Turkey Trots for Tots

Prodigies are always a hot topic, and with the publication of Andrew Solomon's Far From the Tree, they have been back in the news.  While prodigies tend to come from fields where it is not necessary to go through physical maturation first (like music, math, chess, etc.), that is beginning to change as some parents push their kids to become pint-sized phenoms at younger and younger ages.  With the development of the Internet and many more organized competitions in a variety of fields it's become easier to develop skill and talent in a variety of fields and activities. Running is one such area.  Unlike baseball and football, which require specialized skills (although, as I wrote about last month, even football is seeing young stars in areas like quarterback), kids learn to start running shortly after they learn to walk.  Three female running prodigies have recently made headlines.

1) Mary Cain-While she might not seem like a true prodigy given that she is 16, Cain is a prodigy when it comes to (middle- and long-distance) running-- a sport where women often do not peak until their 20s and even 30s.  Cain is setting records (she set the American high school record in the 1500m at the World Junior Championships) and she is already so good that she caught the eye of legendary running coach Alberto Salazar, who is coaching her long-distance (pun intended).  Cain is so good that she stopped running for her high school team and is now running as an independent-- though she is careful to preserve her NCAA eligibility.

2) Katylynn and Heather Welsch-  The Welsch sisters likely aspire to be a runner like Cain someday.  Today the girls inspire strong feelings-- sometimes admiration and awe, but more often concern and consternation.  At only 12 and 10 they often compete in 13-mile trail runs and even in marathons.  Their father coaches them in running and biking and pushes them to run faster than some men.  The long NYT feature on them raised some question marks as it describes tears, injuries, and a high-level of parental involvement.  While it's true that it's difficult to say what is best for a child, and I wouldn't presume to do so, I will hazard a guess that 4-6 years from now these girls won't be competing the way Cain does.  Burnout and/or the puberty monster (hopefully they will hit puberty at a normal rate) will likely strike. Extreme, young athletes like the Welsch girls raise questions about how young is too young for little bodies.

My husband, who is a serious runner, is eager to get our son Carston running.  Given John's competitive style, which I've written about before when it comes to our son swimming, this is not surprising.  It also shouldn't be surprising that when John found out there was a kids' race as part of his traditional turkey trot race, he signed up our ten-month-old...

The "Kids' K" was 100 yards and Carston "ran" in the 4 and under age division.  While he did start walking on his own about a week before the race, we had him use the little wooden walker he likes to use to tool around the house.

We also made sure to get a training "run" in beforehand to see if he could actually do the full distance.  While slightly tongue-in-cheek, you can definitely get a sense of the fun chaos in our house-- and our different parenting styles-- from this video.

So how did the actual race go? Before the race started Carston was very interested in the race official, as you can see.

You may have noticed that according to his bib he was number 1.  No, he wasn't the first one to sign up-- every child is given the number 1.  Even among the youngest kids I find this (as someone who studies kids and competition) slightly ridiculous.  In a race it is very clear-- even to a three-year-old-- who finished first, second, third, etc.  In other competitions like chess and dance it's less obvious so I can understand other choices, but not so in running.

In any case, we held the Little Man back until the final heat in the 4 and under set (there were four, from what I could tell).  He obviously got off to a pretty slow start.  Here he is on the race course.

After getting a lift to the finish line (distracted by the cold and crowd he lost focus, unlike in his training video), he ended strong-- but only barely before the 5-6 age division started.

At the finish line every child got a medal.  As I discovered while research Playing to Win, younger kids are quite taken with participation awards.  But once they hit first grade or so they become much savvier.  For this reason I'm sure that the 8-12 year-olds in particular would have much preferred an actual trophy if they won.  In any case, I'm sure that someday Carston will appreciate his first medal that is just about his current length! In the interest of full disclosure, which gives you some real insight into how I feel about this medal, when his relatives said, "Oh, look what you won!" I replied, "Well, he didn't really win it, but I guess he earned it."

After the Kids' K, I bundled the Little Man up so John could push him in the five-mile race.  John was actually the first person to finish the race while pushing a running stroller, so there's hope for Carston's competitive juices yet-- if only he'd been awake to see the big finish.  By mile 2 Carston was out cold and he slept right on through the finish line and the walk back to our car.

Running is a great activity for kids.  It burns off energy and can promote overall health.  But like most things, when taken to an extreme it can be a negative experience.  I don't envision Carstonr unning endurance races at age 10, but it'd be great if he was setting records at 16...

In any case I'm guessing even next year at 22 months he won't be very competitive at the Feaster Five.  But I'm sure he'll enter, if only to get another shirt like this one.

The Competition-Performance Relation and Dance

When I read Matt Richtel's article, "The Competing Views on Competition," last month in The New York Times I couldn't stop thinking about what one of the chess moms I met told me while I was researching Playing to Win: "Raising kids is a big experiment and I won't know till later if I did it right."  The truth, of course, is that we may never know if we did it "right." One of the main takeaways of Richtel's article about the role of competitiveness in raising healthy children is that there is-- not surprisingly-- a lot of competing (pun intended) advice out there about kids and competition.  As evidence he mentions a meta-analysis that was forthcoming in Psychological Bulletin. 

I recently got my hands on the article, and the two responses to it, and was struck by two brief excerpts.  The first is from the main article, "The Competition-Performance Relation: A Meta-Analytic Review and Test of the Opposing Processes Model of Competition and Performance."  Don't let the long title scare you, because here is the main find: "The take home message from the present research is that at the level of individual psychological processes, competition appears to be neither entirely beneficial nor entirely detrimental to performance.  Rather, our work indicates that the competition-performance relation varies as a function of the type of achievement goals pursued."  This also means that it can vary for the same person in different situations.  It's not realistic to turn away from all forms of competition because, as some critics explain in a response, "Competition is pervasive and an important aspect of human life.  Many people every day are involved in mandatory competitions in educational and career settings whether they want to be or not."

One setting in which competition is a fact of life is the dance world, which I've written about before as competitive dance is one of the featured activities in Playing to Win.  Dancers are constantly ranked in class and in roles for productions and in formal competitions.  Those formal competitions have become even more public as of late.  Recently my DVR has been filled with shows featuring dance competitions-- some of them healthier than others.  Below are my thoughts on some of these shows.

1) Abby's Ultimate Dance Competition- While So You Think You Can Dance and Dancing with the Stars started the competitive reality show craze over dance, Dance Moms started the candid reality show craze.  But the teacher featured in Dance Moms, Abby Lee Miller,obviously had to get in on the competitive reality show market too. So Lifetime came up with this (also featuring Robin Antin of Pussycat Dolls fame, who has her own family history with reality shows, and Richy Jackson, known to many for his association with Lady Gaga and Laurie Ann Gibson). This show is pretty bad-- and the viewers seem to agree as the show earns significantly worse ratings than Dance Moms. The show isn't just about the kids' dancing, it's about whose mom creates more drama and makes better TV.  In this case the competition is more about character than talent.

2) Down South Dance- This one-hour TLC special featured two rival clogging teams.  Clogging is a cross between Irish dancing and tap and involves lots of group precision and rhythm.  The show-- which seemed like a pilot for a possible series-- is in the vein of other TLC shows, setting up dramatic rivalries among big personalities in a relatively obscure activity.  Of course, this being TLC,  injuries, momma drama, and poaching were all plot lines.  In any event the competition here is definitely between teams.

3) The Big Jig- This one-hour TLC special featured five American girls competing in the 2012 Irish Dancing "Worlds."  At this point I'm guessing that each year we can expect a one-hour TLC special about the Irish Dancing World Championships given that TLC showed the 2010 competition by showing Jig (the careful viewer will notice Julia O'Rourke is featured in both), then the 2011 championships shown over the summer in Strictly Irish Dancing.  This special got quite the Toddlers & Tiaras treatment, following the exact same format (seeing the girls train at home a week before the competition, interviews with the moms and girls, seeing them at the event, setting up some other drama for the cameras, etc.).  In addition to the formula there are some child pageant-like elements included the curled wigs, the heavy make-up, and the sequined dresses that can cost thousands.  Now, based on what they showed, seems like some of the Irish dancers might drink pageant go-go juice too. How do we know? Well, they did show one girl become sick on stage (*multiple* times, which wasn't really necessary, I might add)-- and her vomit was bright pink.  Too many pixie sticks?

In any case, the competition shown here is more like what we would expect and each girl handles her own victories and losses in her own way.  I loved 10-year-old Grace who was thrilled to come in 9th, only to find out that due to a computer glitch she came in 13th. She said she was sad, but then she "Grace-ified it," and felt better. None of the featured girls won, and while tears were shed, in general they genuinely did seem focused on their own performance goals and less on the top spot.  I suppose when you train all year for 2-3 minutes of dancing you have to keep perspective.

One other show I'd like to mention that I recently LOVED is PBS' Broadway or Bust.  While dance is a small component of this high school musical theater competition, the main focus is singing.  In any case, this three-part series on the week-long competition is fascinating and fun to watch.  I especially loved that the kids genuinely seemed amazed by one another's talent.  While there was only one male and one female "Jimmy" winner, all of them seemed to gain so much for the experience itself that it felt less like a competition.  As the judges explained every day is an audition if they want to be professional performers, so they have to learn how to be friends now.  made me anxious for Smash to come back.  Along with my other new favorite dance shows, Breaking Pointe and Bunheads.  And would you believe I still haven't seen First Position?! Can't wait for the DVD to come out!

I'm guessing most of the winners' parents worry less about whether their parenting decisions were the right ones... Then again, the truth is, we all worry. And we always will. Some kids thrive in competitive situations and the trick is figuring out if your child is one and what the best competitive outlet is for him or her.

Parenting, Pageantry, and Politics

The past month or so has been pretty crazy in the Levey Friedman household-- death, life, illness(es), first teeth, a hurricane and a nor'easter, Halloween, an election, the list goes on.  Through it all I've attempted to keep writing, but the priority has been parenting the Little Man... especially after we lost our childcare in the midst of everything else! Being a SAHM for a few weeks meant my child got to eat Chicken McNuggets for the first time (which he obviously loved; he also napped better than ever after eating them, so McDonald's clearly knows what they are doing).  I attempted to not feel guilty about this, and other things during this time, with varying degrees of success.

Having written about parenting for years, parenting my own child has certainly added a new dimension to my work, as I knew it would. And just this week I published my first ever parenting essay over on Kveller's Raising Kvell blog.  You'll see that it's about whether or not Little Man should be thinking about competition at 8-months-old.  [You will also note that I am not the woman pictured swimming. As I say to the husband each week, "Someone would have to pay me a lot of money these days to get me into a bathing suit." Of course, if you're that person, feel free to call or email me.]

In last month's Boston Magazine I wrote about some hyper-competitive sports parents in New England, a group which often makes national headlines for their misbehavior.  Swimming parents did make the tournament, but didn't advance far, which in this case is a good thing.  It seems like I won't be part of that group, although clearly I can't speak for the aforementioned husband.  Yesterday I was on NECN's The Morning Show talking about this issue (see below) and speculating about why these stories often come out of the Boston area.

(In the past month I've recently addressed some other parenting issues, from a sociological perspective, on The Morning Show including parents using social media to discipline their children and parents trying to ban yoga from their children's elementary school.)

Parenting a competitive child does not come cheap, as this recent CNBC.com slideshow that features my research reveals, but many parents consider it worth the effort.  Parents are also starting to "afterschool" their kids, as this new, interesting article reveals; note that I'm quoted here as saying, "They want to make sure their kids stay at the top of their class," but in general parents just want to try to be sure their kids "stay at the top."

As I've learned over the years people can stay at the top in a variety of fields.  It can be in parenting, swimming, hockey, football, chess, soccer, dance, school, and, yes, beauty pageants.  Competition abounds in our society.  As a follow-up to my two pieces earlier this year on beauty queen political candidates-- women looking to conquer both pageants and politics-- I posted on The Hill this week with an update on how the beauties fared in their elections (spoiler: one won!).

Because I was home with him I got to take the Little Man to see democracy in action for the first time.  But he wouldn't tell which beauty queen politician he would have voted for... Guess I'll have to wait until he can talk to find out!

Shrinking and Pinking "Chick" Fights

I learned a new term this month: "Chicked."  Apparently that's what you say in skiing when a woman beats a man on the slopes. Here's an excerpt from an article describing what it is to be chicked:

“That’s a verb used in ski racing – chicked – to chick someone,” explained Canadian alpine racer Larisa Yurkiw.

Yurkiw was the talk of the Swiss glacier when she beat a guy in training over the summer. The 24-year-old from Collingwood, Ont., who has high hopes for Sochi in 2014, won’t identify the humiliated racer, only to say he is not a Canadian, but a “fellow Commonwealther.”

“It was the biggest news of the day,” she recalled.

“It was just training and it didn’t matter,” Yurkiw said. “It didn’t count for anything, but it’s that prestige verb to be able to use.”

Of course, the reason this was in the news is because of Lindsey Vonn's (failed) bid to race against men in a World Cup downhill.

While she failed this time it's only a matter of time before she, or someone else, does get the clear to compete against men in a sanctioned race. Sure, some will be afraid of getting chicked-- but the same was true in golf and tennis and auto racing and many other sports.  Sure, she might have to make some changes to her all-female races, like if racing the course advantages her over competitors.  But given the potential for publicity and the march of women's athletics I suspect within the next quad or two we'll see this.

Even MMA is getting in on the action.  MMA-- currently considered one of the toughest and most hegemonically masculine sports-- welcomed its first female pro fighter into the UFC earlier this month.  I'm sure they are happy that fighter Ronda Rousey is attractive and photo/telegenic.  Notice that the link is to a story on TMZ about Rousey, so clearly she is already crossing over into mainstream media.  The International Ski Federation should take note that some people might like to see a man get "chicked."

One place where chicking doesn't happen is at Spelman College, an all-female historically black college. Like at all single sex institutions, women are the athletic stars on campus.  Well, at least they were.  Starting next academic year Spelman is eliminating its athletic program.  They won't drop fitness-- they actually plan to promote it for everyone on campus, targeting issues that impact black women's health-- but they will leave the NCAA.  This is the first school to voluntarily leave the NCAA in about a decade.  About 40 women who planned to attend Spelman for athletics will no longer be able to compete, but they will still be students.

It's an interesting take on how best to use funds to promote health and athletics for more women.  I wonder if other schools will follow suit? Chicks everyone can be sporty and smart.  And sometimes they do best the boys.

Pint-Sized Football Phenoms

We're in the midst of multiple football seasons-- Pop Warner, high school, college, and pros-- and, like anything, we have some good and some bad stories. The bad stories focus on injuries and over-involved adults.  Massachusetts and New England are no strangers to crazy youth sports parents and physical altercations (as I wrote about in last month's Boston Magazine).  While hockey parents were named the whackiest, football parents came in a close second.  Given that, it's no surprise that MA youth football season has been making headlines-- both in the region and nationally.  Following a September game between two Central Massachusetts teams which resulted in five preteen players sustaining concussions, adult coaches and officials were suspended and banned for allowing aggressive play to go on for so long.  In general the reaction has been negative mainly because of the new culture surrounding football in general with regard to head injuries, especially when it comes to the youth game.

But just as we have become more concerned over the safety of youth football players, we also have seen a rise in the number of pint-sized football phenoms.  An article in the October 15th issue of The New Yorker by Ben McGrath, "Head Start: Steve Clarkson grooms future quarterbacks for the pros," sheds light on private coaching for young quarterbacks, which can start as soon as kids hit double digits.  It's not surprising that organizations like Clarkson's Dreammaker Academy exist, given society's penchant for rewarding precocity and athletic achievement.  What is surprising about the article is the extent to which some parents will go to get their children in with Clarkson and college coaches-- like holding their sons back a year in middle school (different from academic redshirting in kindergarten), paying thousands of dollars for an hour session, or changing schools (sometimes mid-year, sometimes across state lines, and sometimes inventing a new school from scratch).  McGrath rightly points out that it has taken a surprisingly long time to cultivate football prodigies (partly because size is so important, but unclear until kids get older), but given the intricacy behind the quarterback position it makes sense that this would be the first one to see the youngest of the pint-sized football phenoms.

Even though I hope my own son won't be a pint-sized football phenom someday-- primarily because of concerns about head injuries (and I'm not the only mom who thinks this!)-- I would be thrilled if he displayed the type of character these pint-sized football phenoms have shown this fall.  Yes, these are the good stories and you may need a tissue after you read them.

1) Heartwarming story about a senior football star in Ohio, Michael Ferns, who intentionally went out of bounds so that a freshman, Logan Thompson, could score. Why? Thompson's father had just passed away from a stroke two days before.  Special moment in video and pictures can be seen here.

2) Great story about a NJ kicker, Anthony Starego, who helped his team win recently.  What's special about his story is that he has pretty severe autism.  I also love that his team has fully accepted him and they make sure that no one bullies him.  Just hope that all of the people discussed in this story are safe after Hurricane Sandy.

3) But  the best story in my opinion is about Carson Jones and Chy Johnson.  Chy has a brain disorder and had been severely bullied. Her mom spoke to Jones, the star quarterback of an undefeated high school team in AZ.  Jones and his teammates took Chy under their wings and had her sit with them at lunch.  Everyday.  I first read about this on the 27th in New York Daily News. I was not at all surprised to see that ESPN picked up the story a few days later.  Rick Reilly's story about Chy and her boys moved me even more deeply-- though didn't mention if the team was still undefeated. No matter what the outcome of their season is, this are remarkable young men. I dare you to read about them and not tear up a bit.

While Carston likely won't be on any undefeated football teams, I hope he is an honorable man like Carson Jones.  I hope he appreciates people's differences-- the good and the bad-- and can root for others.  He attended his first football game this weekend (Harvard vs. Columbia, and he cheered the Crimson on to victory).  Even fans can be pint-sized phenoms.