Development
The challenges of transitioning from sub-elite to elite
Unless you have been living under a rock or actively avoid any news or social media (please reach out if so, I’d love to hear more) you would have seen the recent performances of Gout Gout. The young Australian of South Sudanese heritage performed impressively at the Australian national track & field championships, running a low 10 second 100m and low 20 second 200m. For context these are in the realm of Usain Bolt’s efforts at a similar age, with many calling Gout the second coming of Bolt.
But how likely is it that Gout can find the last half second or so in both distances required to rival Bolt’s records?
The reality is if we had to bet on one runner to break Bolt’s records, Gout is may be the one, but if betting a binary will he or won’t he, it may be worth betting on the latter. This is not to say the young man can’t do it, or I think he won’t but it is worth considering the challenges of athletic development. This very discussion was the genesis of this article, remembering that the challenges can serve as informative. Said differently; I could have written a ‘how to’ using these same areas of challenge.
A helpful analogy for talent development and maturation may be the classic primary school activity of growing a seed. Initially, wrapped in some wet cottonwool the seed sprouts, eventually it is then planted, watered and it grows from there. You all remember what I am talking about.
But some of these plants grew quicker than others, and some ended up bigger than others. This is perhaps the way to think about talent and peak human performance. There are certainly different rates of maturation, and some indications early on about which plant will be the best but it is impossible to look at any one plant and predict its success. Different access to sunlight, sabotage, genetic or idiosyncratic differences could well change the trajectory of the growth of a sprout - just like a human.
What Does the Research Say?
You guessed it! Research in the track and field (T&F) space specifically suggests progression to an elite senior is unlikely statistically. Again, remembering that statistics are information about populations, not individuals, it still may be the Gout is the next big thing, however in general people in similar situations are not.
In the study of reference, data from 67,600 athletes was collated. Specifically looking at those ranked in the top 100 and top 50 at U18 and U20 age groups and then tracking their progression towards the top 100 in the open/senior category.
Only 23.5% of those ranked in the top 100 at U18 and 35.4% ranked in the top 100 at U20 were ranked in the top 100 as seniors. It is worth noting that U20 level is all but senior and thus being a top U20 means you are close, if not already a high level senior athlete.
In the sample, only 20% of athletes were ranked top 100 at U18, U20 and at senior level. Whilst 48% of top 100 ranked U18 athletes were neither top 100 at U20 or senior level (these were probably earlier maturing athletes - more on this later).
Below is a pie chart of top 100 senior athletes and their rankings at junior levels. The majority 68.5% were never in the top 100 as juniors, 16.6% were top 100 at U20 only and 12.7% were top 100 U18 & U20s. Somewhat strangely 2.2% were top 100 at U18 but not U20 (this likely reflects injury or similar).
Athletes ranked top 50 as U18 were, unsurprisingly, more likely to be ranked in the top 50 as seniors than athletes ranked 51-100 at U18 level. This pattern was maintained for U20 ranking through to seniors also.
Interestingly, top 100 U18 females were much more likely to become top 100 senior athletes than their male counterparts, perhaps reflecting to their earlier physical (and mental) maturation.
Development is Non-Linear
Our propensity for, and challenges of, linear thinking is something I covered recently. I could easily have included progression and development in this.
There is a belief that achieving a certain outcome by a certain age puts you on a trajectory that continues linearly but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Development is non-linear for a myriad of reasons. During development, physical maturation can delay this progression via coordination challenges or growth related injuries for example. Only once development is complete, can we truly understand the impact development had on performances during it. In a mathematical context; we have no idea of the shape of the graph we are looking at, or it’s intercepts so prediction of any point far removed from where we are on it is difficult.
Physical maturation and it’s role in development cannot be underplayed, more on this below, but one huge impact on development is injury. As mentioned the physical maturation process can at times be a significant factor in injuries (particularly if we consider the definition of “injury” to be anything that requires a modification to training) and as a result physical maturation has the potential to negative impact the single biggest factor in performance; consistency.
As I have discussed in earlier writing, physical maturation can often be misinterpreted as talent, specifically this is known as the relative age effect (where someone in January is effectively a year older than someone born in December of the same year). Overlayed on this, is that they may not develop the necessary skills and tolls to be successful when they aren’t physically more mature than others. Having said that, they’re more also likely to get access to better coaching if they are seen as ‘talented’.
Training Age & Specialisation
Training age, for those unfamiliar, is in effect how long the athlete has been training for the sport. This is distinct from chronological age, obviously and isn’t hard and fast (a year of 1 session a week is different from 5 sessions a week). In short, though, greater training age reflects a more mature development in the sport and probably less future potential upside.
Again, acknowledging that training age is more a concept than a measurable parameter, someone can have accumulated relevant practice from similar sports. For example someone who’s never played pickle ball or padel (take your pick based on your geography) technically has a training age of 0, but we all agree that their friend who grew up playing tennis, table tennis and badminton is probably better positioned to succeed at this point (but if they’re performing equally at the moment, may have a lower ceiling).
One challenge with early success is the temptation to specialise. Early specialisation is a cause of much debate and heartache, but my read on the crux of the debate is as such; early specialisation sports (tennis, gymnastics, swimming amongst others) seem to be outliers where early specialisation is an advantage, whereas the rest favour later specialisation (I covered a little on specialisation vs generalisation here). There is also some indications in the literature that earlier specialisation is a risk for injury.
These concepts overlap in that earlier specialisation can increase training age (part of the driver for it)
Pressure
As discussed further below in the section on ‘transitions’; life changes significantly when leaving school and/or becoming a professional. One of the changes that is associated with professionalism is pressure. One challenge for a young man who’s performed so well, is the expectation of performance and the pressure to succeed. That is, people will be disappointed any time Gout doesn’t run a 19 second 100m, or win a race. His silver at the world youth championships last year was an excellent achievement, but no doubt there is a subset of the media and fans who expected a gold.
Dealing with this pressure isn’t something everyone can do or is made to do. Yes it is part of what being a professional is about, but that doesn’t make it easy. This sort of pressure can easily ruin careers and/or progression through mental health challenges or maladaptive coping mechanisms.
Environment
I have previously discussed the role environment can play in success in both the health and performance realms. Reverting back to our initial analogy of the seedling growing; if the soil doesn’t have the required nutrients, there’s no water or it is in the cupboard without light - the seedling won’t grow. It is worth noting that in the specific case of Gout, he’s currently in a great environment - his school prioritises track & field, he has a great coach and has friends and family around. His signing with Adidas means he will spend some time training with Noah Lyles next year, which could be an amazing opportunity for the young man to learn about high performance and professionalism from one of the best in the world. But it is also worth noting, that this may not be the case, in a podcast I did (see below player) with my cohost and a guest Merhawi Kudus, we discussed the challenges of developing cyclists from Africa (and why there aren’t more given their propensity for endurance sports).
In the podcast Merhawi talks about the challenges of having to move to Switzerland to the UCI cycling centre in Switzerland. This ‘fish out of water’ and or disconnection from support network should not be underplayed - it’s not always easy being in these environments, no matter how good the opportunity seems.
Jessica Hull, the Olympic 1500m silver medalist, recently moved back to Australia from a great training group in the USA. Of course, the decision looks to be vindicated by her performance, but this should speak to the role that the performance environment can have for even the most professional of athletes. It is unclear whether Gout will stay in his current environment and for how long, but it should be noted that these sorts of changes can be the cause of a significant stressor and contribute to underperformance. This is pertinent because at some point, no doubt, there will be an evaluation of ways in which Gout can get better. Environment, competition and facilities will play a role in this and it is almost inevitable that the potential for a change is floated - for instance joining Noah Lyles. This could be a masterstroke or a real challenge, only time will tell but such is the complexity of environment on success.
Transitions
It is worth noting that there is a gulf between running fast and being a professional athlete. I covered this well in an article delineating high performance, elite and professional. The evolution from the article would be that in the case of a junior elite, such as Gout, he will need to navigate the transition to being paid what I can assume is a significant sum of money (if you don’t understand this is a challenge for young athletes you haven’t been paying attention) and the transition out of school (eventually, though he is a little while away). The latter providing structure and routine, which whilst it sounds as though it may be a burden, it should be remembered that traditional wisdom such as “discipline begets freedom” and “idle hands do the devil’s work” exist for a reason.
The ability to successfully navigate these transitions, and for that matter stay focussed and committed are in of themselves a form of talent. That’s right, whilst we see Gout’s finishing ability, raw speed and power, there are many other factors that are not often called talent which probably should be. As mentioned in the link above in this paragraph, we probably all have a story of someone who we grew up with that was extremely talented and didn’t make it for one reason or another - some of which was perhaps a deficit in talent outside the physical realm (I have such a story of someone from Gout’s high school in fact).
Ego and the Trappings of Success
Marvin Hagler, the undisputed middleweight champion once said; "It's hard to wake up and do road work at 5:00 am if you're sleeping in silk pajamas."
The team sports world is particularly bad at telling talented juniors they’re the next big thing and treating them as though they’re already successful. Maintaining drive, motivation and work ethic in this context is very difficult.
The ego associated with all of these things has all but undone many a career. I won’t share stories, but almost everyone has one. In the Australian rugby codes I can currently name 3 ‘greats’ who could and maybe should have had their career go down the toilet given some of their early behaviour. Thankfully they course corrected but I can’t help but feel as though somewhere earlier in their development someone could have done them a service by telling them that success at a junior level is marginally more meaningful than not. It is a potential stepping stone to the ultimate goal but not the goal itself (nor the only path).
Closing Thoughts
As a final illustration of the non-linearity of development and juniors progressing to seniors, here is a list of Australian junior world tennis No.1s in the past 20 years:
Jason Kubler (2009)
Luke Saville (2011)
Nick Kyrgios (2012)
Emerson Jones (2024)
*Ash Barty peaked at No.2 in 2011
Even the most staunch tennis fan would have been lucky to know anyone on that list not called Nick Kyrgios (Ash Barty excluded).
Millions, in fact probably billions, are spent on talent identification and development yearly across different sports, but despite this we are not particularly good at it (through no fault of those doing the work). Part of this is because of what goes in to creating the best in the world and all of the factors that need to fall into place.
So why continue this with such a low ROI? Because the cost of missing out is so significant. Think about how different the NFL would be if any of the 31 other teams had appropriately talent identified a 22 year old Tom Brady in the year 2000 (you could even argue the Patriots didn’t do a great job either given he was drafted with the very last pick of the draft).
Never forget the body is not a simple or even complicated system, it is a complex system and humans are even more so.
References
Bezuglov E, Emanov A, Waśkiewicz Z, Semeniuk N, Butovsky M, Shoshorina M, Baranova D, Volodina K and Morgans R (2022) Successful Young Athletes Have Low Probability of Being Ranked Among the Best Senior Athletes, but This Is Higher When Compared to Their Less Successful Peers. Front. Psychol. 13:869637. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.869637