After four years of intensive soccer training at her high school, Amélie Desgagné broke down. An injury forced her to stop sport for a year. She had an operation. Then the unthinkable happened: she gave up soccer, which was a passion.
“Looking back, I realized I was doing too much. I got bored. I decided to turn the page on soccer,” says the 26-year-old athlete, who is now a physiotherapist.
Amélie Desgagné literally lived for sport during her high school studies at Juvénat Notre-Dame du Saint-Laurent, in Saint-Romuald, on the South Shore in the Quebec region. She took five soccer lessons per nine-day period at school. She also had one game and two practices per week with the interscholastic team. In addition, she played in a civilian league between the months of April and October: another match and two practices were then added each week.
That was a lot of soccer for one person. Too much. The body gave out. A lumbar disc herniation and radiculopathy put her on hold. She had numbness in one leg.
It was in secondary five. The next year. At CEGEP, even after her operation, Amélie Desgagné no longer wanted to play soccer. She started cycling and running. But his misadventure in soccer gave rise to a great reflection on the sports concentrations of his high school.
Change of direction
“We realized that young people were overloaded. The program no longer met their needs at all. What hurt us the most was seeing students stop playing sports during high school,” says Patricia Bourcier, coach at Juvénat Notre-Dame du Saint-Laurent.
Athletes like Amélie Desgagné, the coach seen dozens of them over the years. Athletes who excel in their sport. Who love competition. But who end up giving up due to injuries, performance pressure or weariness.
In the hope of preventing young people from dropping out of sports, the Juvénat Notre-Dame has reorganized its sports concentrations in 2021. During the first two years of secondary school, students now practice “almost every sport that exists”, rather than confining yourself to a single discipline.
In addition to the great classics like soccer and basketball, young athletes are trying golf, skateboard, cross-country skiing, tennis, rugby, pickleball and many other activities. This diversity maintains students’ interest in physical activity. They play to have fun. No pressure to win medals. And they don’t have time to become jaded.
By practicing several sports, young people also avoid injuries, which become more frequent when you specialize in a single discipline. “When you practice only one sport, you always use the same joints,” explains Patricia Bourcier.
The 44-year-old coach knows what she is talking about: she has played soccer up to the national level. However, she arrived relatively late in the discipline. It was in CEGEP that she turned to soccer, after having played several sports, including volleyball, in her youth.
“In my time, there were no high school sports studies on the South Shore. I didn’t have that pressure to perform in a discipline. I think that’s why I continued in soccer. I played until I was 40,” says Patricia Bourcier.
A global trend
This tendency to avoid early specialization — and to encourage the practice of several sports at a young age — is growing all over the world, underline authors Pierre Lavoie and Jean-François Harvey in their recent essay It has to move!
The sport-study model aimed at training elite athletes is “outdated”, say the authors, who are also great athletes. Scandinavian countries some time ago put aside sports-study programs intended to produce champions at young ages. In Norway, there is no ranking in sporting events before the age of 13.
Coach Patricia Bourcier believes that this shift is necessary: “The role of the school is not to train athletes, but to support young people in their sporting journey so that they continue to move throughout their lives. »
This does not mean that the students of this private school must be content to play dilettante, without real commitment, she specifies. “The notion of pleasure is important, but we are demanding in terms of effort, surpassing oneself and perseverance. These are values that will be used in everyday life. »
Students can specialize in a discipline in their final year of high school if they wish to continue at the college and university level. The skills learned on the tennis or basketball courts can be useful to them even if they decide to devote themselves to soccer, for example, emphasizes Patricia Bourcier.
The decision to transform the sports centers was not taken without gnashing of teeth, admits Jimmy-Éric Talbot, director of the establishment. Management and the board of directors were not convinced of the need for this shift, “even if we were moving in the direction of what science prescribes,” he explains.
However, everyone was “pleasantly surprised”, explains Jimmy-Éric Talbot. “There has been no reduction in registrations, but on the contrary, a craze. »
A reason to go to school
Heidi Malo, an alpine ski champion turned mental health consultant, also notes that the time is ripe to re-evaluate sports-study programs. She is familiar with the research demonstrating a risk of burnout and students dropping out of sports. But demand remains strong for these programs.
“Sports studies is what allows young people to stay motivated at school,” she says. Some have academic difficulties, but shine in sports. It keeps them in school. The problem is that their grades can drop because of the considerable time spent on training, matches and traveling, underlines Heidi Malo.
“What is important is the support offered to young people,” she says. The consultant helps sports studies students from two high schools in the Laurentians, north of Montreal, to manage their schedules. Their performance anxiety. To step out of their comfort zone and face adversity.
“Often the pressure comes from themselves. They must learn that not winning a competition does not mean that “I am rotten”,” explains Heidi Malo.
The coach recommends that young athletes try other activities after their hockey or snowboarding season. “Even when they do other sports for fun, they are afraid of failing. I ask them: “When was the last time you plays ? Just for the fun ?” »