunges with no weight today.
Chandler: Right, right. And it’s a great movement. And then we got kids where it’s like, all right, we’re on 40s and you’re 14 years old and you’re reverse lunging and it looks fucking good. That takes a lot of progressions. So I would be really adamant about This is important. We don’t need to add load yet, but let’s get down the skills, the process of what you’re actually doing first.
Perry: And as I get into lifting more and more, which is weird because I’ve lifted ever since freshman year of high school and never stopped, right? Um, just focusing on control through the entire range of movement. Um, you know, I, I think these kids start feeling strong, so they get a little squirrely with it, you know, teaching them how, even with lightweight or even a body weight lunge, how much just control matters.
Chandler: Yeah. It’s a challenge coaching 13, 14-year-old boys in a weight room. Like, it is a challenge. They want to lift more weight. It’s a game of comparison, for sure. I think the girls do a better job of understanding it. It is challenging as a coach that you have to be aware that it’s not just coaching like, hey, this is what we’re trying to do. It’s like, you gotta manage a lot of egos. You got to manage the social comparison in the weight room. It’s tough, but it is important and I value it tremendously.
Perry: Invaluable lesson to teach, especially at this age, is when to stop at a bad rep. I think at this age, reps in reserve is a or an RPE are great ways to program for them, help them understand what it feels like when your form starts going off and be like, Hey, this is, you know, I should probably stop one or two before this. And if I got to that fact of like, Hey, I got a barb, I got a bench like halfway up and I start quivering in one side drops. I probably at this age should have stopped one or two reps ago, right?
Chandler: It’s funny. I used to, uh, I used to have like 40 kids in the weight room and it would just be me as a coach, 40 kids. And I have ages 13 to 18. An 18-year-old boy, a 13-year-old boy, that is completely different. An 18-year-old boy, it’s like, we’re going trap bar deadlifts, loaded pull-ups. We’re going bench press. We’re moving weight, and it’s controlled and it’s good. 13-year-old boy is like, can’t even walk.
Perry: Yeah, I know.
Chandler: That’s a really hard environment and there’s coaches all over the country that do that. But I’ve always been on the side of like, I’m going to be super adamant about the progressions. Like I am not going to put a kid underneath a barbell at all until I see really good foundational movements. And I’m very adamant about like we’re going to be actually more hesitant to progress than anything else.
Perry: And I think one big thing to add to this, not just in the weight room, but in the water or on the mats is. Skill and keeping skill under fatigue, right? Like as the kids get tired, can they maintain good structure and good movement patterns? Um, and can they recognize it?
Chandler: Right.
Perry: That self-awareness is like that way. One of the top things they can develop at this age.
Chandler: Yeah. Yeah. In the water training for us is, is, um, this, I mean, 13, 14 is kids can start training and, uh, My background was when I was 13, 14, and honestly, I think 12, almost 13, I was training 20 hours a week in the water. I did enormous amount of volume and it hindered my long-term development for sure. It definitely has impacted the way that I coach. uh now but we are as in the swimming community i think we’re behind where we are really training kids with enormous amount of volume at such an early age which i i do think that you can get enormous like you can get big performance from kids at 13 14 does high volume
Perry: Not acutely, but in the long run, do you get a lot more injury with that in the pool? You would like running, right? There’s substantial injury increase with increased running.
Chandler: Yeah, I don’t think it’s about injury. I really think it’s about… Love of the activity? I think low aerobic swimming is no problem. You can do big volume, low aerobic swimming. So like you put an 11, 12 year old through, low aerobic, skill based. Like we’re gonna go low intensity, but we’re gonna be focused on our turns, and it might be a lot of volume. I think that’s fine. The stuff that hinders long term performance is early on, high intensity, lot of volume. So it’s like there’s volume in energy zones. And I think that the very early on, we’re going to go hard and a lot of volume hurts long-term performance. And that was my experience. That’s a lot of experience with kids around the country and swimming.
Perry: Are you still whooping all your kids? Yeah. So Chandler and I both wear whoops, which is like a fitness tracker. But a cool thing is you can set up as a coach, so you can monitor your athletes and things like that. And I know that you’re having several of your athletes on it. Do you use it at this age at all to, to see how much like volume they’re doing and the impact?
Chandler: It’s tough because I look at 11, 12 is completely different than 13, 14. That’s true. You know, you could have a 14 year old girl or boy that’s freshmen in high school versus an 11 year old that might be in sixth grade. I would be hesitant on adding variables like whoops or like, yeah, we’re going to really track this stuff at 13, 14. But I do see that there is value, but not necessarily a push.
Perry: Because I think sometimes parents don’t understand how much activity these kids get throughout the day. Granted, they’re in the classroom sitting around, but like they’re still walking around. They still have a recess and lunch period. Man, most of the kids that I know are doing like multiple hours of athletics a night. Yeah. You know, I get kids that are coming from wrestling practice to jiu-jitsu. Like they’re still running around. They’re going through growth spurts. Right. And that just that passive expenditure that they have just from growing is insane. Yeah.
Chandler: I feel like we miss that.
Chandler: Yeah. And it’s tough because… you know, it’s hard to, to put that into like perspective of what these kids are actually doing. Like, Oh, I go to basketball practice. I go to some practice. I go to tennis. Um, I mean, that was my life. That’s what I did. Uh, it was hard. It was definitely, it definitely like hurt my performance.
Perry: I remember like summer going activity, activity, activity. What is, what are your, uh, man talking about hindering longterm performance? What are your key staples of recovery for athletes these at this age?
Chandler: Yeah. I mean, I look at recovery as for kids that are 11 to 14 is naturally these kids are like they’re, they recover way different than me and you. Yeah. And it’s basic things like make sure you get a good meal, go to sleep. Like those are very basic things, but they’ll wake up the next day and they’ll feel So much better, you know, like me and you we go through a heart a super hard intense workout Yeah, there’s gonna be more things that we have to do But it’s like we can set up the foundations of like hey This is important to rest up and get a good night’s sleep and have a good meal Those are like those are basic things but at 11 12, you’re you’re not thinking like that.
Perry: Yeah, you know, it’s crazy These kids are supposed to be at this age athletes are supposed to be getting like 9 to 10 hours of sleep
Chandler: That’s one of the reasons why we have set when I was in, when I was a kid, we had Saturday morning practice at 5 30 AM. Yeah. And then we would go Tuesday, Thursday doubles. I’m like 12 by 30 morning. And of course I’m going to bed at 11. I have always been on the side of like, dude, if we don’t need to go at five 30 morning on Saturday mornings, we’re going to start at 10 AM. Yeah. It’s like, we’ll start Saturday practices at 10 AM versus there’s no way.
Perry: man, there’s no way a kid that is doing an afternoon activity with homework and eating and parents driving. And then something before school is getting that many hours of sleep, right? Five 30, whenever, even at like 6 00 AM gym lift at the school, like there’s no way they’re getting that nine to 10 hours of sleep. And as a coach, you recognize like your kids walk in at, you know, for a four or five, six o’clock practice, your kids walk in half asleep and you’re like, I know why you’re tired.
Chandler: Right. And at this age, it’s like that the investment of valuing sleep over training is, I think more, I think there’s, there’s more return on not doing doubles at 13, 14 years old in sleeping versus going to do more volume and swimming early in the morning. And I think that that in my community is actually, that’s not the normal opinion. Yeah. In my community.
Perry: It’s crazy. I think this is also a great age to teach kids about nutrition, giving them ownership over it. We try to do that when they’re even younger, like, hey, what are good things to eat before a practice, right? What should you be eating before or during a competition between rounds? But man, at this age, especially as the kids want more output from their bodies, right, they have higher expectations and how much volume that they wanna do, giving them ownership over what they should be eating and how to fuel themselves is another great opportunity for parents.
Chandler: Yeah, 100%. And it also is a little touchy subject, like as a coach. For sure. But I feel like there’s something there that as a coach, you can put a lot of emphasis into that is not like, hey, you need to lose weight or whatever. It’s like, I’m trying to help your athlete
Perry: Yeah.
Chandler: Develop long term man to talk about.
Perry: I mean, I came from wrestling, right?
Chandler: Right. That’s a bat. Yeah. That’s hard.
Perry: Really hard, especially for me. Like I was cutting weight, not at not in middle school, necessarily, maybe just a little bit.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: But man, when high school rolled around and we’ll talk about that in the next podcast, like I was cutting weight. all of the time.
Chandler: Yeah, that’s crazy. But it’s like, at this age, it’s basic things. All right, let’s make sure everyone has a water bottle at practice. You know, we’re gonna get a snack. When we get home, let’s make sure we’re eating. Before some eat, what are some things that we can eat? Well, you know, are you gonna eat pizza or are you gonna eat this big, nice breakfast with the meat, a protein, a carb? You know, those are like small, basic things that me and you are like- Yeah, teach them how to recognize that like pizza’s sitting in your gut.
Perry: is not going to feel the best, but maybe that equivalent amount of carbs in banana and honey form would feel better. That’s a challenge, but I think it’s, again, we want to give kids as much ownership at this age as possible so they can learn how to do it as it starts to matter even more and more in their sport. Let’s talk about competition in these ages. What do you like to look for? What are your tips for parents and kids approaching competition in this age group? Because you’re starting to get competitive, right?
Chandler: We have 11, 12s that go through, we call it, I mean, it’s like a national event. Kids at 11 can qualify for nationals. Kids at 12 can qualify for nationals. 13, 14 can qualify for nationals. But we have to keep it fun because there’s so much external things. And I hate saying, like, we’ll have fun with it because that’s such a subjective thing. What’s fun to me is going to be different than what’s fun to you. But defining what fun means is important. And fun could be we’re just getting up and we’re competing. Fun could be, you know, I’m challenging myself. It doesn’t mean that, like, we can’t put You know, we can’t have goals. We can’t have, um, you know, specific meets that we’re looking for or trying to perform at, but it, um, the, the idea of defining fun is important and we can’t put additional pressure on athletes at this age. Cause we, we don’t know what’s going to happen the next X amount of years. So we can’t talk about collegiate swimming. Oh, what do we got to do to set up Sally to go? Yeah. Cal Berkeley when she’s 11, 12. Those conversations are just waste of time, you know? So I think it’s really about setting up the foundation of, okay, meets are fun because of X, Y, Z. You know, there’s pressure in meets, but we look at that as a, that’s our body’s way of getting up and trying to do something, trying to perform at a high level. I think there’s a lot of coaching opportunities there when it comes competition. Because at this age, you develop sports specific values. Yeah. You know, it’s like. If you’re just emphasizing result, result, result, then the kid is really going to sponge that up into the value of the result is the only thing that matters versus there’s a lot of process coaching that can go on. For us, I think that’s the real meat. It’s like how can we implement process within competition knowing that these kids are looking at meats that are higher level.
Perry: We’ve talked about setting process goals, process objectives in our past episodes. What sort of process goals and objectives do you like to set for these teenage years when kids are either in practice or in competition?
Chandler: Yeah. And I feel like that, that gets set up early on, you know, as a nine and 10 year old. Hey, uh, what’s your, what are you working on? Oh, I’m going to try to maintain three dolphins off each wall at 11 and 12. Those should be the ownership of the athlete. We don’t need to tell them. At 9 and 10, there’s going to be a little bit more communication from the coach to say, hey, you think you could do this? Oh, yeah, I should do that. At 11, 12, 13, 14, now the ownership has to be bigger on the athlete. The athlete has to implement these things. They have to be aware of them. When it comes to process-type goals, I think that that’s a progression just like anything that you do, whether it’s skill-based or in the weight room, there has to be progressions. So we’re looking for skills, really, that’s what it is. There has to be a progression in the thoughtfulness and the mindfulness in skills. You know, like race plans, executions, the way that you’re looking at practice, your goals in practice. At this age, you can implement those way more than a nine and 10 year old.
Perry: I know, especially with where the kids are at emotionally at these ages, I really like to make sure that they have some sort of process school around remembering to like, take a second and breathe hard and swimming, swimming. You need to keep swimming. If you stop swimming, you’re definitely not going to win. But in Jiu Jitsu, we have all these, you know, we have transitions and we have positions, right? We’re removed. And then we kind of hold someone down for a second. Um, maybe even 30 seconds. And in my, one of my process goals I like with the kids at this age, um, is winning or losing when those control positions happen, like take a breath, right? Take three, just to recompose yourself. And I think it’s, you know, for one, it’s great, you know, get rid of that carbon dioxide and fuel your muscles with some oxygen, but. where the kids are at emotionally, if a lot of times at this age, you’ll see comebacks happen less. And maybe it’s more of a jiu-jitsu thing, but like, man, if I watch five and six year olds, like one kid could be super losing and they don’t get emotional. They don’t really recognize that they’re losing. They come back and win. But at this age, like they get so in their heads about it. That I like introducing that to just give them like an emotional break in the match.
Chandler: Yeah, that’s that’s actually reminds me similar to what I implemented. I think we talked about last time, which is the battle behind the block.
Perry: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Chandler: Uh, that’s a progression. So like, uh, as an eight year old, we tell kids, all right, when you get behind the block, put your hands on your hips, like Superman. Right. And then they go behind the block and they don’t know why they’re doing it, but they’re doing it.
Perry: Yeah.
Chandler: And then at nine and 10, we say, all right, when you’re behind the blocks, what do we do? All while we put our hands on our hips, like Superman, make yourself big. And then we take some deep breaths and then they go behind the block and they do it. 11, 12, 13, 14, there is a step in that progression. Like we’re trying to recognize why we do this. You know, like when we get behind the block, there’s going to be these things that we can control in the moment, right? And we want to make sure that we’re setting ourself up for success. So one of the things that we do is we put our hands on our hips. Why do we put our hands on the hips? And at that point, we’re like, we’re coaching that up. Well, we got to make ourself big, trying to display some good body language.
Perry: Yeah.
Chandler: And then we’re going to focus on our breath. How do we breathe? So at 9 and 10, it was like, big inhale. Now it’s like, all right, let’s talk through it. Big inhale, gradual exhale. Focus on belly breathing, not breathing through the chest. Why do we belly breathe? Okay, well, that’s going to calm ourself down. Yes, 11-12, we can do this. At 13-14, there’s even a bigger progression. But those small things lead up to long-term at 19-20, they’re still doing the same routine.
Perry: I wish I did all that stuff.
Chandler: It’s easy to do. It’s hard to implement. It’s very easy to do, but it’s very hard to implement. But if you set up those routines, that process at a young age, those processes keep going. I’ve seen it for years.
Perry: Man, it’s so incredibly helpful. I remember when I was wrestling, I would look across the mat and I’m like, dude, that guy looks big. Right? And like instantly in my head. Right? Because I wasn’t focused in the moment on myself and what is actually controllable.
Chandler: Yeah. Here right now. Yeah. It’s, it’s, uh, I think there’s so much, there’s so much coaching that can be done at this age around that you’re setting up the foundation.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: Um, what do you like doing post event? Because these kids are getting smarter. Yeah, reflections. Yeah, I think reflections, they can start remembering what they did, how they were feeling in the match, how the match went. Anything specific you’d like to do with kids at this age?
Chandler: Yeah. So for us, it’s a little bit different. So you have a race, you have some downtime, you have a race. Usually how it goes is after your race, you go up to your coach, your coach gives you feedback.
Perry: We have the same thing. Like, well, we’ll do the same idea. Six, six matches in a day with like. five to 20 minutes between each match.
Chandler: Right. Okay. So it’s very similar process. And, um, you know, after your event, you go up to your coach, your coach gives you some feedback, you go warm down or take care of yourself, get a snack, whatever. Uh, and then there’s the, after the meet, there’s going to be some reflection. at 11, 12, 13, 14 is like we’re just trying to start introducing the communication of athlete coach after an event, which could be a very unemotional thing. Yeah. Like, you know, a kid had a bad race, kid had a bad match. If they’re coming back, they’re in this emotional state. There’s going to be an opportunity there to coach something valuable and hopefully learnable. Now we’d want them to be in a less emotional state. But they’re going to go through this process and you have to be very aware of what you’re saying. Years ago, I was at a meet and I was listening to this coach kind of communicate with their athletes. And the first thing they would say every time they came back, was, okay, give me one thing you’re proud of. And I was listening to these kids come back and just be like, you know, I was really proud of how I didn’t give up. Or I was really proud of my turn there. I really was aggressive in the wall. And they just kept going through this thing. And even though it’s such a simple thing, like, what are you proud of? First of all, it gives the ownership of the athlete. The athlete has the ownership. They have the autonomy. They have to think about it. Versus like, Hey, you did this. Well, you did this. Well, you got to get better at this. Now it’s just like me telling them versus the athlete reflecting on like, hey, what am I proud of? That’s different than, hey, what did you do? Well, you know that even that, yeah, that idea. What are you proud of? Yeah. It’s different. It goes to a very controllable process-based thing versus, what did you do well? Well, I went at best time. So I started into kind of implementing that in the post-race reflection. I was like, what are you proud of? And then, hey, what adjustments are you going to make next time? And then similarly, they’re coming up with, well, I need to do this, I need to do this. And then that’s when, as a coach, you can say, hey, you know, I totally saw that. I also saw X, Y, Z. Let’s try and do this. You know, and then I’ve gone through so many battles with athletes after this race. Like, let’s say it’s a bad race. I’ve gone through battles that we go head and head where there’s, these kids are in an emotional state. You know, they, they want to get something, some feedback, but a lot of times they’re not ready to receive feedback. So sometimes the best thing for them is like, Hey, you need to go take care of yourself. When you come back. and you’re in a less emotional state, then we can talk. And at 11, 12, that’s really hard to do. Kid comes back, they’re crying. Hey, I’m not talking to you right now. You’re in an emotional state. You got to go take care of yourself. Come back when you feel like you’re ready. That’s hard to do.
Perry: I mean, I feel like that ties back. You can tie that back to your stoplight that you use, green, yellow, and red. If they’re in red, it’s not the time to be giving them corrections.
Chandler: Yes, no way. And coaches, all over do this and it’s hard to watch because that kid is just looking for validation in that moment versus like actual feedback. So it’s like this game of like what’s actually valuable here and it has to be very short to the point. If they’re in an emotional state or a red light, you might as well send them on their way or teach them like, hey, let’s bring it down here. We need to get to yellow light. What are we going to do? For post-meet stuff, with 11-12, we’ve done things, and I’ve done things where we’re gonna talk as a group, hey, what did we do well as a group? Not so much on the individual stuff, but at 13-14, I’ve made post-meet reflection sheets, and I’ve walked through it, and it’s basic stuff. What are you proud of? What adjustments are you making next time? What are your wins? but it’s very process-oriented. And that progresses to the 15 to 18 level, but it’s like the introductory of, all right, I’m after a meet, I can reflect on things. One of the things I’ve, a good perspective I’ve had with kids, is usually when, and I have, and probably you too, you have a bad match, you’re trying to forget about it. You’re not really trying to think about it, because it’s like, That sucked. It just sucked. Similarly with athletes, they’re going through the same thing. They’re going to have a very hard time of reflecting on poor performance. But there’s so much in poor performance that you can gain from. So the analogy I created years ago with a kid was, Okay, you go to a meet, you swim a race, and it goes really poorly, really, really bad. But from that meet, you learned, I’m going to work on X, Y, and Z. Because I saw this within my race, I had a really bad job of doing X, Y, and Z. So the next three weeks of practice, you go to practice and you’re working on X, Y, and Z, and you’re really, really, Like I’m dialed in on those three things. And then you go to a meet in a month and you step up and best times. Was that a bad meet or a good meet? And usually they’ll say, well, that was a good meet. And then you’ll say, well, why? Well, because I learned X, Y, Z. So it’s like those, That’s what you’re trying to teach, is that there’s performances that are going to go well, there’s performances that are not going to go well. The ones that don’t go well, there’s so much information you can pull from and you can either ignore it or you can really grab a hold of it and learn from it. And at 11, 12, 13, 14, this is like the foundation of that. Eventually that’s going to be, we know that it’s not always going to be good, but you’re setting up the stepping stones for long-term.
Perry: What about parents? So we talked about like the coach’s role. What do you like to see parents before, during, and after? I think the drop, drop them off and that’s it. Drop them off, pick them up.
Chandler: Thank you. I think that would be a perfect world, but that’s not reality. I have parents, uh, all parents, no matter if they’re like, you think about the worst parent you’ve ever dealt with. And I think about the worst parent I’ve ever dealt with. and I have a very clear vision of my brain of who that is, but they, all of them, want the best for their kid. They’re trying their absolute best, and whether it’s their lack of experience, knowledge… And it’s short-term best.
Perry: They want the best right now.
Chandler: Right now. And it’s very hard for them, even though they know They know deep down this is probably not the best. It’s very hard to see past here right now and into long term. They want to support. They want to help. They want to do what’s best for their kid.
Perry: And they don’t want to see their kid sad.
Chandler: Yeah. Where, where you’re like, well, you know, this is kind of important for them to fail and learn. Yeah.
Perry: So it’s like growth mindset.
Chandler: There has to be, um, there has to be obviously communication between the coach and the athlete. The coach has to similarly to the athlete, give some, like, these are our non-negotiables as a parent. This is, this is what we’re trying to implement in your kid. Sometimes it may not go well. Your job as a parent is to do X, Y, and Z. Now that doesn’t always, that doesn’t, even if you do that, that doesn’t mean you’re not going to have parents that are… What are some of the best things for parents to do before, during, after?
Perry: Like perfect world.
Chandler: Yeah. I did an exercise years ago where I asked kids, and it was a trick, I asked kids, I gave them three note cards. The first note card, write three things that you’d like from your coach prior to the meet, during the meet, after the meet. And they wrote down their three things. And I said, all right, on the other three note cards, you’re going to write down, Same idea, but with your friends. What do you want before the meet, during the meet, after the meet? Really what I was getting at was now the next one, which is the parent. Write three things down you’d like from your parents before the meet, during the meet, after the meet. And I had 60 kids do this. And I obviously took all the coaches’ one, read through it. I’m like, okay, great, got these. But I really was looking into what are the kids saying about their parents? And I sent that out into a newsletter. whether parents read it or not, and I almost guarantee you, they did not read it. I can almost guarantee you they did not read it. But they were so basic and so like, yeah, that’s good. Three basic things was like, before the meet, you don’t need to talk about the meet or make the meet more important. Just bring me into practice. One of the things that kids wrote down a lot was… Feed me? Yeah. Act as if it was a normal week. Yeah. It was like, oh, yeah, you should probably act like it’s a normal week. Yeah. Just because you got this competition doesn’t mean you need to give me this special dinner or cater to me. It’s just like just act like it’s a normal me. That means that your body language, the what what you’re saying is normal, as if this is a typical normal week. Just because I have a big meet this weekend or a competition doesn’t mean you need to change the way that you’re talking to me or the way that like your behavioral you change. Yeah. It’s like, that’s such a simple thing. But parents do this all the time, all the time. You know, and then the second thing is like, after a meet, don’t talk about the meet. Let’s go get dinner. Seems like such a basic thing. Yeah. But it’s like those parents are coaching them during the meet. They’re going to coach them after the meet. They’re going to say things or identify things that are just making the athlete really second-guessing what they’re doing, or the athlete doesn’t want to think about that. They just went through a weekend of racing and really an emotional thing.
Perry: I mean, talk about a powerful, powerful question you can ask. how can I support you in this moment, right? Like, how can I support you? What do you want?
Chandler: Right. Those are very basic things, but get neglected. So my advice to a parent is to keep it simple. You know, your kid’s going to go race. Your job is there to support them. Now, support them is also a very subjective thing. Supporting them to one parent might be like, I need to make sure they have their Gatorade and I got to, you know, set up their bag and I got to make sure they get, You may feel that is supportive, but it really is hurting them in their long-term success. You want to be on the edge of like, I’m there for them, but I’m not their coach.
Perry: Because remember, they want ownership and independence at this age. When they were younger, when they were eight, they needed a lot of help. If you let your eight-year-old go and pack their bag, they’d forget their swimming suit. At this age, they can handle the responsibility.
Chandler: Right, right. So it’s a very fine line of what is support? What does that look like? What are the behaviors of support? It’s not packing the bag or making the special meal. No, those are great. Those are cool. But it just furthers the idea of the kid is just wanting, hey, just act normal. It’s a normal week. Yeah. You know, you start doing those things, you’re putting the you’re actually putting the pressure on, hey, this is different. This is my mom is like doing these things. My dad is doing these things. You’re putting pressure on the actual thing versus. Yeah, it’s competition. It’s fun. It’s normal.
Perry: Yeah, man. What else do you have for this age group that covered a lot of it?
Chandler: This is a this is an important age group. This is where kids really develop values and it’s like as a parent, as a coach, as a friend, this is the time where we can influence really good habits and it’s also the time where it can also go the other way. It’s a fun age group though. These kids are fun. They’re energetic. They’re moving. They want to learn. They learn fast. They start actually getting good at the sports. Yeah, they’re so adaptive to skills. Yeah. Like you take a kid in September and then you look at them in November.
Chandler: Holy shit.
Perry: Yeah. So much. I mean, I’ll tell, I’ll tell you two people like this is the age where you can watch kids and it looks like two full blown adults doing like their technique, their movements are there.
Chandler: Yeah. Yeah.
Perry: With, with the right environment, with the right team, with the right coaching, um, with the amount, right amount of dedication and time in the sport. Like they look good.
Chandler: Yeah. Similarly. That’s cool.
Perry: Well, man, uh, great episode. Anything else we want to touch on?
Chandler: I think we covered a lot.
Perry: Cool. Well, this is the third episode in the series. It’s like the teenage-ish years. The next one is the last one. We’re talking about high school and beyond.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: Whether or how long that takes you beyond that. Maybe just forever.
Chandler: Yeah.
Perry: Cool. All right, man. Well, thank you so much and excited for the next episode.
Chandler: Yeah.
Chandler: Thank you. Cool.