Parents’ guidance important for athletes during sports season

Another high school fall sports season officially kicked off Monday as players started preparing for openers that will follow in two weeks for cross country, football, soccer, field hockey, volleyball and golf.

High school athletes encounter hours of demanding practice during preseason and the regular season that follows, often under hot or humid conditions. They also deal with the demands of balancing athletics with academics while learning the responsibilities and value of being on a team.

During this time, parents may actually have more anxiety than their sons or daughters who are on the playing field and in the classroom. Injuries and concerns over proper training are always key, along with whether parents are providing a good support system.

Given that, I did a little surfing on the Internet and discovered some useful guidelines from the National Athletic Trainers’ Association. I’ll add some of my own tips, gleaned from several years of dealing with one demanding high school athlete. The full article from the trainers’ association is available on its Web site: NATA. Highlights are:

. Use good nutritional practices incorporating grains, fruits and vegetables, dairy and meat, poultry, fish. Diets should be high in complex carbohydrates and include essential proteins and fats.

. Athletes practicing or playing in warmer climates should become acclimatized to high levels of activity in hot weather. Practice should be held early in the morning or late in the afternoon.

. The night before an event, athletes should hydrate with electrolyte fluids.

. Fluid breaks should be offered at least every 45 minutes, and athletes should have unrestricted fluids to help prevent dehydration.

. A minimum 15-minute warm-up period before a game or practice, and an appropriate cool-down period afterward, is recommended. Athletes should warm up for five minutes during any prolonged breaks – including halftime.

. Parents should be aware of who is responsible for injury care at their child’s school. Ask whether the person is both qualified and available for both practices and games.

My own helpful hints:

. Laundry Lessons: Place a basket or clothes hamper in your athlete’s room. Explain that clothes – especially the smelly, sweaty ones – need to go in the basket if they are to be used again. This prevents socks, shorts and shirts from finding every corner of their room and protects the parent from liability for not being able to come up with those so-called lucky socks, shorts or shirts.

. Private Investigation: Your athlete will bring home a wealth of papers – important forms and waivers to be reviewed and signed, game and meet schedules. Often, these important papers never make it out of the knapsacks unless you take the initiative to open them.

. Bartering for Information: Over the course of the season, your young athlete will constantly need stuff from you. Their moods get better as they approach you for rides to and from practices, for purchase of socks or shorts, or for food and drinks for team gatherings. Strike quickly and ask how they’ve been doing at practices, games and meets. They’re much more forthcoming now and will actually use words with more than one syllable.

. Academics Held Hostage: To my wife, who is a middle school teacher, and to all other teachers, I apologize for the following. Some children make it through school and keep good grades because they know if they don’t, they can’t play. Use this to your advantage; raise the bar. All schools have their own standards – failing a subject or two brings suspension from the team. Your standards might be insisting on nothing lower than a “C” grade, or nothing lower than a “B” as a grade point average.

Good luck to our high school athletes and their parents for an enjoyable fall season.