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Anonymous (fd9a)
I recently took my 8-year-old to a weekend camp at a nationally-recognized gym located 90 minutes from our home. I had no idea what I was walking into. They spent the entire weekend trying to convince me to transfer my son to their gym! They sent coach after coach over to try every angle they could think of to convince me. They even tried to persuade my 8-year-old directly. They kept making outrageous claims about my child’s elite potential, throwing around words like “Olympics” and “scholarship”. They did this openly in front of other kids and parents, so there will be gossip about this for sure. (Cringe)
I’m not a fool and I recognize when I’m being manipulated. But I’m not going to lie, it did catch my attention when an experienced international elite coach and recent Olympic judge told me that he’s only seen a couple kids in his 30-year-career with as much potential as my kid. I told him that I was sure he was exaggerating and he said quite earnestly “No. I am serious. You never see a kid like this. You never see this!”
I would discount this entirely except that this isn’t the first time I’ve gotten similar feedback from an experienced person. Several months ago, my kid won a lesson with an Olympic gold medalist in a raffle and she kept yelling across the gym “He’s so good! He’s amazing! I tell him one time and he does it! I want to coach boys!” The Olympic judge/coach yelled almost the same words across the gym to me at the camp.
It’s hard to know what to make of all this. There is zero chance we are going to commute 3 hours per day to a gym that is notorious for bad owners, frequent coach turnover, and SafeSport violations! For the foreseeable future, he’ll stay at our local gym where he has coaches who care about him, lots of friends, and zero pressure.
I try not to think too far ahead about his future in the sport because I know it’s extremely unlikely that he’ll have the same passion at 18 that he has at 8. But I do wonder if I should be doing anything now to ensure that all the doors remain open for him for when he is older. I think he will be competing 6JE/Future Stars next season, which is the highest level he can compete at his age. That’s pretty ambitious for a kid who started gymnastics last year.
I don’t have specific questions exactly but I’d love some feedback on the general situation. It’s all so weird to me!
I’m not a fool and I recognize when I’m being manipulated. But I’m not going to lie, it did catch my attention when an experienced international elite coach and recent Olympic judge told me that he’s only seen a couple kids in his 30-year-career with as much potential as my kid. I told him that I was sure he was exaggerating and he said quite earnestly “No. I am serious. You never see a kid like this. You never see this!”
I would discount this entirely except that this isn’t the first time I’ve gotten similar feedback from an experienced person. Several months ago, my kid won a lesson with an Olympic gold medalist in a raffle and she kept yelling across the gym “He’s so good! He’s amazing! I tell him one time and he does it! I want to coach boys!” The Olympic judge/coach yelled almost the same words across the gym to me at the camp.
It’s hard to know what to make of all this. There is zero chance we are going to commute 3 hours per day to a gym that is notorious for bad owners, frequent coach turnover, and SafeSport violations! For the foreseeable future, he’ll stay at our local gym where he has coaches who care about him, lots of friends, and zero pressure.
I try not to think too far ahead about his future in the sport because I know it’s extremely unlikely that he’ll have the same passion at 18 that he has at 8. But I do wonder if I should be doing anything now to ensure that all the doors remain open for him for when he is older. I think he will be competing 6JE/Future Stars next season, which is the highest level he can compete at his age. That’s pretty ambitious for a kid who started gymnastics last year.
I don’t have specific questions exactly but I’d love some feedback on the general situation. It’s all so weird to me!