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Playing Sports: The Importance

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Published: Mar 20, 2024

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Physical health benefits, mental and emotional well-being, social benefits, educational and cognitive development.

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Essay on Sports: 100+ Topics and Examples

How to Write an Essay on Sports

Various sports, like basketball, tennis, and soccer, are popular among young and older generations worldwide. In addition to the fact that playing sports brings mental and physical health in shape, it also projects sportsmen and women's leadership skills. These role models give sports fans reasons to keep rooting for their favorite players and fuel young athletes' motivation to keep practicing and perfecting themselves in various youth sports.

If you are interested in professional sports or the career development of professional athletes, we encourage you to write a college essay on sports.

Choosing a relevant topic when writing an essay on sports requires deep knowledge of a specific sports industry and its representatives.

• Choose a topic of your interest. Usually, tasks we are genuinely curious about require equal mental stimulation but less tension and stress. For instance, you could choose the topic of the influence of physical fitness on mental health in case you are interested in health science.
• Look for relevant resources to provide trustworthy and valuable information regarding the shortlist of sports essay topics. For example, you could check out famous journals that prioritize writing about physical activity and sports cultures, such as the British Journal of Sports Medicine or the Journal of Human Sport and Exercise.
• After gathering relevant data, list the major issues you will write about in the sports essay. For instance, if you'd rather concentrate on the features your favorite athlete acquires, we suggest you write on persuasive sports essay topics. Highlight the major events in the sports career of chosen male or female athletes that helped them go pro.
• Construct an essay outline highlighting the major points you will touch down throughout your essay. This will loosen the essay writing process and will save some time for you as well.
• As you point out the major issue of reflection in the thesis statement part of your introductory paragraph, proceed with the body paragraphs of arguments supporting your perspective regarding the statement.

Keep reading to find a variety of essay topics like an essay on sports day in English, as well as specified issues relating to sports competitions, such as an essay on concussions in sports, etc.

Essay Topics on Sports

College students who are interested in doing and writing about sports can find many essay topics listed below on sports ranging from Olympic games to performance-enhancing drugs, sports nutrition to sports injuries, and so on.

Persuasive Essay Topics on Sports

• Cross-country skiing is the most dangerous winter sport.
• American universities should pay college athletes
• Ice-Skating is the most aesthetically pleasing sport.
• Soccer is one of the most played college sports in the US.
• Alcohol consumption should be prohibited during the Olympic games.
• More awareness should be raised about racist team players in all kinds of sports.
• FIFA's primary mission is to promote intercultural relations.
• We should reconsider the age range of baseball players.
• There is a link between team sports and math.
• Dealing with Medicine is the most disputable issue of the Olympic Games.
• Sports culture in the US is much higher than in East European countries.
• Cricket should be included in the Summer Olympics.
• The UEFA Championship promotes youth sports.
• The New Orleans Saints as a revolutionary NFL team.
• Everyone should be developed at least in one sport.
• Fitness obsession is a benefit for physical health.
• Sports nutrition is more important than physical activity.
• Dancing is one of the best confidence boosters.
• The rise of Charlotte Horne's value because of MJ.
• International teams in football attract a wide range of audience.

Feel free to ask to ' write me an essay ' on a wide range of persuasive essay topics on sports. Our writers are always at your service to help you achieve academic success.

Argumentative Essay Topics on Sports

• Should major sports events be taken in politically dangerous zones?
• Sports programs should be accessible through all types of TV channel packages.
• Transgender athletes should have the freedom to choose their own pronouns.
• Current sports organizations are corrupt.
• Athletic training should be psychological too.
• Soccer is number one of the most popular sports around the US.
• The most quality games were played at the World Cup 2022.
• School athletics should be paid for.
• American football is not popular around the world.
• Ice hockey is the most dangerous of winter sports.
• Sporting events are mostly watched during work days.
• Physical exercise is as important as mental through athletic development.
• Sports psychology: implementation of a mental training course for student-athletes.
• Many current sports organizations degrade women's sports.
• Sports history: development of baseball around the USA.
• Playing sports should be obligatory for school children.
• Professional athletes should be paid more in Western European countries.
• Toxic masculinity ruins the success of team sports.
• Cheerleading should be part of the Olympic games.
• Are video games sports?

Simply ask to do my paper on various argumentative essay topics on sports and receive the high-quality finished product in the nick of time.

Essay on Sports and Games in School

• Should sports be made compulsory in schools?
• The impact of promoting Air Jordans on developing a winner's mindset in school children.
• The importance of having sports clubs in schools.
• Should school sports participation be an excuse to miss classes?
• Governments should encourage more youngsters to play school sports.
• Is sports a solution to the current mental health crisis in school children?
• Should governments promote more opportunities for high schoolers to pursue aesthetically pleasing sports?
• Which sport is most popular among youngsters around the US?
• Should prospective basketball players be rejected due to height measures in school basketball teams?
• The importance of physical therapy in high school athletes.
• Does sport teach the importance of teamwork?
• Should parents encourage students to play sports?
• Can the gym be a substitute for physical fitness?
• Do sports conflict with academic learning?
• Sports medicine application to mental exhaustion in school athletes.
• Does sport help students develop leadership skills?
• Is playing chess stimulating analytical thinking?
• Importance of media coverage of sports events.
• The pressure of performance in sports
• The chances of school students making it into the national basketball team.

Argumentative Essay on Gender Inequality in Sports

Check out some of the best sports essay topics if you are willing to write an argumentative essay on gender inequality in sports:

• Why are female athletes paid less than their male counterparts in most sports?
• Male athletes have more chances of going pro in basketball than women.
• Club sports exclude some players based on gender.
• Male and female athletes are equally resilient to sports injuries.
• Soccer and Ice hockey are male-dominated sports.
• The marketing strategies of UCR's Women's Basketball are inefficient.
• Height should not be a decisive factor for either men's or women's basketball.
• Gender prejudices discriminate against myriads of potentially successful athletes in various sports.
• National teams should be completed with males as well as females.
• Women's sports are not valued as much as Men's sports.
• Sports medicine is actively used by female athletes under pressure to enhance performance.
• The number of female athletes participating in the Olympic games should increase.
• Fewer female students choose to play sports after graduating from high school compared to the number of male students.
• Negative psychological aspects of post-traumatic stress disorder in athletes.
• More female students should be encouraged to play sports while performing their academic duties.
• Comparatively, more men make it to major league baseball than women.
• Performance-enhancing drugs adversely affect growing healthy muscle groups.
• Ancient sports like the ancient Greek Olympics have nothing in common with modern Olympic games.
• Lack of women professional football players in America.
• Women's soccer is less promoted by European high schools than Men's.

If you have already surpassed the age of school and you're currently working on an essay on sports and games in school or trying to write an essay on sports event in school, do not hesitate to contact our dissertation writers to hire .

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Essay on Benefits of Games and Sports

Playing professional sports brings about its advantages. Consider writing an essay on benefits of games and sports and choose from a wide variety of topics below:

• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved concentration
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Increased dopamine and serotonin level
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved mood
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved sleeping habits
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Reduced stress and depression
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Boosted Self-confidence
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Development of leadership traits
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved mental health
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Healthy sleeping habits
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Maintaining healthy body weight
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved academic performance in school children
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Better scholastic outcomes
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Active blood circulation
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Developing school athletes as better team players
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Enhanced analytic thinking
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Effective multitasking
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Improved mental and physical health.
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Opportunity to develop a career outside the home nation.
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Better communication skills.
• Benefits of Playing Sports: Smart time management.

Essay on My Favorite Sports Person

Famous sports figures often inspire school students. Take a look at the list of topics to write an essay on my favourite sports person:

• Roger Federer: my favorite tennis player
• Tiger Woods: the best golfer in the US
• Cristiano Ronaldo: The GOAT of GOATs.
• Rafael Nadal: the most prominent tennis player in Spain
• Kevin Durant: the rising star of the NBA
• Lebron James: the best basketball player in the modern NBA
• Usain Bolt: greatest sprinter of all time
• Alexi Lalas: most beloved American soccer player
• Michael Schumacher: seven-time World Champion
• Frank Thomas: greatest baseball player
• Shaun White: the best American snowboarder
• Jennie Finch: most honorable softball player in America
• Dirk Nowitzki: the guy who beat Lebron James.
• Kevin Garnett: most emotional and dedicated in NBA
• Ray Bourque: the best of hockey players
• Billie Jean King: Honor for women tennis players
• Bill Elliot: Nascar's most popular driver
• Mark Messier: greatest leader in hockey history
• Khvicha Kvaratskhelia: Rising star of European football
• Maradona: most prominent soccer player of all time

Feel free to write an essay on sports and games for 10th class from the above topics.

Persuasive Essay on Sports Betting

If you decide to write a persuasive essay on sports betting, take some inspiration from the topics below:

• Beginners should be taught how to place a bet.
• Money-line betting is addictive
• Sports betting should be prohibited under the 18
• Betting on NFL wins totals
• Scandal and controversy in sports are always connected to betting
• Game theory has a direct relation to gambling
• Online casinos should be banned
• Math is used in gambling to assess the risks of winning
• Sports bettors are great analysts
• Mobile betting is a better option than desktop
• Sportsbooks are the main guide to learning sports betting
• Gambling is more entertaining than addictive
• The FIFA World Cup has the biggest betting volume
• The Super Bowl makes up half of all sports bets summed up
• Kentucky Derby is one of the highest-rated betting events in horse racing
• The Grand National horse racing attracts the highest sports bettings around the UK
• Las Vegas is the best gambling destination in the world
• Singapore has one of the strictest gambling rules in the world
• Monte Carlo is the classiest gambling point
• Aruba is the Vegas of the Caribbean

Common App Essay on Sports

You can easily craft top-notch essays related to sports in your college application. Take some of the examples from the topics listed below, and do not hesitate to write a common app essay on sports.

• Learning to take constructive criticism as a soccer player
• Sports is the greatest teacher of teamwork
• Keeping a winner mindset through the challenges of chess
• How I Learned to be a leader through my college sports experience
• Basketball taught me the value of my own contribution to the team's success
• How Failures in soccer championships boosted my self-confidence
• The constant practice resulted in major success: how sport taught me the value of invested work
• How I learned to appreciate my body through the aesthetics of ice skating
• Hip-Hop dancing is the best teacher of networking with people of multicultural origins
• Winning a national tournament in swimming after numerous defeats
• Overcoming a sports injury and going back to a fresh start taught me resilience
• Being a part of the basketball team helped me better perceive my athletic abilities
• Coming from a family of immigrants, my soccer team helped me develop a sense of belonging on American land
• Being a high school student and an athlete led me to better time management
• Baseball player enhanced my concentration skills; within me
• Getting in touch with professional sports persons and mentors led me to personal growth
• Learning from mistakes and using defeat for my own benefit is what playing ice hockey taught me
• Running on the track made me become mentally sharp
• I learned how to lead the game through soccer
• Playing sports led me to broaden my network of professionals

Sample College Essay on Sports

The winning mindset plays a major role in helping athletes develop to the best of their potential. The profound legend of modern-day basketball, Michael Jordan is one of those rare athlete leaders that set an example for millions of college basketball players in and out of the USA on mastering his mind and shaping himself through tough discipline. Therefore, if you are interested in sports psychology, you could pick a related topic and represent an athlete or specific sports teams that similarly show off psychological discipline through their performance that later results in their success.

We have prepared a sample essay on sports below. Examine it carefully to understand a sports research paper format better!

Final Words

We are hoping that not only have you gained some ideas about essay topics on sports, but you are also leaving this article with the motivation to keep working despite any rejections or failures that come along the way.

Meanwhile, you can always use a research paper writing help service, and our experts will guide you through your winning essay writing process.

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Daniel Parker

is a seasoned educational writer focusing on scholarship guidance, research papers, and various forms of academic essays including reflective and narrative essays. His expertise also extends to detailed case studies. A scholar with a background in English Literature and Education, Daniel’s work on EssayPro blog aims to support students in achieving academic excellence and securing scholarships. His hobbies include reading classic literature and participating in academic forums.

is an expert in nursing and healthcare, with a strong background in history, law, and literature. Holding advanced degrees in nursing and public health, his analytical approach and comprehensive knowledge help students navigate complex topics. On EssayPro blog, Adam provides insightful articles on everything from historical analysis to the intricacies of healthcare policies. In his downtime, he enjoys historical documentaries and volunteering at local clinics.

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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, writing about sports in college essays.

Hey guys, I'm a junior and I'm starting to think about the topics for my college essay. I'm really passionate about sports and it's been a significant part of my high school experience. Is it a good idea to write about sports in my college essay? Can you share any tips and suggestions for making it stand out?

Writing about sports in your college essay can be a great idea if you approach it in a unique and personal way. While it's true that some sports-related essay topics are considered cliché, like sports injuries or victories, there's still a way to make yours stand out.

Here are some tips and suggestions for making your sports essay stand out:

1. Focus on a specific aspect: Instead of writing about your entire sports experience, choose a specific aspect or moment that carries personal significance. For example, how your connection with a teammate shaped your perspective on teamwork or how a particular challenge on the field taught you perseverance and resilience.

2. Share personal growth: Rather than just discussing your accomplishments or stats, emphasize how your involvement in sports has contributed to your personal growth and character development. Mention the skills and qualities you've gained and how they'll contribute to your success in college and beyond.

3. Write about a unique experience: Avoid the clichés by writing about an unusual or unexpected experience related to sports. For example, an essay could focus on how coaching a youth sports team shaped your leadership skills or how organizing a charity sports tournament benefited your community.

4. Show your passion: Make sure your genuine love for the sport comes across in your writing. This could be reflected in the vivid description of memorable moments or the enthusiasm with which you talk about your dedication and commitment to the sport.

5. Connect it to your future goals: Tie your sports experiences to your academic and career aspirations to show the admissions committee how your background in sports will contribute to your future success. For example, if you have a passion for sports science or sports management, discuss how your experiences on the field have fueled your interest in those fields.

By considering these tips, you can craft a compelling essay about your passion for sports without falling into cliché territory. Remember to make your essay personal, focused, and reflective of your personal growth, and you'll be well on your way to writing a standout sports-related essay.

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Argumentative Essay: The Importance of Sports

Participation in sports is extremely important, and should be encouraged much more. Children and young people in particular need to do sport so that they develop good habits that they can continue into adulthood. The main benefits of sport are improved health and fitness, and the development of social and communication skills.

With more than a third of adults in the USA being classed as obese, and many more being overweight, it has never been more important to participate in sports. People that do sport on a regular basis are burning more calories than those that don’t, and are therefore less likely to end up overweight. Being a healthy weight means that you will be less likely to die young and suffer from heart disease, strokes, high blood pressure, diabetes and a range of other conditions, and if you already eat well, it can give you an extra calorie allowance so you can treat yourself without feeling guilty about it.

As well as improving cardiovascular health and fitness, exercising is also good for the musculoskeletal system, making muscles more supple and toned, and improving the strength of bones and joints. People who do sports will be stronger and more able to lift and carry heavy things, which is also always useful, and they are less likely to become really weak and frail as they get older because their bodies are strong. Furthermore, doing sports can improve mental health as well as physical health, with exercise being helpful for people with depression and a range of other mental health issues, because it releases good chemicals into our brains. It also makes people feel better about their bodies, which can make them happier, and reduces the risk of eating disorders and crash dieting, as people make more sensible, healthy changes to their lifestyle.

Sports also allow people to develop personally. Social and communication skills can be learned and developed through sport. Teamwork, for example, is naturally learned through participating in team sports and games. Communication skills can really be honed, as they are at the center of any team’s success, and a lack of them leads to failure. Many people will also develop leadership skills through sport, often discovering abilities that they never knew they even had.

Many people’s self-esteem improves through sport as they discover things that they are good at and improve their body. Participating in any competitive sport also improves our ability to handle pressure and still perform well, as well as teaching us how to win and lose graciously. All in all, the fact that playing sport is good for us is completely undeniable, because it helps our minds and bodies, and ultimately means that we will be living longer, happier lives.

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Essay on Importance of Sports for Students and Children

500+ words essay on importance of sports.

First of all, Sport refers to an activity involving physical activity and skill . Here, two or more parties compete against each other. Sports are an integral part of human life and there is great importance of sports in all spheres of life. Furthermore, Sports help build the character and personality of a person. It certainly is an excellent tool to keep the body physically fit. Most noteworthy, the benefits of Sports are so many that books can be written.  Sports have a massive positive effect on both the mind and body.

Physical Benefits of Sports

First of all, Sports strengthen the heart. Regular Sports certainly make the heart stronger. Hence, Sport is an excellent preventive measure against heart diseases . This certainly increases the life expectancy of individuals. Furthermore, a healthy heart means a healthy blood pressure.

Sports involve physical activity of the body. Due to this physical activity, blood vessels remain clean. Sports reduces the amount of cholesterol and fats in the body. This happens because of the increase of flexibility of the wall of the blood vessels. The flexibility increases due to physical exertion, which is the result of Sports.

Furthermore, the sugar level in blood also gets lower thanks to Sports. The sugar certainly does not accumulate in the blood due to physical activity.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

A person experiences a good quality of breathing because of Sports. Sports strengthen the lungs of the body. Sports certainly escalate the lung capacity and efficiency of the body. Hence, more oxygen enters the blood which is extremely beneficial. Furthermore, there are fewer chances of developing lung diseases due to Sports.

Appropriate body weight is easy to maintain because of sports. A Sports playing person probably does not suffer from obesity or underweight problems. Sports certainly help the body remain fit and slim.

Furthermore, Sports also improves the quality of bones. A person who plays sports will have strong bones even in old age. Several scientific research reports that Sports prevent many diseases. For example, many researchers conclude that Sports prevent the development of cancer.

Other Benefits of Sports

Sport is certainly an excellent tool to build self-confidence . Playing Sports increases confidence to talk properly. A sport certainly improves the skills of communicating with others. Furthermore, the person experiences confidence in sitting, standing, and walking properly. Hence, Sports enriches the social life of an individual.

Sports bring discipline in life. It certainly teaches the values of dedication and patience. Sports also teach people how to handle failure. Furthermore, the importance of following a time schedule is also present in Sports.

Above all, Sports improves the thinking ability of individuals. Sports certainly sharpen the mind. Children who play Sports probably perform better at exams than those who don’t.

Finally, Sports reduces the stress of mind . A Sports playing person would certainly experience less depression. Sports ensure the peace of mind of those playing it. Most noteworthy, Sports brings happiness and joy in the life of individuals.

A sport is an aspect of human life that is of paramount importance. It certainly increases the quality of human life. Sports must be made mandatory in schools. This is because it is as important as education. Everyone must perform at least one Sport activity on a regular basis.

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Extracurriculars.

3 Successful Extracurricular Activity Essay Examples

The purpose of the extracurricular activities essay is for admissions officers to better understand how your extracurricular activities have shaped and motivated you. This essay shouldn’t restate the activities you’ve already shared in your resume, but should elaborate on their impact and significance to you as a person.

In this post, we will share three extracurricular essays, written by real students, that are strong responses. Read them to be inspired in your own essay writing!

Please note: Looking at examples of real essays students have submitted to colleges can be very beneficial to get inspiration for your essays. You should never copy or plagiarize from these examples when writing your own essays. Colleges can tell when an essay isn’t genuine and will not view students favorably if they plagiarized. 

Essay Example #1

My fingers raced across the keys, rapidly striking one after another. My body swayed with the music as my hands raced across the piano. Crashing onto the final chord, it was over as quickly as it had begun. My shoulders relaxed and I couldn’t help but break into a satisfied grin. I had just played the Moonlight Sonata’s third movement, a longtime dream of mine.

Four short months ago, though, I had considered it impossible. The piece’s tempo was impossibly fast, its notes stretching between each end of the piano, forcing me to reach farther than I had ever dared. It was 17 pages of the most fragile and intricate melodies I had ever encountered.

But that summer, I found myself ready to take on the challenge. With the end of the school year, I was released from my commitment to practicing for band and solo performances. I was now free to determine my own musical path: either succeed in learning the piece, or let it defeat me for the third summer in a row.

Over those few months, I spent countless hours practicing the same notes until they burned a permanent place in my memory, creating a soundtrack for even my dreams. Some would say I’ve mastered the piece, but as a musician I know better. Now that I can play it, I am eager to take the next step and add in layers of musicality and expression to make the once-impossible piece even more beautiful.

What the Essay Did Well

This essay has a descriptive and engaging hook that immediately places the reader in the middle of the action and captivates us for the rest of the essay. The way the student describes playing piano as a full-body experience, from their splayed out fingers to their tensed shoulders, allows the reader to envision the student in front of them, passionately losing themselves in the music. Seeing the way they write about the piano is a sign that this student is dedicated to this extracurricular. 

Another strength of this essay is how it shows this student’s character, particularly their determination. By describing the challenge of playing this piece, we can fully appreciate all that they had to overcome to be successful. Rather than simply saying it was a hard song, they show us how it was physically and mentally daunting: “ The piece’s tempo was impossibly fast, its notes stretching between each end of the piano, forcing me to reach farther than I had ever dared. It was 17 pages of the most fragile and intricate melodies I had ever encountered.”

This student knows how to make music in their writing, as well as on the piano. The use of elevated and creative language throughout the essay makes it flow smoothly for the reader. They take a rather simple story, but through their deft writing the student makes it both enjoyable and reveals details about themself.

What Could Be Improved

This essay could have been made even stronger if this student included details about them actually practicing. They go from telling us about how daunting this piece was to suddenly being able to play it months later, but admissions officers are curious about how you overcome challenges, not just the fact that you did.

Two or three sentences that describe the tedious process of practicing a particular scale or how they continuously messed up a certain bar of music would be sufficient to express what this student actually accomplished. Although space is tight in this essay, this would have been a better use of the third paragraph than what the student currently has. 

Essay Example #2

My school’s newspaper and I have a typical love-hate relationship; some days I want nothing more than to pass two hours writing and formatting articles, while on others the mere thought of student journalism makes me shiver. Still, as we’re entering our fourth year together, you could consider us relatively stable. We’ve learned to accept each other’s differences; at this point I’ve become comfortable spending an entire Friday night preparing for an upcoming issue, and I hardly even notice the snail-like speed of our computers. I’ve even benefitted from the polygamous nature of our relationship—with twelve other editors, there’s a lot of cooperation involved. Perverse as it may be, from that teamwork I’ve both gained some of my closest friends and improved my organizational and time-management skills. And though leaving it in the hands of new editors next year will be difficult, I know our time together has only better prepared me for future relationships.

This response is great. It’s cute and endearing and, importantly, tells readers a lot about the student who wrote it. Framing this essay in the context of a “love-hate relationship,” then supplementing with comments like “We’ve learned to accept each other’s differences” allows this student to advertise their maturity in a unique and engaging way. 

Personifying the newspaper is a creative way to demonstrate the role it plays in this student’s life. Because it is an unexpected tactic, it lets the reader appreciate the humor and wit of the author, while also being a lighthearted and fun response to read. 

While Extracurricular Essays can be a place to show how you’ve grown within an activity, they can also be a place to show how you’ve grown through an activity. At the end of this essay, readers think that this student is mature and enjoyable, and we think that their experience with the school newspaper helped make them that way.

One strike against this essay is that in the first sentence it claims the student has a love-hate relationship with the newspaper, but the rest of the essay really only addresses their experience from a positive perspective. They say the “ mere thought of student journalism makes me shiver ” but there is little-to-no elaboration about the negatives. Since they poised their essay as a love-hate relationship, it feels like it is missing something without any discussion about the hate aspect of the relationship. 

Essay Example #3

The cool, white halls of the Rayburn House office building contrasted with the bustling energy of interns entertaining tourists, staffers rushing to cover committee meetings, and my fellow conference attendees separating to meet with our respective congresspeople. Through civics and US history classes, I had learned about our government, but simply hearing the legislative process outlined didn’t prepare me to navigate it. It was my first political conference, and, after learning about congressional mechanics during breakout sessions, I was lobbying my representative about an upcoming vote crucial to the US-Middle East relationship. As the daughter of Iranian immigrants, my whole life had led me to the moment when I could speak on behalf of the family members who had not emigrated with my parents.

As I sat down with my congresswoman’s chief of staff, I truly felt like a participant in democracy; I was exercising my right to be heard as a young American. Through this educational conference, I developed a plan of action to raise my voice. When I returned home, I signed up to volunteer with the state chapter of the Democratic Party. I sponsored letter-writing campaigns, canvassed for local elections, and even pursued an internship with a state senate campaign. I know that I don’t need to be old enough to vote to effect change. Most importantly, I also know that I want to study government—I want to make a difference for my communities in the United States and the Middle East throughout my career.

The strength of this essay comes from its connections. It connects the student’s extracurricular activity to their studies and connects theirs studies to their personal history.

While this prompt is about extracurricular activities, it specifically references the idea that the extracurricular should support the curricular. It is focused on experiential learning for future career success. This student wants to study government, so they chose to describe an experience of hands-on learning within their field—an apt choice!

As this student discusses their extracurricular experience, they also clue readers into their future goals—they want to help Middle Eastern communities. Admissions officers love when students mention concrete plans with a solid foundation. Here, the foundation comes from this student’s ethnicity. With lines like “my whole life had led me to the moment when I could speak on behalf of the family members who had not emigrated with my parents,” the student assures admissions officers of their emotional connection to their future field.

Something that is missing from this essay is the emotional reflection this student has from their experiences in politics. They tell us they felt like a participant in democracy and they know they want to study government and make a difference, but for a really strong essay you need to dig deeper and tell the reader more about how this extracurricular makes you feel.

What does it feel like to be a participant in democracy? Liberating? Empowering? How did volunteering impact them personally? Did they develop a new appreciation for what it means to be an American? What feeling is this student trying to elicit by studying government? While all of these questions don’t have to be addressed, the idea is to inject more of the student’s feelings and emotion into the essay to help us better understand exactly what this extracurricular meant to them. 

More Supplemental Essay Tips

4 Tips for Writing a Diversity College Essay

How to Write the “Why This College” Essay

Where to Get Your Extracurricular Activity Essays Edited

Do you want feedback on your Extracurricular Activity essays? After rereading your essays countless times, it can be difficult to evaluate your writing objectively. That’s why we created our free Peer Essay Review tool , where you can get a free review of your essay from another student. You can also improve your own writing skills by reviewing other students’ essays. 

If you want a college admissions expert to review your essay, advisors on CollegeVine have helped students refine their writing and submit successful applications to top schools. Find the right advisor for you to improve your chances of getting into your dream school!

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Leadership in the Sports Club Group

Introduction, sports club group, personality qualities relevant to leadership, leadership styles, use of power tactics.

In any environment like in school, workplace, or at home, groups typically need guidance to obtain and achieve their goals and objectives. In this view, each group needs someone to motivate, coordinate and sustain the group leader (Forsyth, 2018). A leader shapes a group’s future by constantly changing a group’s incompetent status into a productive and active group using various personality qualities that remain relevant to leadership styles, and other tactics like power use. A leader who uses all these approaches successfully transforms a group into a successful one that obtains set goals and objectives. This research paper aims to discuss my changing experience as a member of the sports club group in our community through leadership.

Our community’s sports club group comprises community members that play soccer for the district to raise funds. The group seeks to ensure that each family from a poor financial background gets access to clean community water like other communities using the funds raised from matches played. However, since 2018 the group failed to effectively obtain the set goals and objectives since it has not reached the halfway mark of the set region required for various reasons. In 2019 the group met and elected Johnson King as the group’s new leader due to a lack of motivation, inadequate coordination, and unstable sustainability of group issues because of ineffective leadership. Employees need to be motivated to them perform well and give the best services to clients (Wille et al., 2018). Since 2019 the leadership change has remarkably transformed the group because it has effectively reached the set objectives. Mainly using power tactics, practical leadership qualities, and effective leadership styles have transformed the group.

The dynamics of a group involve influential interpersonal processes such as leadership in groups. When Johnson King took over as a group leader, the group was good but not doing great. A community sports group destined for greatness was not performing well, and Johnson felt the group’s strengths were not exploited fully. He focused on the strategy, structure, systems, and members with optimistic, energetic, and fearless styles. As a group leader, he guided the group using his outstanding qualities of organizing people from inefficiency and disorganization to efficiency and organizing a group that effectively performed its duties.

Previous research indicates that leadership takes place in a group context. For instance, when Johnson took over as the sports club group leader, he sent each member a personal text message expressing massive confidence in the club and encouraged them that change would take place fast. Thus, leadership is a process of influence where members of a group guide each other to pursue collective and personal goals and objectives (Gandolfi & Stone, 2018). Consequently, leadership is a process of influence and not a position in an office through experience leadership (Jain et al., 2018). Johnson’s other personal quality of leadership identifies the group members’ sub-tasks as it pursued its goals. He assigned each task to specific employees who can handle it more professionally.

Studies show that leaders have particular personality characteristics that separated them from the rest. The personality of a leader guarantees stronger relationships among employees and hence, it ensures the successful leadership of a group (Huertas-Valdivia et al., 2019). Other personality qualities include but are not limited to self-monitoring, selfishness, dominance, social motivation, and assertiveness. The experiences under Johnson King as the group leader also show that these personalities’ interactions with the situation help lead a group. Therefore, organized, conscientious, self-controlled, and achievement-oriented people remain most likely to emerge as successful leaders in circumstances that encourage task-oriented leaders (Huertas-Valdivia et al., 2019). Besides that, handling projects promptly satisfy clients’ needs.

On the other hand, extroverted persons lead when the circumstances need interpersonal skills. Johnson as a leader had stable emotions and remained open to new experiences to help the group achieve its goals. Additionally, Johnson’s self-authenticity helped guide the group to its success as he remained aware of his qualities, beliefs, values, and more miniature exhibition of bias when handling self-relevant information. The authenticity made the group members accept him as a leader, hence working in coordination to perform the duties and responsibilities placed upon them. Additionally, his assertiveness helped him to be considered the greatest leader.

Johnson applied the implicit leadership theory to ensure the group succeeds in its objectives. In this case, the theory suggests that the leader must ensure hardworking among groups and ensure things get done. The leader must inspire by motivating members to remain positive, encouraged, and dynamic, like when Johnson sent a text message of encouragement and promised change in the group (Hensel & Visser, 2018). The theory also suggests that the leader remains in command, has relationship skills, is caring, truthful, interested in others’ ideologies, is influential, and active (Hensel & Visser, 2018). As a leader, Johnson utilized charisma, likeability, and persistence as suggested by Robert Lord in the Implicit Theory to lead the sports group to success (Forsyth, 2018). Therefore, the leadership theory advocates for inspirational, intelligent, diplomatic, visionary, high integrity, dedication, team-oriented, and relational. Implicit leadership theory asserts that a leader ought to remain motivational, inspiring, caring, open to new ideologies from other members, and relational.

The experiences also demonstrate that Johnson King used various leadership styles like the shared leadership style. Such leadership remains effective, like centralized leadership that emphasizes a leader’s monopoly in power (Hensel & Visser, 2018). Moreover, a shared leadership style reduces the leader’s authority and influence in a group by distributing responsibility for critical leadership functions among each group member. In this view, Johnson King shared essential leadership functions and assigned critical functions of the ground to each member, creating a sense of togetherness that helped achieve the group’s objectives of raising funds to provide tap water to each member in the community.

Charismatic leadership style assisted Johnson in guiding the group to greatness for two years only. In this case, he transformed the group to achieve more in terms of personal satisfaction, growth, and performance. The style helps each group member establish themselves well, enabling them to pursue group objectives and goals that result in the success experienced within and outside the group (Hensel & Visser, 2018). Transactional leadership also involves a leader and a follower cooperating in pursuing the shared goals and objectives. However, the relationship remains based on exchanging resources such as money, time, instruction, and help. In this case, Johnson utilized the transactional style to obtain set goals.

Power is one of the group-level processes that remain predicated on differentiation in every member’s capability in influencing others. Those that have it make demands that group members might resist. Additionally, power might result in conflicts, hatred, and tension, but it brings order, efficiency, and stability (Mohiuddin, 2017). Some people resist power, but some obey and follow orders without force. Studies indicate that power remains relational and originates in inequalities in control of punishment and resources.

Therefore, when an individual experiences negative and positive outcomes rely on another individual not dependent, it results in differences in power. There are five forms of power: legitimate, referent, coercive, expert power, and reward. In this case, reward power remains considerable because it enables the leader to control the allocation of both personal and impersonal rewards (Mohiuddin, 2017). Johnson King utilized power as a leader through the experiences witnessed to ensure people followed and remained obedient to the directives and instructions that helped achieve the set objectives. In this view, impersonal rewards include awards, food, promotions, while personal rewards include interpersonal reinforcements

Through group experiences, groups require leadership guidance to help in working on setting goals and objectives. Utilizing practical personality qualities relevant to leadership, suitable leadership style, and power motivate, inspire, and guide groups towards a typical course of obtaining set targets. Johnson succeeded in leading the group by effectively using these aspects of his leadership. Therefore, leadership involves a process of influence where each group member guides one another to achieve collective and personal goals. In transforming the group, Johnson King’s personality qualities include self-monitoring, assertiveness, selfishness, motivation, dominance, and social motivation. A shared leadership style allows the leader to share responsibilities that help group functionality. Power could cause conflicts, tension, and aggression, but it could also lead people to obey their leaders, hence achieving set objectives.

Forsyth, D. R. (2018). Group dynamics . Cengage Learning.

Gandolfi, F., & Stone, S. (2018). Leadership, leadership styles, and servant leadership. Journal of Management Research , 18 (4), 261-269.

Hensel, R., & Visser, R. (2018). Shared leadership in entrepreneurial teams: The impact of personality. International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behavior & Research , 6 (24), 1104-1119.

Huertas-Valdivia, I., Gallego-Burín, A. R., & Lloréns-Montes, F. J. (2019). Effects of different leadership styles on hospitality workers. Tourism Management , 71 , 402-420.

Jain, V., Chawla, M., Ganesh, B. E., & Pich, C. (2018). Exploring and consolidating the brand personality elements of the political leader. Spanish Journal of Marketing-ESIC , 3 (22), 297-320.

Mohiuddin, Z. A. (2017). Influence of leadership style on employees performance: Evidence from Literatures. Journal of Marketing & Management , 8 (1), 18-30.

Wille, B., Wiernik, B. M., Vergauwe, J., Vrijdags, A., & Trbovic, N. (2018). Personality characteristics of male and female executives: Distinct pathways to success?. Journal of Vocational Behavior , 106 , 220-235.

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• Essay On Importance Of Sports

Essay on Sports

500+ word essay on the importance of sports.

Sports keep us healthy and active. We can have a healthy mind only when we have a healthy body. We can achieve anything in our lives if we have a healthy body and a peaceful mind. Physical and mental well-being comes naturally when we involve ourselves in sports activities. Sports help in improving our overall personality and make us more active and attentive. Here, students can find a 500+ Words Essay on the Importance of Sports where we will be discussing how important a role sports plays in our life.

Essay on the Importance of Sports

The topic of sports is very broad. It can serve as a form of therapy and a tool in different aspects of life, which can help change the world. Through sports, children develop physical skills, exercise, be team players, and improve their self-esteem. Sports play a significant role in advancing education and in enhancing knowledge.

Playing sports means regular exercising, jogging, going to the fitness centres or playing any game. There are different types of games involved in sports activities. Each game has its own specific rules. These sports activities are done either by individuals or teams for leisure, and entertainment as well as to compete against one another. Playing sports improves the physiological functions of the body organs and improves the functionality of the entire body system. Through sports, we learn different skills like leadership, patience, coordination, motivation, and team effort.

Sport has great importance in building personality, too. For some people, it is not only the body movement or playing strategy, but it’s a life philosophy. In the modern world, a positive attitude to sports is becoming a trend and style. Young people try to look sporty, fit and full of energy. A sports career in India was considered less lucrative in the past. However, now it has become one of the gainful professional options for students. Sometimes students take an interest in sports merely for adventure and a tension-free life. Now, sports games are gaining popularity. Various sports competitions are played at the international level, such as the Olympics. Apart from it, multiple matches and inter-city competitions are organised to promote the field of sports.

Benefits of Sports and Games

Nowadays, we can see problems related to unhealthy lifestyles. We sit more and more on the couch, surrounded by modern technologies. We don’t realise the importance and benefits of sports and physical activities. The lack of physical activity in our body leads to obesity and many other health problems such as heart disease and so. It has become a necessity of today’s world that all of us do daily physical activities or play any sports for a minimum of 30 minutes.

Regular physical activity benefits health in many ways. It helps build and maintain healthy bones, muscles and joints, controls weight, reduces fat, and prevents high blood pressure. Children who participate in physical activities such as sports, experience positive health benefits. These health benefits include a decreased risk of high blood pressure, obesity, heart disease, diabetes and cancer. Also, these children are less likely to smoke or use drugs and alcohol than children who don’t participate in sports.

Keep learning and stay tuned with BYJU’S for the latest update on CBSE/ICSE/State Board/Competitive Exams. Also, download the BYJU’S App for interactive study videos.

Frequently asked Questions on the Importance of Sports Essay

Why is playing sports important for us.

Playing sports not only helps in the active functioning of our body but also helps in flexibility and reduces the chances of falling sick.

Which was the first sport to be played in the world?

Wrestling is said to have been the first sport played in the world, depictions of the same can be found in the caves of France.

Which is the most famous sport in the world?

Football is ranked as the top sport with 3.5 billion followers, seconded by Cricket.

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How the power of sport can bring us together and drive social justice

A man gets ready to ski at Ski Dubai, following the outbreak COVID-19 in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, May 28, 2020. Image:  REUTERS/Ahmed Jadallah

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Ahmed medien.

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.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{margin-top:16px;margin-bottom:16px;line-height:1.388;color:#2846F8;font-size:1.25rem;}@media screen and (min-width:56.5rem){.chakra .wef-1nk5u5d{font-size:1.125rem;}} Get involved with our crowdsourced digital platform to deliver impact at scale

Stay up to date:, media, entertainment and sport.

• Sports have brought people together during the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Many leagues have adopted creative solutions to overcome health and safety challenges.
• Sports icons and leagues have leveraged their platforms to address key social justice issues.

Even as the recent surge of COVID-19 cases from new variants has led to increased lockdowns around the world, people are still uniting for a common purpose: sport.

Major international sports leagues successfully started to return to stadiums in much of the world last summer as cross-industry partnerships , innovation and new safety measures made it possible to address the pandemic's challenging health and safety risks and bring sports back to the playing field. At the same time, sports organisations and athletes took on heightened roles by leveraging their platforms to shine the spotlight on social justice issues.

As COVID-19 vaccine distribution expands and fans return to stadiums , what can sport tell us about how to connect people and improve social cohesion in the year ahead?

Learning from bubbles and the digital experience

Some sports leagues, such as the NFL, were impacted by COVID-19 cases in 2020, though relatively low in proportion to the number of tests conducted (the NFL had about 500 confirmed positive cases from more than 800,000 tests between August and December). On the other hand, the NBA and MLS in the US, NHL in Canada, UEFA Champions League in Europe, all finished their 2020 seasons without a single positive COVID-19 case.

This success was largely possible due to strict safety measures from localized bubbles and “bio-bubbles”, which essentially isolated players from the outside world to help minimize the risk of contraction of the coronavirus.

Yet sustaining such an environment is not economical in the long term. The NBA bubble cost over $150 million to maintain factoring in daily tests, treatments, quarantine, meals, security, transportation and sanitization of facilities. Furthermore, isolation can also impact the players’ mental health.

Digital experiences through technological advancement and personalization are instrumental in ensuring commercial viability as well as engaging consumers in a world of social hostility. For example, La Liga introduced various audio-visual effects working with EA sports and others to bring reactive crowd noises and virtual audiences into its games. The NBA created a truly immersive experience by providing courtside seats for its virtual fans to watch and react to the games in real-time.

Driving positive societal change

Beyond its immediate physical health benefits, sport can be a vehicle for well-being, tolerance and a means of raising awareness and lessening the cultural divide. The return of sports and even the re-opening of sports facilities could significantly improve the mental health of sports fans and athletes who find themselves at risk of mental health decline due to isolation. Sport has been attributed to helping form stronger societal bonds and boosting self-esteem for the younger generation .

Sports can also play an important role in addressing and raising awareness of key societal issues. This has been a year of reckoning for social justice throughout the world, leading to renewed conversations about inequalities and the duty of government, businesses, and other influential stakeholders to coalesce around issues of social justice and economic empowerment of marginalized communities.

For example, the NBA established a social justice coalition , a board of players, coaches and governors, to promote civic engagement, voting and reform to police and criminal justice. Players wore jerseys with custom social justice statements to promote the Black Lives Matter movement, and the teams even collaborated with local elections officials to convert their stadiums to polling centres with safety measures to encourage voting during the last presidential elections in the US.

The League, also in partnership with the National Basketball Players Association (NBPA), established a foundation and is committing $300 million in funding over the next 10 years to promote skills development, employment and career advancement among Black youth in the US and Canada.

Sports icons also play an important role in showcasing model behaviour and sportsmanship. From the Michael Jordan mania of the 90’s encouraging athleticism among young fans of basketball, to the “ Salah effect ” generated by Liverpool FC’s Mo Salah that has enabled cultural acceptance of Islam amongst British fans, athletes can promote diversity and tolerance, helping to build understanding towards communities that face cultural marginalization .

For example, during the COVID-19 lockdown, Marcus Rashford, England’s football striker, helped introduce a campaign to feed more than 1.5 million vulnerable children that were unable to get free school meals due to school closures.

Finally, sport can be an excellent common denominator for tackling cultural barriers in society. The International Olympic Committee is taking strides towards messages of tolerance and inclusion. The committee opened Pride House Tokyo , a permanent community hub for LGBTQ+ peoples in Tokyo as part of its ongoing planning for the Tokyo Summer Olympics in July 2021.

On the same front, Manchester United, the Premier League’s club with most titles, continues its support towards reducing cultural barriers in the workplace by partnering with Stonewall, a UK-based LGBTQ+ national charity, to promote an inclusive work environment and training programs for its employees.

Have you read?

The uniquely unifying power of sports, and why it matters , sports as a service: will covid-19 change how we watch sports, it's time to change the way we think about the value of media.

Creating targets for social justice

International sporting events have played a tremendous role not only economically, but in being a force for peace and reconciliation that enable cohesion across the world. In the 2018 Winter Olympics, North Korean and South Korean athletes marched under a unified flag , a significant tender of peace between the countries; both countries even fielded a unified ice hockey women’s team.

That said, powerful anecdotes such as this one would be strengthened if they could be benchmarked against measurable targets.

The United Arab Emirates is one country attempting to do so by developing a social cohesion index as part of its Vision 2021 . One of its metrics is the number of Olympic and Paralympic medals won by the country, illustrating the importance the country places on participating in sport and recognizing the impact of social cohesion on societal wellbeing.

These values are exemplified throughout the country. For example, Majid Al Futtaim, a leading shopping mall, communities, retail and leisure pioneer across the Middle East, is committed to UAE’s Vision 2021 and has implemented several safety measures to enable customers to return safely to its facilities and Ski Dubai, including a queueless experience enabled by QR codes and advanced sanitization measures. It is also serving as a hub for international sporting competitions such as The World Cup and Para Snowboard World Cup.

“Sport and entertainment are powerful tools for social integration and inclusion, whilst having the power to unite people in challenging times. In line with Vision 2021, we will continue to leverage the power of sport to strengthen social cohesion.”

As the world looks ahead to a promising lineup of international sports events including the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and the Qatar FIFA World Cup in 2022, we must draw on the lessons learned from the industry in 2020. Sport has a unique power to relay important messages, foster cultural inclusion and tolerance and bridge a divided society. We expect that sport will continue to advance social reform and increase cultural acceptance by providing a common platform to bring us together in the year ahead.

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• Systematic review update
• Open access
• Published: 21 June 2023

The impact of sports participation on mental health and social outcomes in adults: a systematic review and the ‘Mental Health through Sport’ conceptual model

• Narelle Eather   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-6320-4540 1 , 2 ,
• Levi Wade   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-4007-5336 1 , 3 ,
• Aurélie Pankowiak   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0003-0178-513X 4 &
• Rochelle Eime   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0002-8614-2813 4 , 5  

Systematic Reviews volume  12 , Article number:  102 ( 2023 ) Cite this article

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Sport is a subset of physical activity that can be particularly beneficial for short-and-long-term physical and mental health, and social outcomes in adults. This study presents the results of an updated systematic review of the mental health and social outcomes of community and elite-level sport participation for adults. The findings have informed the development of the ‘Mental Health through Sport’ conceptual model for adults.

Nine electronic databases were searched, with studies published between 2012 and March 2020 screened for inclusion. Eligible qualitative and quantitative studies reported on the relationship between sport participation and mental health and/or social outcomes in adult populations. Risk of bias (ROB) was determined using the Quality Assessment Tool (quantitative studies) or Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (qualitative studies).

The search strategy located 8528 articles, of which, 29 involving adults 18–84 years were included for analysis. Data was extracted for demographics, methodology, and study outcomes, and results presented according to study design. The evidence indicates that participation in sport (community and elite) is related to better mental health, including improved psychological well-being (for example, higher self-esteem and life satisfaction) and lower psychological ill-being (for example, reduced levels of depression, anxiety, and stress), and improved social outcomes (for example, improved self-control, pro-social behavior, interpersonal communication, and fostering a sense of belonging). Overall, adults participating in team sport had more favorable health outcomes than those participating in individual sport, and those participating in sports more often generally report the greatest benefits; however, some evidence suggests that adults in elite sport may experience higher levels of psychological distress. Low ROB was observed for qualitative studies, but quantitative studies demonstrated inconsistencies in methodological quality.

Conclusions

The findings of this review confirm that participation in sport of any form (team or individual) is beneficial for improving mental health and social outcomes amongst adults. Team sports, however, may provide more potent and additional benefits for mental and social outcomes across adulthood. This review also provides preliminary evidence for the Mental Health through Sport model, though further experimental and longitudinal evidence is needed to establish the mechanisms responsible for sports effect on mental health and moderators of intervention effects. Additional qualitative work is also required to gain a better understanding of the relationship between specific elements of the sporting environment and mental health and social outcomes in adult participants.

Peer Review reports

Introduction

The organizational structure of sport and the performance demands characteristic of sport training and competition provide a unique opportunity for participants to engage in health-enhancing physical activity of varied intensity, duration, and mode; and the opportunity to do so with other people as part of a team and/or club. Participation in individual and team sports have shown to be beneficial to physical, social, psychological, and cognitive health outcomes [ 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 ]. Often, the social and mental health benefits facilitated through participation in sport exceed those achieved through participation in other leisure-time or recreational activities [ 8 , 9 , 10 ]. Notably, these benefits are observed across different sports and sub-populations (including youth, adults, older adults, males, and females) [ 11 ]. However, the evidence regarding sports participation at the elite level is limited, with available research indicating that elite athletes may be more susceptible to mental health problems, potentially due to the intense mental and physical demands placed on elite athletes [ 12 ].

Participation in sport varies across the lifespan, with children representing the largest cohort to engage in organized community sport [ 13 ]. Across adolescence and into young adulthood, dropout from organized sport is common, and especially for females [ 14 , 15 , 16 ], and adults are shifting from organized sports towards leisure and fitness activities, where individual activities (including swimming, walking, and cycling) are the most popular [ 13 , 17 , 18 , 19 ]. Despite the general decline in sport participation with age [ 13 ], the most recent (pre-COVID) global data highlights that a range of organized team sports (such as, basketball, netball volleyball, and tennis) continue to rank highly amongst adult sport participants, with soccer remaining a popular choice across all regions of the world [ 13 ]. It is encouraging many adults continue to participate in sport and physical activities throughout their lives; however, high rates of dropout in youth sport and non-participation amongst adults means that many individuals may be missing the opportunity to reap the potential health benefits associated with participation in sport.

According to the World Health Organization, mental health refers to a state of well-being and effective functioning in which an individual realizes his or her own abilities, is resilient to the stresses of life, and is able to make a positive contribution to his or her community [ 20 ]. Mental health covers three main components, including psychological, emotional and social health [ 21 ]. Further, psychological health has two distinct indicators, psychological well-being (e.g., self-esteem and quality of life) and psychological ill-being (e.g., pre-clinical psychological states such as psychological difficulties and high levels of stress) [ 22 ]. Emotional well-being describes how an individual feels about themselves (including life satisfaction, interest in life, loneliness, and happiness); and social well–being includes an individual’s contribution to, and integration in society [ 23 ].

Mental illnesses are common among adults and incidence rates have remained consistently high over the past 25 years (~ 10% of people affected globally) [ 24 ]. Recent statistics released by the World Health Organization indicate that depression and anxiety are the most common mental disorders, affecting an estimated 264 million people, ranking as one of the main causes of disability worldwide [ 25 , 26 ]. Specific elements of social health, including high levels of isolation and loneliness among adults, are now also considered a serious public health concern due to the strong connections with ill-health [ 27 ]. Participation in sport has shown to positively impact mental and social health status, with a previous systematic review by Eime et al. (2013) indicated that sports participation was associated with lower levels of perceived stress, and improved vitality, social functioning, mental health, and life satisfaction [ 1 ]. Based on their findings, the authors developed a conceptual model (health through sport) depicting the relationship between determinants of adult sports participation and physical, psychological, and social health benefits of participation. In support of Eime’s review findings, Malm and colleagues (2019) recently described how sport aids in preventing or alleviating mental illness, including depressive symptoms and anxiety or stress-related disease [ 7 ]. Andersen (2019) also highlighted that team sports participation is associated with decreased rates of depression and anxiety [ 11 ]. In general, these reviews report stronger effects for sports participation compared to other types of physical activity, and a dose–response relationship between sports participation and mental health outcomes (i.e., higher volume and/or intensity of participation being associated with greater health benefits) when adults participate in sports they enjoy and choose [ 1 , 7 ]. Sport is typically more social than other forms of physical activity, including enhanced social connectedness, social support, peer bonding, and club support, which may provide some explanation as to why sport appears to be especially beneficial to mental and social health [ 28 ].

Thoits (2011) proposed several potential mechanisms through which social relationships and social support improve physical and psychological well-being [ 29 ]; however, these mechanisms have yet to be explored in the context of sports participation at any level in adults. The identification of the mechanisms responsible for such effects may direct future research in this area and help inform future policy and practice in the delivery of sport to enhance mental health and social outcomes amongst adult participants. Therefore, the primary objective of this review was to examine and synthesize all research findings regarding the relationship between sports participation, mental health and social outcomes at the community and elite level in adults. Based on the review findings, the secondary objective was to develop the ‘Mental Health through Sport’ conceptual model.

This review has been registered in the PROSPERO systematic review database and assigned the identifier: CRD42020185412. The conduct and reporting of this systematic review also follows the Preferred Reporting for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines [ 30 ] (PRISMA flow diagram and PRISMA Checklist available in supplementary files ). This review is an update of a previous review of the same topic [ 31 ], published in 2012.

Identification of studies

Nine electronic databases (CINAHL, Cochrane Library, Google Scholar, Informit, Medline, PsychINFO, Psychology and Behavioural Sciences Collection, Scopus, and SPORTDiscus) were systematically searched for relevant records published from 2012 to March 10, 2020. The following key terms were developed by all members of the research team (and guided by previous reviews) and entered into these databases by author LW: sport* AND health AND value OR benefit* OR effect* OR outcome* OR impact* AND psych* OR depress* OR stress OR anxiety OR happiness OR mood OR ‘quality of life’ OR ‘social health’ OR ‘social relation*’ OR well* OR ‘social connect*’ OR ‘social functioning’ OR ‘life satisfac*’ OR ‘mental health’ OR social OR sociolog* OR affect* OR enjoy* OR fun. Where possible, Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) were also used.

Criteria for inclusion/exclusion

The titles of studies identified using this method were screened by LW. Abstract and full text of the articles were reviewed independently by LW and NE. To be included in the current review, each study needed to meet each of the following criteria: (1) published in English from 2012 to 2020; (2) full-text available online; (3) original research or report published in a peer-reviewed journal; (4) provides data on the psychological or social effects of participation in sport (with sport defined as a subset of exercise that can be undertaken individually or as a part of a team, where participants adhere to a common set of rules or expectations, and a defined goal exists); (5) the population of interest were adults (18 years and older) and were apparently healthy. All papers retrieved in the initial search were assessed for eligibility by title and abstract. In cases where a study could not be included or excluded via their title and abstract, the full text of the article was reviewed independently by two of the authors.

Data extraction

For the included studies, the following data was extracted independently by LW and checked by NE using a customized Google Docs spreadsheet: author name, year of publication, country, study design, aim, type of sport (e.g., tennis, hockey, team, individual), study conditions/comparisons, sample size, where participants were recruited from, mean age of participants, measure of sports participation, measure of physical activity, psychological and/or social outcome/s, measure of psychological and/or social outcome/s, statistical method of analysis, changes in physical activity or sports participation, and the psychological and/or social results.

Risk of bias (ROB) assessment

A risk of bias was performed by LW and AP independently using the ‘Quality Assessment Tool for Observational Cohort and Cross-Sectional Studies’ OR the ‘Quality Assessment of Controlled Intervention Studies’ for the included quantitative studies, and the ‘Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) Checklist for the included qualitative studies [ 32 , 33 ]. Any discrepancies in the ROB assessments were discussed between the two reviewers, and a consensus reached.

The search yielded 8528 studies, with a total of 29 studies included in the systematic review (Fig.  1 ). Tables  1 and 2 provide a summary of the included studies. The research included adults from 18 to 84 years old, with most of the evidence coming from studies targeting young adults (18–25 years). Study samples ranged from 14 to 131, 962, with the most reported psychological outcomes being self-rated mental health ( n  = 5) and depression ( n  = 5). Most studies did not investigate or report the link between a particular sport and a specific mental health or social outcome; instead, the authors’ focused on comparing the impact of sport to physical activity, and/or individual sports compared to team sports. The results of this review are summarized in the following section, with findings presented by study design (cross-sectional, experimental, and longitudinal).

Flow of studies through the review process

Effects of sports participation on psychological well-being, ill-being, and social outcomes

Cross-sectional evidence.

This review included 14 studies reporting on the cross-sectional relationship between sports participation and psychological and/or social outcomes. Sample sizes range from n  = 414 to n  = 131,962 with a total of n  = 239,394 adults included across the cross-sectional studies.

The cross-sectional evidence generally supports that participation in sport, and especially team sports, is associated with greater mental health and psychological wellbeing in adults compared to non-participants [ 36 , 59 ]; and that higher frequency of sports participation and/or sport played at a higher level of competition, are also linked to lower levels of mental distress in adults . This was not the case for one specific study involving ice hockey players aged 35 and over, with Kitchen and Chowhan (2016) Kitchen and Chowhan (2016) reporting no relationship between participation in ice hockey and either mental health, or perceived life stress [ 54 ]. There is also some evidence to support that previous participation in sports (e.g., during childhood or young adulthood) is linked to better mental health outcomes later in life, including improved mental well-being and lower mental distress [ 59 ], even after controlling for age and current physical activity.

Compared to published community data for adults, elite or high-performance adult athletes demonstrated higher levels of body satisfaction, self-esteem, and overall life satisfaction [ 39 ]; and reported reduced tendency to respond to distress with anger and depression. However, rates of psychological distress were higher in the elite sport cohort (compared to community norms), with nearly 1 in 5 athletes reporting ‘high to very high’ distress, and 1 in 3 reporting poor mental health symptoms at a level warranting treatment by a health professional in one study ( n  = 749) [ 39 ].

Four studies focused on the associations between physical activity and sports participation and mental health outcomes in older adults. Physical activity was associated with greater quality of life [ 56 ], with the relationship strongest for those participating in sport in middle age, and for those who cycled in later life (> 65) [ 56 ]. Group physical activities (e.g., walking groups) and sports (e.g., golf) were also significantly related to excellent self-rated health, low depressive symptoms, high health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and a high frequency of laughter in males and females [ 60 , 61 ]. No participation or irregular participation in sport was associated with symptoms of mild to severe depression in older adults [ 62 ].

Several cross-sectional studies examined whether the effects of physical activity varied by type (e.g., total physical activity vs. sports participation). In an analysis of 1446 young adults (mean age = 18), total physical activity, moderate-to-vigorous physical activity, and team sport were independently associated with mental health [ 46 ]. Relative to individual physical activity, after adjusting for covariates and moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA), only team sport was significantly associated with improved mental health. Similarly, in a cross-sectional analysis of Australian women, Eime, Harvey, Payne (2014) reported that women who engaged in club and team-based sports (tennis or netball) reported better mental health and life satisfaction than those who engaged in individual types of physical activity [ 47 ]. Interestingly, there was no relationship between the amount of physical activity and either of these outcomes, suggesting that other qualities of sports participation contribute to its relationship to mental health and life satisfaction. There was also some evidence to support a relationship between exercise type (ball sports, aerobic activity, weightlifting, and dancing), and mental health amongst young adults (mean age 22 years) [ 48 ], with ball sports and dancing related to fewer symptoms of depression in students with high stress; and weightlifting related to fewer depressive symptoms in weightlifters exhibiting low stress.

Longitudinal evidence

Eight studies examined the longitudinal relationship between sports participation and either mental health and/or social outcomes. Sample sizes range from n  = 113 to n  = 1679 with a total of n  = 7022 adults included across the longitudinal studies.

Five of the included longitudinal studies focused on the relationship between sports participation in childhood or adolescence and mental health in young adulthood. There is evidence that participation in sport in high-school is protective of future symptoms of anxiety (including panic disorder, generalised anxiety disorder, social phobia, and agoraphobia) [ 42 ]. Specifically, after controlling for covariates (including current physical activity), the number of years of sports participation in high school was shown to be protective of symptoms of panic and agoraphobia in young adulthood, but not protective of symptoms of social phobia or generalized anxiety disorder [ 42 ]. A comparison of individual or team sports participation also revealed that participation in either context was protective of panic disorder symptoms, while only team sport was protective of agoraphobia symptoms, and only individual sport was protective of social phobia symptoms. Furthermore, current and past sports team participation was shown to negatively relate to adult depressive symptoms [ 43 ]; drop out of sport was linked to higher depressive symptoms in adulthood compared to those with maintained participation [ 9 , 22 , 63 ]; and consistent participation in team sports (but not individual sport) in adolescence was linked to higher self-rated mental health, lower perceived stress and depressive symptoms, and lower depression scores in early adulthood [ 53 , 58 ].

Two longitudinal studies [ 35 , 55 ], also investigated the association between team and individual playing context and mental health. Dore and colleagues [ 35 ] reported that compared to individual activities, being active in informal groups (e.g., yoga, running groups) or team sports was associated with better mental health, fewer depressive symptoms and higher social connectedness – and that involvement in team sports was related to better mental health regardless of physical activity volume. Kim and James [ 55 ] discovered that sports participation led to both short and long-term improvements in positive affect and life satisfaction.

A study on social outcomes related to mixed martial-arts (MMA) and Brazilian jiu-jitsu (BJJ) showed that both sports improved practitioners’ self-control and pro-social behavior, with greater improvements seen in the BJJ group [ 62 ]. Notably, while BJJ reduced participants’ reported aggression, there was a slight increase in MMA practitioners, though it is worth mentioning that individuals who sought out MMA had higher levels of baseline aggression.

Experimental evidence

Six of the included studies were experimental or quasi-experimental. Sample sizes ranged from n  = 28 to n  = 55 with a total of n  = 239 adults included across six longitudinal studies. Three studies involved a form of martial arts (such as judo and karate) [ 45 , 51 , 52 ], one involved a variety of team sports (such as netball, soccer, and cricket) [ 34 ], and the remaining two focused on badminton [ 57 ] and handball [ 49 ].

Brinkley and colleagues [ 34 ] reported significant effects on interpersonal communication (but not vitality, social cohesion, quality of life, stress, or interpersonal relationships) for participants ( n  = 40) engaging in a 12-week workplace team sports intervention. Also using a 12-week intervention, Hornstrup et al. [ 49 ] reported a significant improvement in mental energy (but not well-being or anxiety) in young women (mean age = 24; n  = 28) playing in a handball program. Patterns et al. [ 57 ] showed that in comparison to no exercise, participation in an 8-week badminton or running program had no significant improvement on self-esteem, despite improvements in perceived and actual fitness levels.

Three studies examined the effect of martial arts on the mental health of older adults (mean ages 79 [ 52 ], 64 [ 51 ], and 70 [ 45 ] years). Participation in Karate-Do had positive effects on overall mental health, emotional wellbeing, depression and anxiety when compared to other activities (physical, cognitive, mindfulness) and a control group [ 51 , 52 ]. Ciaccioni et al. [ 45 ] found that a Judo program did not affect either the participants’ mental health or their body satisfaction, citing a small sample size, and the limited length of the intervention as possible contributors to the findings.

Qualitative evidence

Three studies interviewed current or former sports players regarding their experiences with sport. Chinkov and Holt [ 41 ] reported that jiu-jitsu practitioners (mean age 35 years) were more self-confident in their lives outside of the gym, including improved self-confidence in their interactions with others because of their training. McGraw and colleagues [ 37 ] interviewed former and current National Football League (NFL) players and their families about its impact on the emotional and mental health of the players. Most of the players reported that their NFL career provided them with social and emotional benefits, as well as improvements to their self-esteem even after retiring. Though, despite these benefits, almost all the players experienced at least one mental health challenge during their career, including depression, anxiety, or difficulty controlling their temper. Some of the players and their families reported that they felt socially isolated from people outside of the national football league.

Through a series of semi-structured interviews and focus groups, Thorpe, Anders [ 40 ] investigated the impact of an Aboriginal male community sporting team on the health of its players. The players reported they felt a sense of belonging when playing in the team, further noting that the social and community aspects were as important as the physical health benefits. Participating in the club strengthened the cultural identity of the players, enhancing their well-being. The players further noted that participation provided them with enjoyment, stress relief, a sense of purpose, peer support, and improved self-esteem. Though they also noted challenges, including the presence of racism, community conflict, and peer-pressure.

Quality of studies

Full details of our risk of bias (ROB) results are provided in Supplementary Material A . Of the three qualitative studies assessed using the Critical Appraisal Skills Program (CASP), all three were deemed to have utilised and reported appropriate methodological standards on at least 8 of the 10 criteria. Twenty studies were assessed using the Quality Assessment Tool for Observational Cohort and Cross-Sectional Studies, with all studies clearly reporting the research question/s or objective/s and study population. However, only four studies provided a justification for sample size, and less than half of the studies met quality criteria for items 6, 7, 9, or 10 (and items 12 and 13 were largely not applicable). Of concern, only four of the observational or cohort studies were deemed to have used clearly defined, valid, and reliable exposure measures (independent variables) and implemented them consistently across all study participants. Six studies were assessed using the Quality Assessment of Controlled Intervention Studies, with three studies described as a randomized trial (but none of the three reported a suitable method of randomization, concealment of treatment allocation, or blinding to treatment group assignment). Three studies showed evidence that study groups were similar at baseline for important characteristics and an overall drop-out rate from the study < 20%. Four studies reported high adherence to intervention protocols (with two not reporting) and five demonstrated that.study outcomes were assessed using valid and reliable measures and implemented consistently across all study participants. Importantly, researchers did not report or have access to validated instruments for assessing sport participation or physical activity amongst adults, though most studies provided psychometrics for their mental health outcome measure/s. Only one study reported that the sample size was sufficiently powered to detect a difference in the main outcome between groups (with ≥ 80% power) and that all participants were included in the analysis of results (intention-to-treat analysis). In general, the methodological quality of the six randomised studies was deemed low.

Initially, our discussion will focus on the review findings regarding sports participation and well-being, ill-being, and psychological health. However, the heterogeneity and methodological quality of the included research (especially controlled trials) should be considered during the interpretation of our results. Considering our findings, the Mental Health through Sport conceptual model for adults will then be presented and discussed and study limitations outlined.

Sports participation and psychological well-being

In summary, the evidence presented here indicates that for adults, sports participation is associated with better overall mental health [ 36 , 46 , 47 , 59 ], mood [ 56 ], higher life satisfaction [ 39 , 47 ], self-esteem [ 39 ], body satisfaction [ 39 ], HRQoL [ 60 ], self-rated health [ 61 ], and frequency of laughter [ 61 ]. Sports participation has also shown to be predictive of better psychological wellbeing over time [ 35 , 53 ], higher positive affect [ 55 ], and greater life satisfaction [ 55 ]. Furthermore, higher frequency of sports participation and/or sport played at a higher level of competition, have been linked to lower levels of mental distress, higher levels of body satisfaction, self-esteem, and overall life satisfaction in adults [ 39 ].

Despite considerable heterogeneity of sports type, cross-sectional and experimental research indicate that team-based sports participation, compared to individual sports and informal group physical activity, has a more positive effect on mental energy [ 49 ], physical self-perception [ 57 ], and overall psychological health and well-being in adults, regardless of physical activity volume [ 35 , 46 , 47 ]. And, karate-do benefits the subjective well-being of elderly practitioners [ 51 , 52 ]. Qualitative research in this area has queried participants’ experiences of jiu-jitsu, Australian football, and former and current American footballers. Participants in these sports reported that their participation was beneficial for psychological well-being [ 37 , 40 , 41 ], improved self-esteem [ 37 , 40 , 41 ], and enjoyment [ 37 ].

Sports participation and psychological ill-being

Of the included studies, n  = 19 examined the relationship between participating in sport and psychological ill-being. In summary, there is consistent evidence that sports participation is related to lower depression scores [ 43 , 48 , 61 , 62 ]. There were mixed findings regarding psychological stress, where participation in childhood (retrospectively assessed) was related to lower stress in young adulthood [ 41 ], but no relationship was identified between recreational hockey in adulthood and stress [ 54 ]. Concerning the potential impact of competing at an elite level, there is evidence of higher stress in elite athletes compared to community norms [ 39 ]. Further, there is qualitative evidence that many current or former national football league players experienced at least one mental health challenge, including depression, anxiety, difficulty controlling their temper, during their career [ 37 ].

Evidence from longitudinal research provided consistent evidence that participating in sport in adolescence is protective of symptoms of depression in young adulthood [ 43 , 53 , 58 , 63 ], and further evidence that participating in young adulthood is related to lower depressive symptoms over time (6 months) [ 35 ]. Participation in adolescence was also protective of manifestations of anxiety (panic disorder and agoraphobia) and stress in young adulthood [ 42 ], though participation in young adulthood was not related to a more general measure of anxiety [ 35 ] nor to changes in negative affect [ 55 ]). The findings from experimental research were mixed. Two studies examined the effect of karate-do on markers of psychological ill-being, demonstrating its capacity to reduce anxiety [ 52 ], with some evidence of its effectiveness on depression [ 51 ]. The other studies examined small-sided team-based games but showed no effect on stress or anxiety [ 34 , 49 ]. Most studies did not differentiate between team and individual sports, though one study found that adolescents who participated in team sports (not individual sports) in secondary school has lower depression scores in young adulthood [ 58 ].

Sports participation and social outcomes

Seven of the included studies examined the relationship between sports participation and social outcomes. However, very few studies examined social outcomes or tested a social outcome as a potential mediator of the relationship between sport and mental health. It should also be noted that this body of evidence comes from a wide range of sport types, including martial arts, professional football, and workplace team-sport, as well as different methodologies. Taken as a whole, the evidence shows that participating in sport is beneficial for several social outcomes, including self-control [ 50 ], pro-social behavior [ 50 ], interpersonal communication [ 34 ], and fostering a sense of belonging [ 40 ]. Further, there is evidence that group activity, for example team sport or informal group activity, is related to higher social connectedness over time, though analyses showed that social connectedness was not a mediator for mental health [ 35 ].

There were conflicting findings regarding social effects at the elite level, with current and former NFL players reporting that they felt socially isolated during their career [ 37 ], whilst another study reported no relationship between participation at the elite level and social dysfunction [ 39 ]. Conversely, interviews with a group of indigenous men revealed that they felt as though participating in an all-indigenous Australian football team provided them with a sense of purpose, and they felt as though the social aspect of the game was as important as the physical benefits it provides [ 40 ].

Mental health through sport conceptual model for adults

The ‘Health through Sport’ model provides a depiction of the determinants and benefits of sports participation [ 31 ]. The model recognises that the physical, mental, and social benefits of sports participation vary by the context of sport (e.g., individual vs. team, organized vs. informal). To identify the elements of sport which contribute to its effect on mental health outcomes, we describe the ‘Mental Health through Sport’ model (Fig.  2 ). The model proposes that the social and physical elements of sport each provide independent, and likely synergistic contributions to its overall influence on mental health.

The Mental Health through Sport conceptual model

The model describes two key pathways through which sport may influence mental health: physical activity, and social relationships and support. Several likely moderators of this effect are also provided, including sport type, intensity, frequency, context (team vs. individual), environment (e.g., indoor vs. outdoor), as well as the level of competition (e.g., elite vs. amateur).

The means by which the physical activity component of sport may influence mental health stems from the work of Lubans et al., who propose three key groups of mechanisms: neurobiological, psychosocial, and behavioral [ 64 ]. Processes whereby physical activity may enhance psychological outcomes via changes in the structural and functional composition of the brain are referred to as neurobiological mechanisms [ 65 , 66 ]. Processes whereby physical activity provides opportunities for the development of self-efficacy, opportunity for mastery, changes in self-perceptions, the development of independence, and for interaction with the environment are considered psychosocial mechanisms. Lastly, processes by which physical activity may influence behaviors which ultimately affect psychological health, including changes in sleep duration, self-regulation, and coping skills, are described as behavioral mechanisms.

Playing sport offers the opportunity to form relationships and to develop a social support network, both of which are likely to influence mental health. Thoits [ 29 ] describes 7 key mechanisms by which social relationships and support may influence mental health: social influence/social comparison; social control; role-based purpose and meaning (mattering); self-esteem; sense of control; belonging and companionship; and perceived support availability [ 29 ]. These mechanisms and their presence within a sporting context are elaborated below.

Subjective to the attitudes and behaviors of individuals in a group, social influence and comparison may facilitate protective or harmful effects on mental health. Participants in individual or team sport will be influenced and perhaps steered by the behaviors, expectations, and norms of other players and teams. When individual’s compare their capabilities, attitudes, and values to those of other participants, their own behaviors and subsequent health outcomes may be affected. When others attempt to encourage or discourage an individual to adopt or reject certain health practices, social control is displayed [ 29 ]. This may evolve as strategies between players (or between players and coach) are discussion and implemented. Likewise, teammates may try to motivate each another during a match to work harder, or to engage in specific events or routines off-field (fitness programs, after game celebrations, attending club events) which may impact current and future physical and mental health.

Sport may also provide behavioral guidance, purpose, and meaning to its participants. Role identities (positions within a social structure that come with reciprocal obligations), often formed as a consequence of social ties formed through sport. Particularly in team sports, participants come to understand they form an integral part of the larger whole, and consequently, they hold certain responsibility in ensuring the team’s success. They have a commitment to the team to, train and play, communicate with the team and a potential responsibility to maintain a high level of health, perform to their capacity, and support other players. As a source of behavioral guidance and of purpose and meaning in life, these identities are likely to influence mental health outcomes amongst sport participants.

An individual’s level of self-esteem may be affected by the social relationships and social support provided through sport; with improved perceptions of capability (or value within a team) in the sporting domain likely to have positive impact on global self-esteem and sense of worth [ 64 ]. The unique opportunities provided through participation in sport, also allow individuals to develop new skills, overcome challenges, and develop their sense of self-control or mastery . Working towards and finding creative solutions to challenges in sport facilitates a sense of mastery in participants. This sense of mastery may translate to other areas of life, with individual’s developing the confidence to cope with varied life challenges. For example, developing a sense of mastery regarding capacity to formulate new / creative solutions when taking on an opponent in sport may result in greater confidence to be creative at work. Social relationships and social support provided through sport may also provide participants with a source of belonging and companionship. The development of connections (on and off the field) to others who share common interests, can build a sense of belonging that may mediate improvements in mental health outcomes. Social support is often provided emotionally during expressions of trust and care; instrumentally via tangible assistance; through information such as advice and suggestions; or as appraisal such feedback. All forms of social support provided on and off the field contribute to a more generalised sense of perceived support that may mediate the effect of social interaction on mental health outcomes.

Participation in sport may influence mental health via some combination of the social mechanisms identified by Thoits, and the neurobiological, psychosocial, and behavioral mechanisms stemming from physical activity identified by Lubans [ 29 , 64 ]. The exact mechanisms through which sport may confer psychological benefit is likely to vary between sports, as each sport varies in its physical and social requirements. One must also consider the social effects of sports participation both on and off the field. For instance, membership of a sporting team and/or club may provide a sense of identity and belonging—an effect that persists beyond the immediacy of playing the sport and may have a persistent effect on their psychological health. Furthermore, the potential for team-based activity to provide additional benefit to psychological outcomes may not just be attributable to the differences in social interactions, there are also physiological differences in the requirements for sport both within (team vs. team) and between (team vs. individual) categories that may elicit additional improvements in psychological outcomes. For example, evidence supports that exercise intensity moderates the relationship between physical activity and several psychological outcomes—supporting that sports performed at higher intensity will be more beneficial for psychological health.

Limitations and recommendations

There are several limitations of this review worthy of consideration. Firstly, amongst the included studies there was considerable heterogeneity in study outcomes and study methodology, and self-selection bias (especially in non-experimental studies) is likely to influence study findings and reduce the likelihood that study participants and results are representative of the overall population. Secondly, the predominately observational evidence included in this and Eime’s prior review enabled us to identify the positive relationship between sports participation and social and psychological health (and examine directionality)—but more experimental and longitudinal research is required to determine causality and explore potential mechanisms responsible for the effect of sports participation on participant outcomes. Additional qualitative work would also help researchers gain a better understanding of the relationship between specific elements of the sporting environment and mental health and social outcomes in adult participants. Thirdly, there were no studies identified in the literature where sports participation involved animals (such as equestrian sports) or guns (such as shooting sports). Such studies may present novel and important variables in the assessment of mental health benefits for participants when compared to non-participants or participants in sports not involving animals/guns—further research is needed in this area. Our proposed conceptual model also identifies several pathways through which sport may lead to improvements in mental health—but excludes some potentially negative influences (such as poor coaching behaviors and injury). And our model is not designed to capture all possible mechanisms, creating the likelihood that other mechanisms exist but are not included in this review. Additionally, an interrelationship exits between physical activity, mental health, and social relationships, whereby changes in one area may facilitate changes in the other/s; but for the purpose of this study, we have focused on how the physical and social elements of sport may mediate improvements in psychological outcomes. Consequently, our conceptual model is not all-encompassing, but designed to inform and guide future research investigating the impact of sport participation on mental health.

The findings of this review endorse that participation in sport is beneficial for psychological well-being, indicators of psychological ill-being, and social outcomes in adults. Furthermore, participation in team sports is associated with better psychological and social outcomes compared to individual sports or other physical activities. Our findings support and add to previous review findings [ 1 ]; and have informed the development of our ‘Mental Health through Sport’ conceptual model for adults which presents the potential mechanisms by which participation in sport may affect mental health.

Availability of data and materials

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We would like to acknowledge the work of the original systematic review conducted by Eime, R. M., Young, J. A., Harvey, J. T., Charity, M. J., and Payne, W. R. (2013).

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Eather, N., Wade, L., Pankowiak, A. et al. The impact of sports participation on mental health and social outcomes in adults: a systematic review and the ‘Mental Health through Sport’ conceptual model. Syst Rev 12 , 102 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1186/s13643-023-02264-8

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How to Grow a Super-Athlete

By Daniel Coyle

• March 4, 2007

This story could begin in many places — it's about beginnings, after all — but I'd like to start with the recent evening when my 4-year-old daughter, Zoe, appeared before me wielding a yellow baseball bat and an important announcement: batting tees were for babies. From now on, she would hit real pitches, like the big kids.

By way of biography, I should mention that Zoe, the youngest of four, is considered one of the finest all-around mini-athletes in the history of our house. She's widely celebrated for her ability to throw balls really far, to hop on one foot across the whole front porch, and to run faster than a superfast airplane can fly. So as I walked (and she raced) down to the basement and located an inflatable purple ball, I fully expected Zoe to take to hitting like she'd taken to everything else.

But Zoe, it turned out, pretty much stunk.

Toss after toss, she missed. Five tosses. Then 10. I tried throwing the ball softer, harder, lower, higher. I got a different bat, offered advice and abundant encouragement, tried covertly to pitch the ball so it hit the bat. Nothing worked. Zoe whiffed with virtuosity and enthusiasm. Against my nobler instincts, I found myself, like the purple ball, getting a bit deflated. I felt as if I were receiving a grimly polite report suggesting that Zoe, despite her athletic promise, had regrettably tested negative for hand-eye coordination.

A few days later, we did it again. This time Zoe started off missing, then hit a foul ball. Then two fair balls in a row. Then three. She was watching the ball now, timing it. As the saying goes, something had clicked. Zoe hit the last toss squarely, and the purple ball zipped past my ear and smacked the window with a resounding gong. We froze at the unexpected sound, enjoying the moment and the question echoing beneath.

What, exactly, just happened?

What is talent? It's a big question, and one way to approach it is to look at the places where talent seems to be located — in other words, to sketch a map. In this case, the map would show the birthplaces of the 50 top men and women in a handful of professional sports, each sport marked by its own color. (Tennis and golf handily rank performance; for team sports, salaries will do.) The resulting image — what could be called a talent map — emerges looking like abstract art: vast empty regions interspersed with well-defined bursts of intense color, sort of like a Matisse painting.

Canada, for instance, is predictably cluttered with hockey players, but significant concentrations also pop up in Sweden, Russia and the Czech Republic. The United States accounts for many of the top players in women's golf, but South Korea has just as many. Baseball stars are generously sprinkled across the southern United States but the postage-stamp-size Dominican Republic isn't far behind. In women's tennis, we see a dispersal around Europe and the United States, then a dazzling, concentrated burst in Moscow.

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The pattern keeps repeating: general scatterings accompanied by a number of dense, unexpected crowdings. The pattern is obviously not random, nor can it be fully explained by gene pools or climate or geopolitics or Nike's global marketing budget. Rather, the pattern looks like algae starting to grow on an aquarium wall, telltale clumps that show something is quietly alive, communicating, blooming. It's as though microscopic spores have floated around the atmosphere in the jet stream and taken root in a handful of fertile places.

A quick analysis of this talent map reveals some splashy numbers: for instance, the average woman in South Korea is more than six times as likely to be a professional golfer as an American woman. But the interesting question is, what underlying dynamic makes these people so spectacularly unaverage in the first place? What force is causing those from certain far-off places to become, competitively speaking, superior?

In early December, I traveled to the heart of one of those breeding grounds, the Spartak Tennis Club in Moscow. Russia is the birthplace of a group of athletes who have affected the World Tennis Association rankings in the same way that zebra mussels have affected the Great Lakes — which is to say, pretty much clogged them. The invasion happened swiftly: at the end of 2001, Russia had one woman (Elena Dementieva) in the W.T.A. Tour's top 30. By the start of 2007, Russian women accounted for fully half of the top 10 (Dementieva, Maria Sharapova, Svetlana Kuznetzova, Nadia Petrova and Dinara Safina) and 12 of the top 50. Not to mention 15-year-old Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova, who was the International Tennis Federation's No. 1-ranked junior and who was joined in the top 500 by five countrywomen also named Anastasia.

Spartak, usually preceded in the tennis press by the word "famous" or "legendary," had produced three of the top six Russians (Dementieva, Safina and Anastasia Myskina), along with Anna Kournikova, now retired. Tournament pairings regularly became all-Spartak affairs, most memorably the 2004 French Open final, Myskina over Dementieva, the continuation of a rivalry the two began at age 7. To put Spartak's success in talent-map terms: this club, which has one indoor court, has achieved eight year-end top-20 women's rankings over the last three years. During that same period, the entire United States has achieved seven.

"They're like the Russian Army," says Nick Bollettieri, the founder of the Nick Bollettieri Tennis Academy in Bradenton, Fla., and the former coach to Sharapova, Andre Agassi and other top-ranked players. "They just keep on coming."

Getting to Spartak, however, takes more than a talent map; it's not located on any real maps. Fortunately, help arrived in the form of Elena Rybina, a chain-smoking, speed-talking translator who worked part-time for the Russian Tennis Federation and who possessed a fast-alternating combination of film noir toughness and childlike giddiness that I took as the quintessence of modern Russia.

"I learned my English listening to music, like Elton John," she said. " 'Crocodile Rocks'! I love it!"

We rode the subway half an hour northeast to Sokolniki Park and started walking. And walking. Sokolniki is almost twice the size of Central Park, considerably less central and only vaguely parklike. It's basically a huge forest of birch and elm trees filled with a disconcertingly energetic population of stray dogs. We walked past an abandoned chess club, an abandoned amusement park, an abandoned factory and the smashed onion dome of what appeared to be an abandoned church.

"It is very beautiful in summer," Rybina assured me as we passed a pond frosted with green scum. "But Spartak, I must warn you, is not so nice."

"What do you mean?"

Rybina lighted a Davidoff cigarette and raised her eyebrow into a Gothic arch. "Spartak is not exactly like a palace."

We turned a corner, followed a road for a few hundred yards and saw a loose assortment of peaked buildings and shotgun shacks that resembled a dilapidated ski village. Windows were dim cataracts of warped plastic, paint was scabbed and peeling and the buildings were frescoed in a rich coat of grime. A glaze of ice coated the club's 15 outdoor clay courts, as it did for six months of the year. A beat-up 18-wheeler lent the scene a postnuclear, "Mad Max" vibe. The only bright color came from the rainbow sheen of diesel fuel in the puddles.

Rybina shrugged indifferently and lighted another Davidoff. We walked past the inexplicably manned guard post, past an A-frame that appeared to be a storehouse for scrap metal and toward a larger structure that resembled a greenhouse. We ducked through a low door and onto the court. The surface was worn down in frequently trodden spots, like cathedral steps. Two wooden sticks nudged the sagging net futilely toward regulation height. The fluorescent lights buzzed. "We are lucky," Rybina whispered. "The heat is working." When it doesn't, the kids play in their coats. 1

The class, called the Little Group, had already arrived. They wore heavy coats and toted their tennis rackets in backpacks, sports duffels and plastic grocery bags. At first glance, they looked like a standard-issue assortment of 5- to 7-year-olds: there was Denis, the handsome blond in the blue turtleneck; Alexandra, the lanky towhead in the green T-shirt; Gunda, the smiley ponytailed girl in the silver shoes; and Vova, the revved-up boy with the Asiatic eyes who was the class's only 4-year-old. There were 12 students in all. They had been coming to Spartak three times a week since September; by now they'd been on the court perhaps 40 times. As the lesson began, a few of them made their final preparations, reaching into their bags for what appeared to be their good luck charms: a tidy gallery of stuffed dinosaurs, bunnies and pandas formed on the wall behind the base line.

The coach, 77-year-old Larisa Preobrazhenskaya (pronounced pray-oh-brah-ZHEN-skya), stood at the sideline, watching. She wore a red-and-white tracksuit and a knowing, amused expression. Preobrazhenskaya was Spartak's most renowned youth coach, but she wore her authority lightly, radiating a grandmotherly twinkle behind hooded eyes. She'd been quite a player in her day, the 1955 Soviet singles champion. She still looked athletic, sauntering around the court with a John Wayne limp caused by a sore hip. The parents huddled by the door, watchful and silent.

The students formed a circle on one side of the net and started to stretch. I watched, scoping for telltale signs of überkinder superiority, but saw nothing of the sort. The Little Group proceeded to hustle energetically through a 15-minute set of calisthenics worthy of Jack LaLanne: jumping jacks, hops, crab walking, bear walking, skipping, sidestepping, zigzagging through a line of orange cones. I was half expecting them to pull out medicine balls, when they actually did pull out medicine balls, passing them back and forth earnestly like so many extras in a Rocky movie.

"All the motions," Preobrazhenskaya would tell me. "It is important to do everything, every practice."

The Little Group paired off with rackets and began imitatsiya — rallying with an imaginary ball. They bounced lightly from foot to foot, they turned, they swung, the invisible balls flew. Preobrazhenskaya roamed the court like a garage mechanic tuning an oversize engine: realigning a piston here, tightening a flywheel there. Several times, she grasped their small arms and piloted their bodies through the stroke. Thus the lesson began, and with it the unspoken implication: the great, rusty Spartak machine was coming to life, carrying its cargo of mini-geniuses another step closer toward inevitable glory.

As I pictured the scale of the David and Goliath phenomenon this unlikely scene embodied, the question arose: how does Spartak do it?

Explanations were not in short supply. I'd heard plenty from American tennis coaches, a nicely bulleted list that included a Slavic gene pool that produces a seemingly inexhaustible supply of tall, fast, strong kids; the economic and cultural gateway that opened with the 1991 collapse of the Communist government; the former Russian president Boris Yeltsin's enthusiastic (if at times klutzy) love for the sport; and the potent catnip effect of Kournikova, the former top 10 player who, though she never won a singles tournament, provided an escape-hungry generation of girls (and, more important, their parents) with vivid proof that tennis success equaled glamour, fortune, fame.

The Russians, when I asked them, chimed in with explanations of their own, including the lifelong commitment of coaches like Preobrazhenskaya; the superior biomechanical techniques taught at the Moscow Institute of Physical Culture, where many of Russia's top coaches train; and (in a nostalgic burst of cold war trash talking) the intrinsic softness of the West.

Watching the Little Group play, I, too, felt a strong urge to bellow my share of theories: it must be the medicine balls! The discipline! The lack of Game Boys! I was particularly struck by the kids' obvious enjoyment of the lesson. One of the mothers told Preobrazhenskaya that her daughter, Gunda, had awakened early that day, unable to sleep. "Today is my day with Larisa Dmitrievna!" Gunda had said. "It is today!"

In sum, there are a lot of explanations, some better than others. For instance, is the Russian gene pool really that innately superior to that of Ukraine or Slovenia or Southern California? If Kournikova inspired so many Russians, then where were the German stars inspired by Steffi Graf? But ultimately the theories fall short because they don't explain the principles underpinning Spartak's success. Indeed, seeing the place up close made me wonder if there were any principles. Spartak radiates the glow of happenstance, the diamond in the trash heap. (This impression is apparently shared by the Russian Tennis Federation, which has been content to allow Spartak to remain with its single indoor court.)

So even here, at the core of one of the globe's brightest talent blooms, the question of that talent's source remains enigmatically tangled, perhaps as much of a mystery to those who nurture these athletes as it is to the rest of us. It's enough to make you wish for a set of X-ray glasses that could reveal how these invisible forces of culture, history, genes, practice, coaching and belief work together to form that elemental material we call talent — to wish that science could come up with a way to see talent as a substance as tangible as muscle and bone, and whose inner workings we could someday attempt to understand.

As it turns out, that's exactly what's happening.

I was peering inside an incubator at the Laboratory of Developmental Neurobiology at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Md. The incubator, about the size of a small refrigerator, held shiny wire racks on which sat several rows of petri dishes containing clear pink liquid. Inside the liquid were threadlike clumps of mouse neurons, which were wired to platinum electrodes and covered with a white, pearlescent substance called myelin. Within that myelin, according to new research, lies the seed of talent.

"In neurology, myelin is being seen as an epiphany," Douglas Fields, the lab's director, had told me earlier. "This is a new dimension that may help us understand a great deal about how the brain works, especially about how we gain skills."

The myelin in question didn't look particularly epiphanic, which is understandable since it would normally be employed by mice for sniffing out food or navigating a maze. Neurologists theorize, however, that this humble-looking material is the common link between the Spartak kids, the Dominican baseball players and all the other blooms on the talent map — a link all the more interesting for the fact that few outside this branch of neurology currently know much about myelin. In fact, as Fields pointed out, if indirectly, the talent map wasn't technically the most accurate name for my hypothetical landscape. It should be called the myelin map.

"I would predict that South Korean women golfers have more myelin, on average, than players from other countries," Fields said. "They've got more in the right parts of the brain and for the right muscle groups, and that's what allows them to optimize their circuitry. The same would be true for any group like that."

"Tiger Woods?" I asked.

"Definitely Tiger Woods," he said. "That guy's got a lot of myelin."

Fields, 53, is a sinewy man with a broad smile and a jaunty gait. A former biological oceanographer who studied shark nervous systems, he now runs a six-person, seven-room lab outfitted with hissing canisters, buzzing electrical boxes and tight bundles of wires and hoses. The place has the feel of a tidy, efficient ship. In addition, Fields has the sea captain's habit of making dramatic moments sound matter-of-fact. The more exciting something is, the more mundane he makes it sound. As he was telling me about the six-day climb of Yosemite's 3,000-foot El Capitan he made two summers back, I asked what it felt like to sleep while hanging from a rope thousands of feet above the ground. "It's actually not that different," he said, his expression so unchanging that he might have been discussing a trip to the grocery store. "You adapt."

Fields reached into the incubator, extracted one of the pink petri dishes and slid it beneath a microscope. "Have a peek," he said quietly.

I leaned in and saw a tangled bunch of spaghetti-like threads, which Fields informed me were nerve fibers. The myelin was harder to see, a faintly undulating fringe on the edge of the neurons. I blinked, refocused, struggled to imagine how this stuff might help my golf game.

Fields proceeded to explain that myelin is a sausage-shaped layer of dense fat that wraps around the nerve fibers — and that its seeming dullness is, in fact, exactly the point. Myelin works the same way that rubber insulation works on a wire, keeping the signal strong by preventing electrical impulses from leaking out. This myelin sheath is, basically, electrical tape, which is one reason that myelin, along with its associated cells, was classified as glia (Greek for "glue"). Its very inertness is why the first brain researchers named their new science after the neuron instead of its insulation. They were correct to do so: neurons can indeed explain almost every class of mental phenomenon—memory, emotion, muscle control, sensory perception and so on. But there's one question neurons can't explain: why does it take so long to learn complex skills?

"Everything neurons do, they do pretty quickly; it happens with the flick of a switch," Fields said. "But flicking switches is not how we learn a lot of things. Getting good at piano or chess or baseball takes a lot of time, and that's what myelin is good at."

To the surprise of many neurologists, it turns out this electrical tape is quietly interacting with the neurons. Through a mechanism that Fields and his research team described in a 2006 paper in the journal Neuron, the little sausages of myelin get thicker when the nerve is repeatedly stimulated. The thicker the myelin gets, the better it insulates and the faster and more accurately the signals travel. As Fields puts it, "The signals have to travel at the right speed, arrive at the right time, and myelination is the brain's way of controlling that speed." 2

It adds up to a two-part dynamic that is elegant enough to please Darwin himself: myelin controls the impulse speed, and impulse speed is crucial. The better we can control it, the better we can control the timing of our thoughts and movements, whether we're running, reading, singing or, perhaps more to the point, hitting a wicked topspin backhand.

Back at Spartak, the Little Group lined up outside the service box, rackets at the ready. Preobrazhenskaya stood at the net, a shopping cart of balls at her hip. She waited for silence, then started: forehand, backhand, back to the end of the line. One by one, the kids took their swings — to my eye, pretty nice-looking swings. But not to hers. Preobrazhenskaya frequently stopped them, had them do it over. More follow-through. More turn. Watch. Feel.

Pravil'no, she said. Correct.

Molodets. Good job.

If Preobrazhenskaya's approach were boiled down to one word (and it frequently was), that word would be tekhnika — technique. This is enforced by iron decree: none of her students are permitted to play in a tournament for the first three years of study. It's a notion that I don't imagine would fly with American parents, but none of the Russian parents questioned it for a second. "Technique is everything," Preobrazhenskaya told me later, smacking a table with Khrushchev-like emphasis, causing me to jump and reconsider my twinkly-grandma impression of her. "If you begin playing without technique, it is big mistake. Big, big mistake!"

I thought of something Dr. Fields had said: "You have to understand that every skill exists as a circuit, and that circuit has to be formed and optimized." To put it in Spartak terms, myelin is a slave to tekhnika — and so, in turn, was the Little Group. Preobrazhenskaya didn't instruct them on tactics or positioning or offer any psychological tips; rather, every gesture and word was funneled to teaching the elemental task of hitting the ball clean and hard. Which they did, one by one. A few of the kids had located that magical-seeming burst of leverage that makes the ball explode off the strings with a distinctive thwock.

"What do good athletes do when they train?" George Bartzokis, a professor of neurology at U.C.L.A., had told me. "They send precise impulses along wires that give the signal to myelinate that wire. They end up, after all the training, with a super-duper wire — lots of bandwidth, high-speed T-1 line. That's what makes them different from the rest of us." 3

As the Little Group continued its lesson, I found myself picturing myelin. I'd seen a highly magnified image on one of Fields's computer screens, and it looked like a deep-sea photograph: bright colors against a field of black. The oligodendrocytes — oligos, in lab lingo, are the cells that form the myelin — resembled glowing green squids, their tentacles reaching toward a set of slender nerve fibers. Once they seize hold, each tentacle begins to curl and extend, as the oligo squeezes the cytoplasm out of itself until only a cellophane-like sheet of membrane remains. That membrane proceeds to wrap over the nerve fiber with machinelike precision, spiraling down to create the distinctive sausage shape, tightening itself over the fiber like a threaded nut.

"It's one of the most intricate and exquisite cell-cell interactions there is," Fields said. "And it's slow. Each one of these wraps can go around a nerve fiber 40 or 50 times, and that can take days or weeks. Imagine doing that to an entire neuron, then an entire circuit with thousands of nerves."

So each time Alexandra or Denis or Gunda swings the racket properly — or, for that matter, each time we practice a chip shot or a guitar chord or a chess opening — those tiny green tentacles sense it and reach toward the thousands of related nerve fibers. They grasp, they squish, they make another wrap, thickening the sheath. They build a little more insulation along the wire, which adds a bit more bandwidth and precision to the circuit, which translates into an infinitesimal bit more skill and speed. Myelin is both practice and mastery, cause and effect. As Bartzokis had said: "Myelin is our Achilles strength, and it's our Achilles' heel. It's what makes us human." 4

All this myelin talk, combined with jet lag, left me feeling slightly changed. I wandered Moscow as if I were seeing the world through myelin-colored glasses. Emerald-green squids and snowy white sausages were everywhere I looked. A TV highlight of a Ronaldinho goal? Pure myelin! That violinist playing Mozart in the subway? What incredible oligodendrocytes that guy must have! A poster for the 2008 Olympics? An international myelin cultivation contest! My repeated ability to get lost within a few blocks of my hotel? Myelin again! (Rather, my lack of it.)

It also left me thinking about the clusters on the talent map. Specifically, wondering whether these places quietly possess myelin-accelerating factors: i.e., forces and conditions that promote what Fields would call "circuit optimization." Might those factors help explain the success of these superior athletes?

The rise of the South Korean golfers, who won almost one-third of the events last year on the Ladies Professional Golf Association Tour, has usually been explained by citing two factors: the country's formidably driven parents, and the rock-star status of Se Ri Pak, who has won 23 tournaments and is one of the nation's biggest sports celebrities. Yet the logic of this formula has always been confounded by a puzzling fact: South Korea happens to be a nation where it is singularly difficult for a young person to play golf. There are only 200 golf courses in the entire country, compared with 17,000 in the United States.

Viewed through the prism of myelin, however, the situation makes more sense. The lack of public courses sends golf-hungry parents and kids to South Korea's abundant driving ranges, which are Elysian fields of myelination compared to the relative randomness of course play. Were South Korea to increase access to courses, it could be argued, the country might wind up producing fewer top golfers.

Then there's the Dominican Republic, which has historically produced more Major League Baseball players than any other country outside the United States. Conventional wisdom holds that this remarkable record arises from the fruitful collision of a baseball-mad culture and grinding poverty. The equation is undeniably true, but it's also true of several nearby countries that don't achieve a fraction of the Dominican Republic's success.

There is one way, however, in which the Dominican Republic is historically unique. It's the first place where Major League Baseball teams built training academies — two dozen of them, starting in the mid-1970s. While academies provide players with obvious advantages like good nutrition and housing, not to mention regular exposure to scouts, they also provide a daily structure of drills and practices that, like the South Korean driving ranges, would presumably be a ripe environment for building myelin. 5

The most impressive myelin collection I encountered during my Moscow trip belonged to a woman encased in a sheepskin coat, fur-trimmed boots and a fuzzy white hat. Elena Dementieva, 25, represented the acme of the Spartak product. She stood 5-foot-11, weighed 141 pounds and emanated a vibration of such unearthly physical perfection that crowds parted as she moved down the sidewalk. Seeing Dementieva walk into the Russian Army sports club, where she trains between tournaments, I flashed to an image of the Spartak kids and felt a brief parental pang of disbelief. Such a transformation seemed impossible. 6

Sitting down on a set of courtside bleachers (level gaze, warm laugh, no hint of divahood), Dementieva told her story. Surprisingly, she had been rejected by several other clubs as too slow before landing at Spartak. She spoke fondly, if a little vaguely, of her days at the club: dodging stray dogs, washing dirty tennis balls in the sink, doing homework on the long subway ride. Her first instructor was the renowned Rausa Islanova (the mother of Dinara Safina and of the men's 2000 United States Open winner, Marat Safin), who was known for her strictness and her elimination system in which students competed for a constantly shrinking number of slots. Dementieva's group started with 25 students; within a year it was down to 7. Of those 7 kids, 4 became world-class players (Myskina, Kournikova and Safin were the other 3).

"Spartak was good for me, I think," Dementieva said, squinting as if she were peering into her hazy past. "I always had a feeling that I was going forward, getting better technique."

When Dementieva took the court to practice, she began with a set of those Jack LaLanne-style warm-ups — sidesteps, jumping jacks, high steps. She looked as if she were still a member of the Little Group, so much so that, watching from the bleachers, I was momentarily unsure whether it was her or some beginner. Dementieva did imitatsiya; she practiced each stroke in slow motion. Then, when her male sparring partner showed up, she proceeded to hit the ball so hard, accurately and consistently that it seemed she was playing a sport I'd never seen before. Again and again, her body rose to the ball in a twist of ballistic force, the power betrayed only by the snakelike rise of her thick blond braid. The ball hissed.

Trying to wrap my head around the metamorphic process through which a too-slow kid could become . . . her, well, it left me utterly at a loss, able only to fumble for such useful scientific terms as "magic" and "miracle."

Fortunately, there are more rational people to consult, and perhaps the most rational is K. Anders Ericsson, who has devoted much of his life to studying phenomena like Dementieva and Spartak. Ericsson, a native of Sweden and a professor of psychology at Florida State University, is co-editor of "The Cambridge Handbook of Expertise and Expert Performance," published in 2006. If talented people can be thought of as a singular species, then Ericsson is its John J. Audubon, and the handbook is his painstakingly annotated field guide.

The handbook runs to 901 pages, so, in the interest of time, allow me to sum up. Every talent, according to Ericsson, is the result of a single process: deliberate practice, which he defines as "individuals engaging in a practice activity (typically designed by teachers) with full concentration on improving some aspect of their performance." In a moment of towering simplification, "The Handbook" distills its lesson to a formula known as the Power Law of Learning: T = a P-b . (Don't ask.) A slightly more useful translation: Deliberate practice means working on technique, seeking constant critical feedback and focusing ruthlessly on improving weaknesses.

"It feels like you're constantly stretching yourself into an uncomfortable area beyond what you can quite do," Ericsson told me. It's hard to sustain deliberate practice for long periods of time, which may help explain why players like Jimmy Connors succeeded with seemingly paltry amounts of practice while their competitors were hitting thousands of balls each day. As the tennis commentator Mary Carillo told me, "He barely practiced an hour a day, but it was the most intense hour of your life."

Ericsson also discusses the Ten-Year Rule, an intriguing finding dating to 1899, which shows that even the most talented individual requires a decade of committed practice before reaching world-class level. (Even a prodigy like the chess player Bobby Fischer put in nine hard years before achieving his grandmaster status at age 16.) While this rule is often used to backdate the ideal start of training (in tennis, girls peak physically at around 17, so they ought to start by 7; boys peak later, so 9 is O.K.), the Ten-Year Rule has more universal implications. Namely, it implies that all skills are built using the same fundamental mechanism, and that the mechanism makes physiological demands from which no one is exempt.

This is not to suggest that the only difference between an average Joe and Michael Jordan is a few thousand hours of deliberate practice. Almost all of the scientists I spoke with agreed that inheritance is a huge factor in potential, if perhaps not in quite the way we've commonly assumed. (Perhaps, as George Bartzokis suggests, Jordan's greatest natural gift was his powerful oligodendrocytes.)

All in all, Ericsson's theory sounds logical and appealing, but part of me rises up in rebellion. What about geniuses? What about young Mozart's famous ability to transcribe entire scores on a single hearing? What about Shakespeare or Leonardo or those 14-year-old Ph.D. candidates? What about savants, who walk up to the piano or a Rubik's cube and are magically brilliant?

T = a P-b would be the reply. In his 1999 book, "Genius Explained," Michael Howe of the University of Exeter speculates that Mozart studied some 3,500 hours of music with his instructor father by his sixth birthday, a number that places his musical memory into the realm of impressive but obtainable party tricks. Savants, it is pointed out, excel within narrow domains that feature clear, logical rules (classical piano, math, occasionally art — as opposed to, say, jazz clarinet). Furthermore, savants typically possess prior exposure to those domains, such as listening to music around the home. Savants' true expertise, the research suggests, is in their ability to practice obsessively, even when it doesn't look as if they're practicing. As Ericsson succinctly put it, "There's no cell type that geniuses have that the rest of us don't."

So let's return to the initial question: how does Spartak do it? If the new science is right and myelination is to talent as photosynthesis is to plant growth, then Spartak makes it abundantly clear that photosynthesis alone is never enough; you also need soil, water, air, sunlight, luck. The question becomes, which variables are helping Spartak's myelin grow to such riotous abundance? Four factors stand above the rest:

1. Driven Parents. The hunger and ambition of Russian parents is uniquely strong, particularly when one considers how hard life is in Russia right now and also that the patron saint of Russian tennis parents is the ex-Siberian oil-field worker Yuri Sharapov, who came to America with less than $1,000 and his 7-year-old daughter, Maria, who now earns an estimated $30 million a year in endorsements. On the other hand, while they are intense, Russian parents aren't all that different a group from the parents in Serbia, the Czech Republic or Mission Viejo, Calif.

2. Early Starts. The kids here start young and specialize early. They are tennis players, and not much else competes for their attention (only a handful owned video games, according to my informal poll), and they also benefit from a Russian culture that's built to select athletes and shield them from academic pressures. Incidentally, there were indeed elite athletic genes floating around at Spartak: Alexandra's parents were famous figure skaters, and another kid was Myskina's cousin. So good genes probably play a role, or (just as likely, to my mind) there's a beneficial effect to growing up in an environment of working athletes.

3. Powerful, Consistent Coaches. Most tennis coaches I saw were treated with a respect reserved for university professors. The tennis clubs I visited were patrolled by a squad of Brezhnev lookalikes who offered advice that seemed hewed from stone. Their institutional specialty is biomechanics, but the point is perhaps not so much in the details of that coaching, but rather in the passion, rigor and uniformity with which that coaching is delivered. This, incidentally, is the opposite of the entrepreneurial system in which many American tennis coaches operate, as they often compete with one another, relying on their ability to sell their services to sometimes anxious parents. American coaches have to be unique to survive; Russian coaches are mostly the same.

4. Cultural Toughness. As poets have pointed out, the intrinsic hardiness of the Russian woman is legendary. Historically, this might have something to do with the hardships of life under Communism and the loss of 11 million soldiers in World War II. Whatever the cause, the immediate effect is a tangible mental toughness and a work ethic second to none. After all, at Spartak, they don't speak of "playing" tennis. The verb they like to use is borot'sya — to struggle.

If I gave in to the uncontrollable Ericssonian urge to put Spartak's success into a formula, it would read something like:

Intense Parents + Young Kids + Rigorous Technique + Toughness = Talent

Alongside it, we could write another equation:

Deliberate Practice + Time = Myelin = Talent

But in the end, as I look around the court, it can't come down to a formula because formulas are rational, and whatever Spartak is, it isn't entirely rational. It's a bunch of kids in a dumpy club who are burning to be here, for whom every swing is meaningful, who wake up in the morning and say, "Today is my day with Larisa Dmitrievna!" It's deeply and purposefully irrational, because it's built on a love of sport and country that can't be explained but holds everything together anyway. Spartak is not science; what happens here is not analogous to what happens in a factory or a laboratory. It's closer to what happens in a garden, a forgotten, rundown garden that somehow produces marvelous tomatoes, summer after summer. 7

Thwock . . . thwock . . . thwock . . . thwock.

The Little Group was smacking it now, the balls zipping over the net and ricocheting off the far wall. Preobrazhenskaya, the gardener, watched with a smile, occasionally correcting a backswing or a grip, nudging the kids on with a murmur of praise and instruction: "Clever boy." "Good girl." "No." "Correct." "Not there." "That's it."

On my last day at Spartak, I met one more player. Her name was Kseniya; she was 5, and she'd come for a tryout. Her parents, an upscale pair, ducked through the low door and asked Larisa Dmitrievna if she might have a moment. Kseniya had black pigtails held in place with pink ribbons. She wore new silver tennis shoes. She walked solemnly, one step behind her parents, carrying a tiny pink racket. Something in the precision of her walk, in her air of self-possession, reminded me of my daughter Zoe.

Preobrazhenskaya put her arm on Kseniya's shoulder and walked her to the corner of the court, out of the parents' earshot. The girl looked up into the coach's face. "She has good eyes," Preobrazhenskaya said later.

Preobrazhenskaya rotated Kseniya's arms in a wide circle, feeling for looseness in her muscles, which she regarded as a good sign. Preobrazhenskaya then showed Kseniya a new tennis ball, and told her what was about to happen. Kseniya listened closely, and nodded. Then the coach tossed the ball lightly, and Kseniya, her small body coming alive at once, ran to catch it.

1 In September, as part of an ongoing effort to revive American tennis, the United States Tennis Association plans to centralize its player development program at the Evert Tennis Academy in Boca Raton, Fla., a new complex that will feature 23 courts (14 lighted), dormitories, a state-of-theart video lounge and a staff of 30, including a mental-conditioning coach. Tuition with room and board will cost as much as $42,000 a year. By comparison, the Russian Tennis Federation's total youth-development budget is estimated to be between $300,000 and $400,000.

2 Timing is vital because neurons are binary: either they fire or they don't — no gray areas. Their firing depends solely on whether the incoming impulse is strong enough to exceed the neuron's threshold of activation. To explain the implications of this effect, Fields had me imagine a skill circuit in which two neurons need to combine their impulses to make a third, high-threshold neuron fire — for, say, a golf swing. In order to combine properly, those two incoming impulses must arrive at nearly exactly the same time — sort of like two people running at a heavy door to push it open. The time window turns out to be about four milliseconds, or roughly the time it takes a bee to flap its wings once. If the first two signals arrive more than four milliseconds apart, the door stays shut, the crucial third neuron doesn't fire and the golf ball soars into the rough (or, as I was reflexively picturing, Zoe swings and misses the purple ball). "Your brain has so many connections and possibilities that your genes can't code the neurons to time things so precisely," Fields said. "But you can build myelin to do it."

3 These studies shine a new light on the neuro-anatomist Marian C. Diamond's 1985 finding that the left, inferior parietal lobe of Albert Einstein's brain, though it had a typical number of neurons, had significantly more glial cells than her other samples, a study that neurologists at the time considered so meaningless as to be nearly comical but that now seems to make sense, bandwidth-wise.

4 The list of myelin-related pathologies is long and, Bartzokis believes, includes multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer's as well as a wider range of conditions, like schizophrenia, dyslexia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and autism, all of which can be understood as disorders of impulse timing.

5 Venezuela is a more recent example of this phenomenon. In 1989, the Houston Astros opened the first of what are now nine major-league academies there, and a few years later, the number of Venezuelans in the big leagues started to rise. Since 1995, 125 Venezuelans have broken into Major League Baseball, 51 more than had appeared in all the years up to that point.

6 In children, myelin arrives in a series of waves, some of them determined by biological code, some of them dependent on activity. These waves last into young adulthood. Until this time, the brain is extraordinarily receptive to learning new skills. Though adults retain the ability to myelinate throughout life (thankfully, 5 percent of our oligos remain immature, ready to answer the call), anyone who has tried to learn a language or musical instrument late in life can testify that it costs a lot more time and sweat to build the requisite circuitry. The effortlessness is the first thing to go.

7 Replicating the Spartak system in the United States (or, for that matter, installing Dominican-style baseball academies or forcing young golfers to practice only at driving ranges) would likely not create a sudden wellspring of stars. The reasons that the United States is losing ground on the talent map have less to do with training mechanisms and more to do with bigger factors: a highly distractive youth culture, a focus on the glamour of winning rather than on the brickwork of building technique and a sporting environment that is gentler than those found in many of the world's harder corners.

"You can't keep breast-feeding them all the time," Robert Lansdorp, a tennis coach in Los Angeles, told me. "You've got to make them an independent thinker." Lansdorp, who is in his 60s, has coached Sharapova, along with the former No. 1-ranked players Pete Sampras, Tracy Austin and Lindsay Davenport, all three of whom grew up in the same area and played at the same run-of-the-mill tennis clubs near Los Angeles. "You don't need a fancy academy," he said. "You need fundamentals and discipline, and in this country nobody gives a damn about fundamentals and discipline." Lansdorp also mentioned that he'd visited Spartak last year to teach a clinic. "It was a pretty different place," he said. "But that Larisa, she sure knows her stuff."

Inside the World of Sports

Dive deeper into the people, issues and trends shaping professional, collegiate and amateur athletics..

Testing the W.N.B.A.’s TV Limits:  The docuseries “Full Court Press” closely tracked college stars like Caitlin Clark and Kamilla Cardoso. Fans who want to follow elite W.N.B.A. rookies could have a tougher time .

Competing for Olympic Spots:  Two friends had run side by side for more than 10,000 miles. Both vied for a place in the marathon at the Paris Games .

Captivating New York:  It has been 50 years since the Knicks last won the N.B.A. championship. Now, a freshly promising team has enthralled the city .

Americanizing English Soccer:  U.S. investors are gobbling up the storied teams of the English Premier League — and changing the stadium experience  in ways that soccer fans resent.

Wild World of Sports:  Surprisingly often, animals show up uninvited at sporting events. Sometimes, it gets a little weird .

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Rotary names student contest winners

By sanibel-captiva rotary club - | may 17, 2024.

SANIBEL-CAPTIVA ROTARY CLUB Sanibel-Captiva Rotary Club member Chet Sadler, winners Kate Branin, Jhana Hoang and Anna Kolobova and The Sanibel School Interact Club President Joshua Schwartz with their family, Principal Jennifer Lusk and Interact Club advisor Edna Dykhuizen.

The Sanibel-Captiva Rotary Club announced the winners of its Annual Four-Way Test Essay Contest, which is open to eighth-graders at The Sanibel School. First place went to Anna Kolobova, Kate Branin won second place and third place went to Jhana Hoang. The test asks: Is it the truth? Is it fair to all concerned? Will it build goodwill and better friendships? Will it be beneficial to all concerned? The contest asks applicants to write an essay describing how the test can be applied to life challenges or decisions faced by them or others their age. The winners read their essays at a recent club meeting, where club members also received an update from school Interact Club President Joshua Schwartz. The winning essays will be entered into the Rotary District 6960 competition.

Chamber applauds return of Suncatchers’ Dream

F.I.S.H. moves tool borrowing program off-island

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Rory McIlroy files for divorce from his wife of 7 years ahead of the PGA Championship

Rory McIlroy, of Northern Ireland, holds the trophy after winning the Wells Fargo Championship golf tournament at the Quail Hollow Club Sunday, May 12, 2024, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

Rory McIlroy, of Northern Ireland, celebrates after an eagle on the 15th hole from the bunker during the final round of the Wells Fargo Championship golf tournament at the Quail Hollow Club Sunday, May 12, 2024, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

Rory McIlroy, of Northern Ireland, celebrates after winning the Wells Fargo Championship golf tournament at the Quail Hollow Club Sunday, May 12, 2024, in Charlotte, N.C. (AP Photo/Chris Carlson)

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LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Rory McIlroy has filed for divorce after seven years of marriage, according to court records in Palm Beach County, Florida, a stunning development going into the PGA Championship .

McIlroy and his wife, Erica Stoll, had a storybook meeting during the Ryder Cup in 2012, began dating two years later and were married in 2017 . They have one daughter, Poppy, born in September 2020.

TMZ first reported on the filing, which was made Monday.

The petition for divorce described the marriage as irretrievably broken and asked that a prenuptial agreement signed about a month before their April 21, 2017, wedding be validated and enforced. The prenuptial agreement was sealed.

McIlroy’s attorney was listed as Thomas Sasser, the same attorney who represented Tiger Woods when his wife divorced him in 2010.

“Rory McIlroy’s communications team confirmed today that a divorce has been filed. They stressed Rory’s desire to ensure this difficult time is as respectful and amicable as possible,” said a statement from his manager, Sean O’Flaherty.

He said there would be no further comment.

McIlroy arrived at Valhalla on Tuesday. He has gone 10 years since winning a major, the last one at Valhalla in 2014 for the PGA Championship. His pre-tournament news conference was scheduled for Wednesday.

McIlroy and Stoll met under unusual circumstances. She worked for the PGA of America in 2012 during the Ryder Cup at Medinah in the Chicago suburbs, where McIlroy nearly missed his Sunday singles match because he said he forgot he was in the Central time zone.

Stoll arranged for a police escort to Medinah, and McIlroy barely arrived in time. He won his match over Keegan Bradley as Europe rallied to win.

McIlroy was dating tennis star Caroline Wozniacki at the time. They were engaged just over a year later, but then McIlroy abruptly broke it off over the phone.

He and Stoll began dating later that year. They were engaged in 2015.

McIlroy filed for the divorce a day after he won the Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, North Carolina, his second straight PGA Tour win and the 26th of his career. Asked if he planned to go straight to Valhalla on Sunday night, McIlroy said, “I’ll probably go home and just sort of reset, then head up to Louisville tomorrow night or Tuesday morning.”

The divorce filing comes amid chaos in golf created by the launch of Saudi-funded LIV Golf. McIlroy has been a central figure over the last two years, harshly criticizing LIV and then changing his views and pushing for some form of reunification.

He resigned from the PGA Tour board last November, then was involved in a plan to rejoin the board by replacing Webb Simpson. That move was met by resistance from other player directors. Instead, McIlroy was appointed to a committee that is negotiating with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia over potentially becoming a minority investor.

Associated Press Writer Terry Spencer in Palm Beach, Florida, contributed to this report.

AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf

IIHF imposes sanctions on Flyers’ Ivan Fedotov, his former KHL club, and the Russian Federation

T he International Ice Hockey Federation announced sanctions against Flyers goalie Ivan Fedotov, CSKA Moscow, and the Russian Federation on Saturday.

Fedotov, a seventh-round pick in the 2015 NHL draft, signed a one-year, entry-level contract with the Flyers in 2022. He was arrested in Russia for evading military service, which delayed his arrival in North America. After missing the entirety of the 2022 season to fulfill his military requirements, Fedotov signed a two-year contract with his previous KHL club, CSKA Moscow, in July 2023.

The IIHF ruled last year that this violated international transfer regulations since Fedotov was playing in the KHL while under a valid NHL contract with the Flyers for the 2023-24 season. Fedotov initially received a four-month ban from participating in national and international games which expired in December 2023, although he continued to play.

CSKA Moscow terminated Fedotov’s contract on March 28, allowing him to join the Flyers for the end of the 2023-24 NHL season to back up goalie Sam Ersson. He appeared in three games and posted an .811 save percentage. On April 23, he signed a two-year, $6.5 million contract with the Flyers .

The new sanctions announced Saturday include a 24-month ban on all international transfers for CSKA Moscow, which will last through Aug. 10, 2026. Fedotov is also suspended from playing at the club level for six months, which will kick in if he leaves the NHL to join any club under IIHF jurisdiction. Additionally, he is suspended from playing in all IIHF competitions, including the Olympics, for three years.

Russia has already been banned from competing in IIHF events since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, a sanction that was recently extended to include the 2024-25 championship season.

The Russian Ice Hockey Federation was also fined 1 million Swiss francs for its role in Fedotov’s transfer violation.

©2024 The Philadelphia Inquirer. Visit inquirer.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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Man Utd could be forced to hand Bruno Fernandes new deal to keep him at club - Paper Talk

Plus: Newcastle United are pushing ahead with a deal to sign Arsenal goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale; Ruben Amorim's move to Liverpool from Sporting Lisbon reportedly fell through due to a dispute over his release clause; Sofyan Amrabat is set to remain in the Premier League next season

Saturday 18 May 2024 09:07, UK

The top stories and transfer rumours from Saturday's newspapers...

Manchester United could be forced to hand Bruno Fernandes a bumper new deal to keep him at Old Trafford.

DAILY TELEGRAPH

Chelsea have increased the price of general admission season tickets for the first time in 13 years - the first hike of the Clearlake Capital-Todd Boehly regime.

Newcastle United are pushing ahead with a deal to sign Arsenal goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale in the first move of what promises to be a busy summer of ins and outs at St James' Park.

Michael Carrick is expected to sign a new deal at Middlesbrough and commit his future to the club after interest from the Premier League.

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• Fury vs Usyk highlights and reaction: New champion has hospital scan on jaw
• Transfer Centre LIVE! Villa keen on Chelsea's Gallagher
• PL Predictions: Still hope for Arsenal? West Ham to make Man City sweat
• Nelson: Don't be surprised if Fury walks away
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Declan Rice has claimed that it's England's 'time' to win a major trophy ahead of next month's European Championships.

Ruben Amorim's move to Liverpool from Sporting Lisbon reportedly fell through due to a dispute over his release clause.

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Gary O'Neil has backed Wolves' bid to abolish VAR in its current form and claimed every Premier League manager has problems with the system.

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DAILY MIRROR

Arsenal midfielder Mohamed Elneny, currently the club's longest serving player, has announced his Gunners exit.

Vincent Kompany claims Burnley will announce the future of their out-of-contract players next week.

THE GUARDIAN

Mauricio Pochettino has admitted he could have been sacked after Chelsea's humiliating 4-2 defeat at home to Wolves in February.

Harry Kane has given England a massive Euro 2024 scare as he is currently injured with a back problem.

Manchester United star Jadon Sancho is in line for an awkward encounter with Erik ten Hag - after the winger splashed out on a stunning mansion round the corner from where his manager lives.

Sofyan Amrabat is set to remain in the Premier League next season - with or without Manchester United with Crystal Palace and Fulham both having watched the midfielder.

Gary O'Neil says some managers would not want to work in the "tough and difficult" financial circumstances at Wolves.

Anthony Joshua will leap in and fight Saturday night's undisputed winner - if Tyson Fury or Oleksandr Usyk's opener is a one-sided show.

Barcelona look set to sack their head coach Xavi less than a month after he decided to stay at the club, having been poised to quit at the end of the season.

The FA's chief executive, Mark Bullingham, has said it will keep VAR for the FA Cup even if the Premier League stops using the system.

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EVENING STANDARD

Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has assured fans that he will sit down for talks with the club over his future "when the time is right".

SCOTTISH SUN

Rangers are eyeing a summer move for Ferencvaros winger Adama Traore.

THE DAILY RECORD

Philippe Clement admitted he's got a bigger job on his hands at Ibrox than he first thought.

Celtic have reportedly yet to indicate to Benfica if they plan to seal a permanent deal for Paulo Bernardo.

It's one of the biggest sporting events in a generation. Tyson Fury and Oleksandr Usyk collide for the undisputed world heavyweight championship on Saturday May 18, live on Sky Sports Box Office. Book the fight now

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