The first time I came across LTAD I thought it was the name of village in South Wales. When I first met Istvan Balyi the originator of the phrase I was more confused. Not having come from a sports science background the terminology was a bit frightening. That said I felt I needed to learn more because all the sports in the UK where signing up to develop their own plan of how they would adopt the principles of LTAD.
Well that was six years ago and the princioles of LTAD are fairly well embedded in most coach education programmes and most player development models embrace some of the principles. Some of Balyi’s claims are now challenged as being unproven in some quarters, but his guiding principles are universally accepted.
So what is it? Well lets keep this simply and jargon free.
Long Term Athlete Development (LTAD) is what it says on the tin. It is a model that recognises that children go through different stages of physical, psychological, social and emotional development. At each stage certain characteristics and training regimes need to be understood in order for the child to meet its full potential.
Hardly groundbreaking rocket science and fairly obvious to every parent in the land. However it is not as simple as that and as a parent you should ask the question.
What should you know as a parent?
A key document that explains everything is published by the RFU and can be found on this link.
Have a look and if you have any questions post them in the forums.
Haydn
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