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Don't kill the apostrophe. Bring back the diaeresis in places other than the New Yorker.

can't we all just coöperate?

^^^that. the same goes for something like baseball, where the coaching you get and the level of play around you has a HUGE impact on how well you develop. i have a friend who saw five kids in his high school class get drafted by MLB teams. is that because peabody, massachusetts has an unusually high number of freakishly talented baseball players? no, it's because all the boys play baseball and the athletic kids are funneled to baseball and coached very well from a young age. they won the babe ruth league world series when my buddy was 14. and when the initial selection is going on, the kids who are ahead developmentally have an advantage. that's not to say that some younger kids don't eventually rise to the top, or even that some younger kids aren't always obviously more athletic (viz. nate robinson). but it is to say that, in aggregate, relatively older kids have an advantage.

don't take my word for it, go check out the various pieces the science of sport guys have done on this over the years:

http://www.sportsscientists.com/2009/01/matthew-effect.html

http://www.sportsscientists.com/2013/02/long-term-athlete-development.html

also, one other point: i think that, even for "pure" sports like track and field or swimming, it's actually not that interesting to look at people like asafa, bolt, michael phelps, etc. they are true freaks and it's hard to extrapolate anything from them. how many guys have run 9.7? like, six? but dozens have run 10.0 and hundreds have run 10.3, which is still an elite time! i feel like you can learn much more interesting to look at the broader picture of elite athletes.

that is both horrifying and very impressive.

Quote from: LBSS on September 24, 2013, 11:54:56 am

^^^true, true. reminds me of the gladwell-popularized fact that most NHL players are born in the first third of the year. the theory goes that kids born earlier in the year tend to be older for their grade or division than kids born later in the year. the 9 or 10 months can make a big difference when you're little, so early-birthday kids are overselected for competitive teams because they're just bigger and stronger and more coordinated than kids younger than they are. path dependency takes over and the relatively younger kids never make up the gap.

or so i comfort my november-born, always-one-of-the-youngest-kids-in-the-class self.

I'm going to make sure my kid gets held back in kindergarten

yeah i mean on the one hand i always felt extra smart and awesome being the youngest. on the other hand, being among the older kids has huge advantages and not just for sports. my parents just decided i was ready for kindergarten when i was four, and that was that.

^^^true, true. reminds me of the gladwell-popularized fact that most NHL players are born in the first third of the year. the theory goes that kids born earlier in the year tend to be older for their grade or division than kids born later in the year. the 9 or 10 months can make a big difference when you're little, so early-birthday kids are overselected for competitive teams because they're just bigger and stronger and more coordinated than kids younger than they are. path dependency takes over and the relatively younger kids never make up the gap.

or so i comfort my november-born, always-one-of-the-youngest-kids-in-the-class self.

still incredibly expensive.

don't you train at Blenderate's gym? Or was it Tigerak's gym? If you go to latter you'll probably see Frank Yang at some point.

no, and i don't know who those people are. i think frank yang trains up in montgomery county (where he and i are both from), which is not far but not as close as any of the half-dozen or more gyms that i could walk to from work and home.

forgot about this thread. never got this on here. from january 2012, the first time i broke 2xbw in the squat. 350 @ 171.6 bw (2.04):

<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_i48vau718c" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_i48vau718c</a>