Elite Athletes Who Are Elite Athletes

Every elite athlete makes it look easy. Splashing through the water or striding gracefully down the track making it look effortless. Some people assume they are “naturals,” that their perfect DNA sequence is what has brought them to this level. Others argue that hard work and drive is

What makes a good athlete? What separates a person on the 1st line up from a bench warmer? Where does athleticism come from? Is it from our genes, or is it a product of the environment we live in? These are the types of questions that arise in the nature vs. nurture debate pertaining about athletic ability. In 1582, British educator, Richard Mulcaster wrote that
''Nature makes the boy toward, nurture sees him forward,'' he gave the world
a euphonious name for an opposition that has been debated ever since; Nature and Nurture. People's
beliefs about the roles of heredity and environment affect their opinions on an
astonishing range of topics including sports. The nature versus nurture debate not only exists in the sporting community but also in many others. It is a very controversial topic that has puzzled researchers for centuries. There are two sides to the debate; Nature and Nurture. To be on the side on nature one believes that DNA and heredity make us who we are. In the case of sports, an athlete is born with genes that give them the ability to excel in a certain sport. On the other hand, many people believe that we become who we are because of the environment and people around us; Nurture. A nurtured athlete is an individual that has developed elite skills over time caused by rigorous training and their surroundings. Nature or nurture, which contributes more to the creation of professional athletes?

Are elite athletes/sports men or women being paid too much if not how are there high salaries justified, if so, why, and how could there money be put to better use? To most people one million dollars a lot of money, to most people one thousand dollars is a lot, but

What many people fail to see in an athlete is the amount of talent in them, the commitment they have, the intense training they go through, and the competitive attitude they posses. The physical challenges they face and endure is astonishing. An average person works eight hours a day behind a desk with his computer. Imagine working the same number of hours everyday while training your abilities, maintaining your physical form, and sharpening your skills (Anonymous par. 4). That is what a professional athlete endures. Athletes face short career lengths. They also face a lot of competitiveness; therefore, an athlete is at the top of his game when he is still young. Professional athletes also face the risk of career ending injuries when they are fighting to win a game and be the best they can. Combining all those problems they face, the average career length of an athlete is five years (Keown par. 2). Not only do these athletes need to stay in shape, but they also have to perform well. But all the hard works leads to health issues such as lack of sleep, fatigue, and continuous tension (Wilson par.3). If they are not able to put up to the

In The Sports Gene, David Epstein compares two high jumpers and their success, arguing that physical ability is the leading cause of an individual's success. David Epstein uses Donald Thomas as an example to support his claim by comparing his success to Stefan Holm. Donald Thomas was an inexperienced high jumper who had an incredible amount of success leading him to participate and eventually win the 2007 World Championships. Stefan Holm was the reigning Olympic champion of the high jump which used discipline and many years of practice to achieve success but was defeated by a neophyte. Epstein provides information about studies conducted on

Athletes: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly As a casual reader of the sports section of this newspaper, you come across many articles depicting the triumphs of local athletes. However, very rarely do these articles describe the actual athlete behind the success. Athletes come in all sorts of sizes and shapes. They range from the incredibly talented to the horribly uncoordinated. Some are great teammates while others would rather be a one man team. Certain athletes seek out attention from the people around them while others are modest and stay in the background. The fact of the matter is that there is a wide spectrum of different types of athletes that exist in this world and no two athletes are exactly the same. However, each can be put

Some people are born with natural god given skills and ability while others who are not that lucky and have to work twice as hard just to get the same result. And then there are those rare individual who even though they are born with the talent, they still work just as hard and sometimes even harder to keep improving. It is called determination and that is a trait that all the great athletes share and it is what separates the great ones from the just good ones. This is perfect way to describe Peyton Williams Manning, who is considered to be one of the most prolific passers in NFL history.

The author's purpose in writing ​​the sports gene​ is to show the readers the difference between being born with a natural talent/gift and have years of hard work and practice to master that one subject/sport. In this case, Donald Thomas was the example of being born with a natural gift. On the other hand, we have Stefan Holm who had 25 years of practice and experience. During the competition, Donald Thomas didn't know the techniques and struggled at the beginning. While Holm had years of experience and time to perfect the techniques. Holm did not struggle, he easily passed all the bars without having to repeat them. Thomas came in 4th place and took a year to practice. "He slowed down so drastically as h approached the bar that it seemed

Many athletes quit playing sports they dislike their junior year or senior year. Unfortunately, the most common sport quit between junior and senior year at Unionville Sebewaing Area high school's girls basketball. Therefore, the girls basketball program is gradually getting smaller each year. Eventually there with be no girls

Athletic Scholarships There are many good athletes in professional sports today. There are many good athletes in college sports today also. Some of the biggest names in sports are Mark McGwire, Steve Young, Michael Jordan, Allen Iverson, and so on. Now, imagine if all of those players never

The thing that Colvin is trying to get out to the readers is to show them what it takes to be great. The article”What it takes to be great”was published on October 30, 2006. The question is what does it take to be a great. Something that he wants to get to the readers is that to be great at something it has to come from lots and lots of deliberate practice. You can’t just do it once and say “I did it. I’m the best at it now.” You have to go through many months and sometimes even years to get good at what you want to be good at. You have to strive for the sport. Something that Colvin says to support his argument is “The elite athletes became great through lots of practice dedication and focus.” You have to at least have these few traits, Practice,

I believe in order to be an elite athlete, you must have a great coach. Coaching makes you better because you have someone who knows your faults and is helping you improve your game. A coach can teach you the fundamentals of the game (the xs& ys). A coach can help an athlete become a great player, but an elite athlete doesn't need coaching to be elite. If a player is a natural born athlete, for example Lebron James or the Mannings, they did not need coaching to be elite. James is a natural born freak of nature. Even if he had choose football, I believe he would have been a star football player. For Peyton and Eli Manning, football is genetic for them. The Mannings were throwing the football around with their father. coaching didn't made them

Several gaps in the current body of knowledge have been indentified including, among others: small sample size of most athletic cohorts, lack of corroboration with replication cohorts of different ethnic backgrounds (particularly, made up of non-Caucasian athletes), the need of research accounting for the potential role of epigenetics in elite athletic performance, and also the need for future models that take into account the association between athletic status and complex gene gene and gene environment

Sport Psychology In earlier days sports psychology was mostly concerned with developing assessment methods that would identify those people with the potential to become serious superior athletes. Today the focus is on psychological training, exercises that strengthen the mental skills that will help athletic performances on the path to excellence. These

The Hardest Working Athletes and the Least Cared About Sport Does the name Michael Phelps ring a bell? Here’s a hint: he’s the most decorated Olympian of all time with a total of 22 medals, 18 of them being gold. Why is it that, even at the height of his career, Phelps was talked about much less than pro-athletes such as LeBron James, Tom Brady, or Derek Jeter? Saying these other athletes are not also great would be unfair, but it must be acknowledged that Phelps is underappreciated even though he is the most decorated Olympian of all time (and there’s really no other title higher than that). Phelps is underappreciated because swimming is underappreciated.