Hoops

Are elite athletes overtrained?

littlebopeep,
I was referring to 17/18 year olds.. not 14 y.o.(Huge difference)

Furthermore, if an "elite" 17/18 year old can't handle 2 workouts a day for 6 days, then he isn't putting in the necessary work to become a better player..Its just a lifting/shooting session in the morning and team training at night.

IMO, thats not a ridicolously heavy schedule. In the USA, thats a normal schedule, and they dont experience as many major injuries as Aus or NZ.

I find it funny that you mention injuries and the AIS..by my account they receive barely any MAJOR injuries..Maybe sprained ankles, but certainly no ACL's or MCL's. Look at the current crop--Igor and Drmic off to Boise St, Aldridge off to Butler, Wroe off to Hartford, Creek with the 36ers. Look at the type of athletes they have become..Creek in particular was able to come out of the AIS and adjust immediately to a 28 game season plus the travel.

To be completely honest, overtraining doesn't cause necessarily cause injuries!
Patella Tendonitis etc is usually a result of a lack of quad, VMO, or calf strength.
Overtraining may make you 'stale' e.g. go through a real rough patch in terms of your shooting drops, your footwork is out of sync and your decision making is hindered.
But at the end of the day, you can do your ACL/MCL etc at any training, whether it be day 1 of camp or day 6 of camp.

p.s. and poor coach/player relations

I agree totally with MACDUB
My son trains 2-3 times a day 6-7 days a week
Has done since under 12s (now Bottom age U18s)
Still keeps up with Schoolwork as well
He has been to America twice - 1st trip came back with Tourny 1st place trophy - 2nd trip came back with a High School scholarship and is going over next year (to stay)
Others that went with him who only trained a few times a week were not in the same league according to U.S. coaches
In Australia we kept all his coaches updated of his trainings so on odd occasions he didnt have to join in on punishments but he still opted to do the majority of them
He believes without his workload he wouldnt be at the elite level and I agree
In my opinion the injuries to players around him are due to them NOT training enough and no decent recovery sessions

It all comes down to recovery.
Stretching, Applying Ice on Knees etc.(even if they are not sore, it helps reduce any inflammation), Nutrition, Getting adequate sleep etc.

If you do these things THOROUGHLY, then you will be able to train twice a day for 6-7 days of the week.

The AIS athletes are able to train alot because they get extra professional services to assist in their recovery--regular use of physio, massaging anytime and day of the week, on-site doctors, sport scientists and nutritionists. They also have the time to do their recovery sessions as well as the resources obviously.

The reason why US high school athletes are able to stay healthy and in condition is because they are usually only committed to one team - their high school. AAU generally takes place in Summer.
When I was in the USA at HS, we shot in the morning, lifted at lunch and then team training at afternoon/night. But if one of us was tired so was the rest of us, because we all had trained similar hours at a similar intensity.

Problem in Aus is that one player can play for 2-3 teams, and so he has a myriad of team trainings and games to balance--and none of his coaches are going to know exactly how many trainings he has a week and none are going to be too impressed to see one of their players become lazy/drop in work ethic because of fatigue from another team's training sessions.

I'm somewhat torn on this one - my overall feeling is yes absolutely. I worked out that last year my daughter was part of 13 different basketball programs (some vertically integrated, others not) but all competing with for her commitment to some extent.

As others have pointed out this is not an unusual situation.

What makes it more challenging is that these kids are, by definition, talented and competitive and so it is often more than one sport which is also competing for their time. And at the end of the day, very few coaches are willing to forego their face time with these kids.

So yes, I think they are overtrained.

Mitigating my conviction is the high rate of injury at the elite level in most sports - and I'd point in particular to the AIS girls program, an environment in which, in theory at least, they should be able to control all aspects of the athlete's workload as they serving only one (two at the most) master. So I vascillate between 'gee the AIS have to get it right and look after these kids' and 'well perhaps pushing the envelope of each individual body is simply a part of the process for forging an elite athlete'.

A long way of saying maybe!