&startStory=1&linktext1=Genetic testing for athletic traits&storylink1=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2022781&headline1=Baby, you're the greatest&subhead1=Want to know what sport your kid should play? Why wait? Everybody into the gene pool.&story1=It's noontime in small-town Connecticut as Kellen, my 1-year-old, awakens from his nap. The shades are drawn, the room dark, the air purifier on a low hum, as I slowly push open the door. He's sitting up in his crib, one hand holding his favorite blue blanket, the other rubbing blue eyes that blink back the hall light. Next to him is the music-box pillow that had sung him to sleep to the ting-ting-ting of "Here Comes Peter Cottontail."

"Hi, kicker boy," I say, using his nickname du jour, so given because of his diaper-time obsession with whacking his heels on the changing table as rapidly as possible, like a Benihana chef with new knives. Kellen, of course, does not get my reference, as he does not yet talk, or walk.

But he does drool. And it's a sample of that saliva that I'm looking to harvest right now -- because his wipe-away spit, clear as a crystal ball, offers genetic insight into his future as an athlete. As Kellen squints back up at me, I slide the end of a Q-tip into the side of his mouth, rub it around the gum area for 20 seconds and drop it into a "Sample Transportation Bag" with his name scrawled in pen on the outside.

<img align="right" src="http://www.espn.com/i/espn/next/sidebar.jpg" width="180" height="809">In two hours, my flight leaves for Australia. "All right, kicker boy," I say, sealing the baggie. "Let's go find your destiny."

The Founding Fathers declared that all men are created equal, a bedrock principle that has been extended to define the ethics of American sports. Despite evidence to the contrary -- notably all the kids of retired pros who are now pros themselves -- we still pledge allegiance to the notion that hard work separates the great from the ordinary. That Tom Brady just wanted it more. That Serena simply fought her way to glory. That Ichiro hustled up the single-season hits chart.

The Aussies, blunt about everything, are more willing to explore the role that inherited traits play in athletic achievement. "I think anyone who opens their eyes will realize that certain people have talent for activity A, whereas others have talent for activity B," says Deon Venter, chief pathologist at Genetic Technologies in Melbourne. The doctor, a former Ironman champion, is sitting on a raised swivel chair inside the company's quiet lab, where DNA samples are being processed. A robotic machine on the counter behind him extracts samples, including Kellen's, and drops them into rows of vials.

In December, at Venter's urging, Genetic Technologies began selling what it calls the world's first DNA test for sports performance. Available over the Internet to anyone with a mouth swab and 110 Australian dollars ($100 U.S.), the test evaluates just one gene, ACTN3, whose relevance was discovered more than a year ago by a University of Sydney researcher. When there is no mutation, the gene creates the protein alpha-actinin-3, which fuels the explosive machinery in fast-twitch muscle fiber.

Every human being gets two copies of every gene (one from Mom, one from Dad). So for ACTN3, the genetic lottery determines whether a child gets two, one or zero copies of the form linked to fast-twitch fibers. Not surprisingly, when testing the genotypes of 429 of Australia's top athletes in 14 sports, including 50 Olympians, researchers found that participants in sprint and power events were far more likely than average Australians to have two copies. In effect, they were getting a double shot of fast-twitch espresso. By contrast, athletes in endurance sports were more likely to have no copies, suggesting that an advantage in those events is gained when the muscles must rely on slow-twitch fiber.

"Sports performance is a jigsaw puzzle, and this is just piece No. 1," Venter warns. But as we stare at a monitor that gradually displays Kellen's results, which are being decoded in a gene machine about the size of a microwave oven, I am filled with anticipation and queasiness. How bizarre will it be to know if he's cut out for sprinting while he still can only crawl? As a parent, even one whose instinct is to expose my kids to the diversity of life and let them find their own way, can I be trusted with such information?

A lab tech copies the results onto a CD, converts them to a graphically pleasing format and hands the disc to Venter, who pulls up a series of bar charts on his laptop. "Well, Tom, here are the results," he says in a gentle voice. The vertical bars on Kellen's graph are absent. In ACTN3 terms, he's a zero (like 20 percent of the population).

"This is more likely to fit with an endurance athlete," Venter confirms.

"So we'll skip the 100-meter dash," I say.

"He can do it if he wants to do it," the doctor replies, "but statistically speaking, based on what we know now, he's less likely to do well because he will not apparently make sufficient power."

Venter is a geneticist, not a sports physiologist, so I'll save the question of which activities would be best tailored to Kellen for tomorrow. That's when I meet with the experts at the Australian Institute of Sport, which made its elite athletes available for DNA analysis in the landmark ACTN3 study. But I'm curious to know if Venter, an accomplished endurance athlete himself who happens to have the same ACTN3 architecture as Kellen, thinks my baby boy has the stuff of an Ironman.

"He might, if he can stand the pain," Venter says. "That's something we don't know how to measure yet."

Yet. It's the geneticist's favorite word.

The ancient Greeks attributed many human acts to the whims of mythical gods and goddesses. Dionysus made folks get drunk. Aphrodite made the furniture move. Nike made victory (and still does, at least some of the time). Modern science has unlocked many secrets. But even now that we know the instructions for life can be found in the 30,000 or so genes that make up the human genome, we're still a bit like those old Greeks, guessing at the source of powerful forces.

For years, people simply assumed that Eero Maentyranta, the great Finnish cross-country skier, was doping when he won two golds at the 1964 Olympics. After all, others trained much harder. Only later was he discovered to be a genetic freak, the beneficiary of a mutation that allowed his body to produce 50 percent more red blood cells than normal. Those cells carried extra oxygen to his muscles. It's the same advantage drug-cheats try to get by taking EPO.

So far, researchers around the world have associated 124 genes with physical activity. But the emphasis of many studies has been on fitness, not performance. Scientists expect to find that a lot of athletic traits, such as hand-eye coordination, involve a cluster of genes. Even the ACTN3 test, which included only white subjects and focused on muscle type, has its detractors. "If you want to find out which kids have fast-twitch fiber, just line them up and fire a gun in the air," says Steve Fleck, a former U.S. Olympic Committee scientist who now works with Sports Potential, a Bay Area startup that helps kids and adults find their ideal sport (see page 87). "You'll see which ones run fast."

Still, as more elite athletes get tested, the genetic database will grow, revealing patterns and allowing for predictions with greater accuracy, based on statistics. Ultimately, it's possible that when a boy like Kellen is born, the vial of blood taken to genetically screen for diseases could also be used to spot athletic traits. Plug the results into the Theo Epstein All-Athlete Database, and before leaving the hospital, the baby's parents could get a report on which stars best match his DNA -- quite the head start if they hope to create the next Freddy Adu or Matt Leinart.

Some of the most cutting-edge research is being done at the Australian Institute of Sport, a three-hour drive north of Melbourne, in the capital city of Canberra. The AIS gets $40 million a year from the government to identify and develop potential stars, many of whom live and train at the 160-acre facility. It's as much a sports factory as anything East Germany ever sponsored, minus the institutional doping and coercion.

Inside his office, the director of the sports science unit taps his fingers nervously on a table. With his thin face, modest eyewear and measured demeanor, Peter Fricker looks nothing like a mad scientist. "Is this for the AIS to do?" he wonders. "Open the lid on Pandora's box?" He knows that by making his athletes available for DNA analysis, he's helping move sports in a new and uncertain direction. Concerned that such knowledge could lead to gene doping, the Australian government temporarily suspended genetic testing by the AIS in 2003.

But the country can't afford to stand idly by: athletes in England, Mexico, China and elsewhere are being tested, and the Aussies' role as the leader in sports science is at stake. With the AIS feeding its pipeline, the nation won more medals per capita in Athens than any other except the Bahamas (the U.S. was 39th by that measure). So Fricker expects to receive the green light on gene work from the minister for sport in the coming months, provided the AIS adheres to an ethical code he hopes the rest of the world's athletic bodies will adopt. There can be no AIS testing of kids under the age of 12, for instance. And its researchers must work hard to understand the value of each genetic marker, so coaches don't just cut a player for atypical DNA. (After all, Lleyton Hewitt was supposedly too short for tennis.)

Some cold decisions are inevitable, though. I can hear the echo of Charles Darwin in the chipper voice of AIS exercise physiologist David Martin, an American who left the U.S. Olympic training center a decade ago because of the Aussies' embrace of sports science. We meet on campus at the biomechanics dome. In the background, on a red rubber track, a doctoral student obediently holds a stick upright for a bearded, slightly obsessive-looking technician tapping furiously on a laptop, calibrating a camera that analyzes a runner's stride. Clearly, the geeks run the show here.

"There's only so much taxpayer money," Martin says. "If three or four athletes are performing at similar levels, the coach could use the genetic test to persuade himself to go with one athlete instead of another, to increase the likelihood of success."

My mind drifts to Kellen and what we know of his evolutionary stew. His maternal grandmother, who played college tennis, marvels at how well he whacks a rolling ball with either hand. Starts low. Finishes high. Topspin deep into the corners?

"With tennis," Martin says, "you want to have fast-twitch fibers to move dynamically."

"What about basketball?" I ask.

"Same thing."

"Baseball?"

"I'd be going for fast-twitch."

"Football?" At least Kellen has the right name. But I anticipate the doctor's answer.

"The most explosive guys on the planet."

Martin is now chuckling sympathetically. "Good hand-eye coordination and endurance," he says, mulling the optimal sport for Kellen. "How about biathlon? They ski for long distances and shoot a rifle."

And so it shall be. Meet the next Ole Einar Bjoerndalen.

All kidding aside, I have something of a dilemma now, right? It's not as if we in the United States have the smartest sports system in the world. Most kids get funneled into the same four or five mainstream games, not because their bodies and minds are tailored for success but because those are what Mom and Dad played. More than 70 percent of them quit sports by age 13, usually because they can no longer make the team or they're not having fun. Now, Couch Potato Nation has an obesity epidemic. Maybe biathlon isn't the answer for Kellen, but a more thoughtful approach to sports selection has its benefits.

I can see those rewards in the blue eyes of Emma Lincoln-Smith. In December, I found the blond, sturdy 19-year-old near the top of a snowy mountain in Park City, Utah, half a world away from the golden beaches of Narrabeen, Australia, where she practically grew up on a surfboard. Until the previous month, she'd never heard of the sport of skeleton, in which competitors sled headfirst down a twisting chute at speeds reaching 80 mph, their chins mere inches above the ice. The AIS, which gives physical tests to teenagers all over Australia, liked her 30-meter sprint power on dry land, so the institute invited her to join a new national skeleton team. Now she was representing Australia at an America's Cup race as her nation's top sledder.

As we talked after the race (she finished eighth), Emma winced while holding ice packs on her left hip and knee, deeply bruised from a crash on Turn 12. Her coach figures she's good enough to win an Olympic medal someday if she can learn how to steer. "I feel like this has been coming all my life, that fate brought me here," she says. "I love going fast. I love dangerous sports. So when the opportunity came up, I just had to take it. It's the best thing that's ever happened in my life."

Genetic screening is the logical extension of Talent Identification or TI, as the Australians call it. Venter, for one, says his ACTN3 test, which hits the U.S. market this spring, is intended to help kids and adults find lifelong avenues of exercise, not to further professionalize youth sports. "We don't see how a genetic test is going to put any more pressure on children than has already been applied by parents for generations," he says. "In fact, it might help stop a father from pushing his child to do well in a sport he wishes he had done well in but for which the child is not genetically suited."

Venter advises me not to act on what little we know about Kellen's genes until after he's had time to climb trees, experiment with a few sports and define his interests on his own. I agree. It's his life, not mine. But I'm glad I have the information. That's all it is, data, not Dolly the sheep. I trust that I will know when the time is right, if ever, to use it as a resource. If Kellen picks a power-based sport, we can always tailor his training. Destinies are surely as much made as found.

Still, after returning from Australia, I couldn't resist one last experiment in ridiculously early TI. I had learned that elite soccer players have unusually long ring fingers (compared to their index fingers) on their left hands. It's apparently a marker of prenatal testosterone, which helps form a strong cardiovascular system. So, in the interest of science, I sent a photocopy of my kid's paw to John Manning, the English pioneer of this quirky research. On the morning of Kellen's first birthday, I reach Manning in his office at the University of Central Lancashire. He greets me with an amused laugh. "I've not looked at many hands of people so young," he says.

But digit length is fixed for life, so I want to know: Can Kellen's fingers point us in a direction? Manning sets the phone down to measure with his calipers. There is silence for half a minute, as he does the math, then does the math again. Kellen's left index finger is 30.75 millimeters long; his ring finger is 34 millimeters. "So if you divide those two, his ratio is .90," Manning says. "That is very low, the kind of ratio that one sees in international-level soccer players."

Now that's more like it. Kicker boy wakes from his nap in about 20 minutes.

<i>Tom Farrey is a senior writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at Tom.Farrey@espn3.com. This article originally appeared in ESPN The Magazine.</i>

&sbtopic1=Also See: Genetic testing for athletic traits&storyid1=2022781&byline1=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto1=1&sbphoto1=1&sbbyline1=By Bill Walton&sbheadline1=Taking the Magic out of sports&topic1=Also See: ESPN's Bill Walton on genetic testing&sbsubhead1=Genetic testing might have robbed basketball some of its greatest stars, like Magic Johnson and Larry Bird&sbstory1=Ready or not, here it comes. Genetic testing of children to determine athletic traits is at the door. Much like the trend to ever-younger talent eschewing the traditional path of education and collegiate sports, there is no stopping this next wave. Our challenge is to use this new technology, information and tool in the best and most ethical manner possible.

Knowledge is power.

But do we really want a society where we're testing babies in the crib and telling them, "Here's your life"? 

I don't know enough about genetics to qualify as an expert. I just know the life that I've led, and what I've seen. I do know, though, that I don't like to see overbearing parents who are trying to push and steer their children in ways that the <I>parents'</I> dreams can come true. Sadly, in my experience in the money sport of basketball, some parents and relatives see a child's success as a route to riches for themselves. These parents become little more than pimps.

Not everyone is going to have the same body as Michael Jordan, Shaquille O'Neal or Kevin Garnett. A lot of people who eventually make it to the NBA level are the winners of the genetic lottery. But those people also have levels of character and humanity in their lives that drive them to become the best. In my sport, two of the absolute greatest players of all time -- Larry Bird and Magic Johnson -- were very average physically. They certainly weren't fast and they could barely jump. There is no way that Larry and Magic would ever be characterized as athletically gifted, in a relative sense. The real strengths of these legends' games were their heart, soul and mind. They are both geniuses of the human spirit. Is that genetics or the environment? Have life's influences made them who and what they are?

I grew up in a home where my parents tried to help me create a life for myself. My dad was the most un-athletic guy I ever knew. I never shot a single basket with him. I did see him run one time at the church picnic and I fell over laughing. But my parents gave me a life based on education, love, trust, confidence, hard work and a love of life that has left me forever intrigued and challenged as to how I can make this a better world. My dad, who worked three jobs, gave up his life so that my dreams could come true.

I knew from the earliest days that I wanted nothing more out of life than to play ball. And my parents still ask me to this very day: "Billy, when are you going to get a job?"

I have tried to provide these same goals and models in raising our four sons. I encouraged my children to play sports for fun, health and to learn life's great lessons from being on a team. I have tried to create opportunities where they can find their own ways, all the while learning how to build their own dreams and fun. I have tried to expose them to as many different things as possible. While they ultimately all chose basketball, my sons regularly played volleyball, tennis, soccer, Little League baseball and flag football.

In the end, my dreams became nightmares as my career was ruined by genetic structural defects in my feet. There were the endless string of stress fractures, the 32 operations, and two fused ankles. But that was my life, my choice and I played until I could not take another step.

Studs Terkel put it best in his most recent book, "Hope Dies Last." Isn't it the job of parents, teachers and leaders to inspire hope? To create an environment where young people wake up every day and say, "Hey, let's go!  Give me that ball," or " ... Give me that computer," or " ... Give me that library card"? For me, the worst thing in life is destroying someone's dream.

So I don't know about the wisdom of genetic testing. And I certainly wouldn't share the results with the children.

But, then again, I never liked sonograms, either. I simply didn't want to know the sex of my unborn children. I only wanted them to become who they are.

<I>Bill Walton, an ESPN and ABC analyst, won NCAA and NBA titles during his injury-marred Hall of Fame career. Each of his four sons -- Adam, Nate, Luke and Chris -- went on to play Division I college basketball. Luke is now with the Los Angeles Lakers.</I>
&sbstoryid1=2023206&linktext2=&linktext3=&linktext4=&linktext5=&linktext6=&linktext7=&linktext8=&linktext9=&linktext10=&linktext11=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext9=Professional coaching&storylink9=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2095768&headline9=When money's no object&subhead9=A father builds a multimillion-dollar training facility, then hires the best coach he can to teach his 9-year-old daughter to play soccer.&story9=The dark brown eyes are those of a 9-year-old, soft and alight with possibility. The daily itinerary is that of a modern third-grader -- school, dance class, soccer, then, if she can get her homework done in time, "American Idol." With an excited smile, Nicole DiTomasso says she preferred Carrie Underwood, the big-haired country crooner bound for glory.

At soccer practice, though, Nicole might as well be an adult. She has Mia Hamm's former coach.

"A lot of kids are like, 'Whoa, you get taught by Tony DiCicco!' " she says. "I'm like, 'No big deal.' I'm used to him by now."

DiCicco built his reputation with the U.S. women's national team that he led to championships at the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta and the 1999 World Cup. He helped introduce women's soccer to the American public, and his record of 103-8-8 is the best in U.S. national team history. Now he works in central Connecticut, teaching 8- to 17-year-olds the basics of the game.

In some ways, he is in no less a professional environment. As technical director of the SoccerPlus Football Club, he offers instruction to his players at the $6 million Farmington Sports Arena, built at an industrial site in a suburb of Hartford. The air-conditioned facility has enough space (130,000 square feet) to house locker rooms, a cafe, a large equipment store and four indoor fields. Each of the fields is covered with the latest artificial turf that looks and feels like real grass.

DiCicco coordinates a large cadre of assistants, including former pro players like Janusz Michallik, the director of coaching, who know how to run a world-class practice. Nicole and her teammates get expert counseling on topics including nutrition and hydration. They receive formal, written evaluations with grades. They even wear expensive uniforms, modeled after teams in England's Premier League. After all, FSA SoccerPlus FC, as it's called in U.S. youth soccer parlance, is a "premier" club.

Premier clubs are private organizations highly focused on developing young talent. These programs are one level above, competitively speaking, travel teams, and two levels above the city recreational leagues that had defined youth sports for generations. They are for the elite of the elite, drawing talent, in the case of DiCicco's club, from towns up to an hour away.

In Connecticut alone, about 25 of these clubs have been created in the past decade. The demand is driven by parents willing to pay $1,600 and more for year-round training, plus travel expenses for tournaments across the country. The cost of playing on Nicole's team for its winter-only season is $500. In April, along with other kids under the age of 12, she returned to her travel team in Farmington.

"It's a lot of pressure," admits Sebastian DiTomasso, her father. "They probably shouldn't even be playing this level of soccer at this age. But everybody else is doing it, so either you jump on the bandwagon, or ... "

Local business owners, the DiTomasso family built the Farmington Sports Arena in part to give Nicole and her eight siblings and cousins an ideal training environment. Other parents bought into the concept so quickly, the arena turned a profit its first year, DiTomasso says. But even with a high-profile coach in DiCicco, FSA faces some fierce competition for the best young players in the local market.

"I had an 8-year-old girl who was called three times last week by the coach of another club," DiCicco says. "You have kids that age being recruited like they're big-time college prospects."

Looking out on the FSA fields from his roomy, second-floor office, DiCicco notes with a shake of his head that high school stars actually are more protected from recruiters than little kids -- NCAA rules limit a coach to one call per week. He recognizes the hazards of pushing up the development curve in team sports. But he also advocates the benefits of professional coaching for kids, which until recently was associated more with individual sports such as tennis and figure skating.

"I've seen more abuse on the sidelines from parent-coaches than pro coaches," he says. "Because we're pros, we're less likely to scream at kids. And pro coaches can better control the behavior of parents on the sideline because they'll listen to us.

"Don't get me wrong, we want to win. But I don't have to identify myself with my youth club's success. I've already identified myself with a world championship team. With a lot of these parent-coaches, the team is their identity. They get so caught up in winning that they lose perspective on what's needed in terms of player development."

Nicole learns skills at FSA that one day will surely help her play in high school, and perhaps beyond. At a recent FSA practice, DiCicco showed her how to get past a defender not by trying to dribble through her opponent, as kids her age instinctually do, but by turning her back to the defender to protect the ball, then reading the pressure and passing if necessary. Using that technique, Nicole scored in the next game.

She has been playing soccer nearly year-round since kindergarten. With travel and premium winter soccer, her commitment to the game only grows. For now, she says with a shrug, it is worth foregoing the more leisurely pursuits of other kids her age.

"It's boring just sitting in front of the TV," she says.

<I>ESPN.com senior writer Tom Farrey can be reached at Tom.Farrey@ESPN3.com.</I>
&sbtopic9=Also See: Professional coaching&storyid9=2095768&byline9=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto9=2&sbphoto9=1&sbbyline9=By Julie Foudy&sbheadline9=When money is an object&topic9=Also See: It takes more than money, Julie Foudy warns&sbsubhead9=It takes more than athletic ability to reach the upper echelon of youth soccer.&sbstory9=Premier clubs are good in that they enable competition between the best players every day. My concern is that programs like these are sometimes cost-prohibitive, which can hurt the development of soccer in this country.

Because these players get the best coaches, and pay these coaches, it becomes an issue of economics for parents. A kid that's really good may not be able to play on that team because it costs too much.

This was a big issue for a lot of kids even when I was growing up in Southern California, where I played club and Olympic Development Program soccer beginning at age 14. These programs attracted middle- and upper-class kids because of the cost. Parents had to pay for travel, so lower-income families just couldn't play. That's really the way soccer is in America -- it's a sport of the suburbs and higher-income families. I would love to see it attract a larger population.

On the U.S. national soccer team that won the 1999 Women's World Cup, Briana Scurry, our goalkeeper, was probably the one person who did not come from the club system. She really didn't get discovered until college because her parents couldn't afford to put her in the ODP, a program that identifies and develops up-and-coming stars. Fortunately, she kept playing, but I am sure there are many kids with tremendous talent who fall through the cracks just because these programs require money -- lots of money -- to participate.

The issue is interesting because soccer is a third-world sport. In other parts of the world, kids grow up on the streets playing the game, like we do here with basketball. In impoverished neighborhoods in those countries, they're playing unstructured soccer. Countries like Brazil and Argentina develop some incredibly talented players. But here, soccer is very structured.

I think premier leagues are helpful. The trick is to provide a premier-league environment that is not as expensive. Maybe there can be a system in place to provide financial assistance for financially disadvantaged players. Otherwise, America won't be able to develop players in lower economic areas.

<I>Julie Foudy, who retired as a player last year, was a captain and 16-year veteran of the U.S. national soccer team. She has served as an ESPN television analyst, president of the Women's Sports Foundation and a member of the 2002 presidential commission that examined Title IX.</I>
&sbstoryid9=2095770&linktext3=&linktext4=&linktext5=&linktext6=&linktext7=&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext11=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext5=Titles for tots&storylink5=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2140471&headline5=No kidding around at the first tee&subhead5=With an eye on becoming the next Tiger Woods, 65 kindergartners test their well-honed golf games with a world championship on the line.&story5=The orange and green roof of an ornate Buddhist temple rises in the distance behind Ahmed Ali as he tees off, an unmistakable reminder of the culturally diverse neighborhood that Colina Park Golf Course serves.

There are 35 dialects spoken within a five-mile radius, making eastern San Diego one of the most ethnically rich, if economically poor, areas in the nation. The kids walking the cracked, sun-bleached sidewalks come from places like Korea, Somalia, Mexico and Vietnam. They eat at burrito shops and noodle houses and the local McDonald's, the one in El Cajon with the on-site playscape that's protected by a thick layer of bars painted red. And 51 weeks of the year, as part of a nonprofit effort to get kids off those streets, they play golf for free on the par-3 course, chasing a little white ball over 14 acres of that rarest of sights around here: green grass.

Ali is not one of those kids. Nor are his playing partners, Tianlang Guan of China and Ekarat Leksuwan of the Philippines. They are kids of privilege, like most of the 45 boys in the 6-and-under division of the Callaway World Junior Golf Championships. Though just as international as the surrounding neighborhood, the field is made up of rising kindergartners and first graders with the family resources to fly halfway around the globe ... for a trophy. For one week in July, they have taken over Colina Park with their daddy caddies, custom clubs, hydration strategies, head-to-toe Nike gear and expensive swings.

"Breeeeeathe, breeeeeathe," Azmat Ali says in a calming whisper to his son, who needs to make a long putt to save par on the third hole.

Ahmed Ali is about as local as golfers get in this tournament. The family home is 15 minutes north of the golf course in a comfortable section of the city -- although for the past year he has lived in Singapore, where his father, a Hewlett Packard marketing executive, is on temporary assignment. A U.S. citizen, Ahmed misses home, his friends and his teaching pro. He would rather play here than in Singapore, where word got out this year about the preschooler from America who can beat adults. Country clubs call his dad all the time, offering free memberships and lessons if Ahmed will just tell people it's his home course.

At the Junior Worlds, though, he isn't the only Next Tiger Woods. Just about every one of these boys has heard that term, in varying degrees of seriousness, from parents, admirers, even media. Playing several groups ahead of him on this, the final round of the three-day, 54-hole championship, is a fellow 5-year-old sensation, Tiger Adams, who's been written up back home in England. One hole behind Ahmed is a pudgy Japanese boy who has been trailed all week by a national network back home. The leader, he gives a Tiger-esque fist pump after each birdie.

Coming into the tournament, Azmat Ali told his son that he had no expectations, that it's just golf, just fun, as it's always been since Ahmed picked up the game at age 2. But with Ahmed in fourth place coming into the final day, 12 strokes over par and just 4 strokes off the pace, the competitive juices that made Azmat a success in the business world get flowing. When Woods won six times here at various levels as a junior, the lowest division was 10 and under; there was no glory at age 5. Now, because of Tiger, hardware and reputations are dispensed earlier than ever. The 8-and-under division was added in 1999, the 6-and-under last year. At stake are titles for tots, with all their global cache.

Walking off the 13th green, Azmat Ali summons a tournament official who is watching nearby. He is frustrated with Guan's father, a stockbroker who will spend $10,000, mostly on family plane tickets from Hong Kong, to expose his only son to the U.S. summer junior golf circuit. The father sometimes takes two minutes to line up Tianlang's putts, double-checking every angle and clearing the tiniest of leaves from the ball's path, as if a Masters victory hangs in the balance. He waves his arms in disgust when the boy misses.

"Aren't there rules against overcoaching?" Azmat Ali says to the official, a Colina Park assistant pro more accustomed to helping kids whose dads are absent or too busy for golf.

"Aren't you doing the same?" the official responds.

Guan's dad is slowing up play more than anyone. Still, it's true that Azmat and Ahmed, like many fathers and sons in this kiddie crucible, have become one, almost like a marionette and his puppet. Between shots, Ahmed sits on Azmat's lap and absorbs a persistent, if gentle, stream of instructions -- most of them designed to manage the inevitable emotions of a 5-year-old.

"Go to your happy place," Azmat says as Ahmed lines up a 12-foot putt. Ahmed's happy place is an ice cream parlor that serves root beer floats, his favorite, so Azmat uses that image to induce serenity. To induce focus, Azmat has already promised Ahmed a GameCube if he "works hard" all week.

Ahmed Ali misses the putt and frowns. He wants to win, too, but like Tiger -- with gusto and drama. His dad, on the other hand, admires the structural values in Tiger's game, the habits that help make a champ. Azmat's perspective is not uncommon in today's youth sports landscape, where little kids this summer are fighting for national titles in baseball, basketball, even power lifting. Golf is the rare game that crowns champions under age 8, but all of these tournaments are filled with kids who get trained like adults.

That essential conflict in elite youth sports -- between work and play, discipline and fun -- comes to a head for Azmat and Ahmed Ali on the final hole of the tournament, a medium-length par 3 with sand at the front of the green and water to the rear. As a couple hundred spectators await the final tee shots of the tournament, Azmat Ali hands his son a club and tells him to hit the ball toward the middle of the green, right of the pin.

"No, Tiger line," Ahmed says, looking up from beneath a red cap autographed by various PGA pros. He wants to shoot straight for the flag.

The middle is safer, the dad suggests.

"Tiger line," Ahmed protests.

No, really, the middle, Azmat quietly insists. Ahmed only needs par to secure one of the brilliant glass trophies that go to the top-five finishers.

The little lefty swings hard. Dad sighs as the ball falls into the rough, near the bunker. Ahmed goes triple bogey, dropping him below playing partner Leksuwan, into sixth.

Ahmed, however, doesn't seem the least bit bothered. He smiles and says, "I went Tiger line!"

He's still grinning a half hour later at the awards ceremony as the Japanese boy with the TV crew struggles to lift the winner's trophy up to his chest for a photo op. Ahmed is sitting anonymously in the crowd, on the ground with legs folded, proud of himself.

For being a kid. For remembering to play.

<i>Tom Farrey is a senior writer for ESPN.com and ESPN The Magazine. He can be reached at Tom.Farrey@espn3.com.</i>
&sbtopic5=Also See: Titles for tots&storyid5=2140471&byline5=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto5=3&sbphoto5=1&sbbyline5=By Steve Young&sbheadline5=The ABC's of youth sports&topic5=Also See: Steve Young on the ABC's of youth sports&sbsubhead5=National championship tournaments shouldn't be held unless the participants can name all 50 states and their capitals.&sbstory5=Many parents today want their kids to be the next Tiger Woods or Venus Williams, and that can be dangerous -- because the odds are that it is not going to happen.

Putting pressure on a kid to make it in sports is like playing the lottery. And playing the lottery is not a smart thing to do. If I said one of my sons is going to be another Steve Young, a Hall of Fame quarterback, my gosh, you don't think that's going to warp him? I would never do that to him. I would hope I wouldn't do that. If he wants to play quarterback when he gets older, then good for him. But if he loves playing the piano, I hope that I'm mature enough to realize that that's good, too.

I see no problem with kids playing organized sports early. My oldest son, Braedon, is starting now at age 4. But it's all about the context. If it's just kicking the ball, having fun and eating ice cream afterward, that's great. But if there's too much intensity, then what are we really trying to accomplish? Are we trying to get the kids out of the house, teach them some basic skills and have some fun? Or are we teaching them that if you lose, you're a loser?

Personally, I think holding national championship tournaments for little kids is nuts. My kids haven't gone through it, and I'm sure it's fun to be national champion. But I don't know how real that is. How about this: You can't be national champion until you can name all 50 states and their capitals.

I just know that when I grew up, sports was fun. It only got serious in high school, when someone called and offered me a football scholarship. For me, that was very healthy. As a kid, I didn't have expectations of becoming a pro athlete. I'd like to keep as much of that spirit as possible in how I raise my kids.

There are maestros out there who need to be taught at a young age. And some kids just have that desire to get better. But in general, it's much healthier to just let kids have fun.

<I>Steve Young, an NFL analyst for ESPN, played quarterback at Brigham Young University and with the San Francisco 49ers<I>
&sbstoryid5=2140472&linktext4=&linktext6=&linktext7=&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext11=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext11=Playing up&storylink11=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2142012&headline11=In search of some real competition&subhead11=In pursuit of a competitive playing field, some parents of athletic prodigies are pairing their children with teenagers -- and even adults.&story11=The day begins with the question Ginger Howard hears just about every time she steps on a golf course, which has been just about every day for the past five years. This time, the curious adult is distributing official scorecards on a blistering hot Jacksonville, Fla., morning.

"How old are you?" the gray-haired woman says from beneath a straw hat, as she looks down at Ginger, all 4-feet-8 of her.

"I just turned 11," Ginger responds, politely as always.

Today is different only in that the question comes before Ginger ever pulls a stick from her bag, before this sprite in pigtails ever rips a tee shot 225 yards down the fairway. It's the local qualifier for the U.S. Women's Open at Deerwood Country Club, held on a Tuesday in May when other kids are in school, and most of the 66 pros and amateurs vying to advance to the sectional qualifier are two or three times her age. Her youth is striking at an event such as this.

One of the best child golfers in the world, Ginger, in the parlance of the game, is "playing up." It's a trend that can be found across youth sports, inspired by the early success of Freddy Adu, the Williams sisters and other young athletes. Driven largely by parents eager to develop the talent of their children, more opportunities have opened up for kids to compete outside their age group.

The trend takes many forms, from Little League organizers' making room on rosters for advanced 8-year-olds, to travel soccer teams' entering tournaments one age division above them. In regional and statewide golf tournaments, Ginger regularly competes against girls as old as 15.

She wins, too. Her room is stuffed with more than 50 trophies and medals, all overseen by three Tiger Woods bobblehead dolls standing sentry on the headboard of her bed.

"Ginger plays up in nearly everything," says Robert Howard, her father, caddy and coach. He expects to spend $27,000 this year on travel, training and course fees for Ginger and her sister Robbi, 9, who sometimes are called the "Venus and Serena of golf" -- a comparison the family embraces and even promotes on its <a href="http://www.gingerandrobbi.com">Web site</a>. He dips into savings to meet those costs, quite the investment given that he has been out of work since spring. He heard from headhunters after getting laid off as an operations manager for Revlon, but has declined all inquiries. His priority is staying in north Florida, where the family moved last year because the girls could not play year-round golf in Virginia.

A former college tennis player, Robert draws inspiration from the late Arthur Ashe. He got to know the tennis legend while teaching at Ashe's urban facility in Philadelphia, learning from him that success is a function of high standards and hard work. At the family home in a subdivision just south of Jacksonville, he displays a framed photo of himself and Ashe together as motivation for Ginger and Robbi. "This is what it's all about, girls," he tells them. Confidence.

Still, playing against elite adults -- Robert's idea -- is new. Ginger only realizes what she's up against in the Open qualifier while walking down the first fairway, her well-struck tee shot still lying a few yards shy of the balls hit by her college-age playing partners.

"Dad," she says, peering up from her soiled visor, "are these <I>all</I> grown women?"

Not all of them, he answers. And it's true: Although Ginger is the youngest golfer this day, the field includes a sprinkling of middle and high school players, including two of Ivan Lendl's daughters, Isabelle, 13, and Marika, 15. Perhaps all are inspired by the example of Michelle Wie, who at 15 has some of the best male adult golfers in the world running scared, or at least resisting her as competition.

Earl Woods kept Tiger from playing up as a junior to develop a mind-set of domination in his son. Robert admires Earl, but he says Ginger has no choice but to play teenagers. After she earned top honors last year on the Central Florida Junior Golf Tour, Robert said the organizer asked him to move Ginger out of the 9-to-14 division. "Other parents don't appreciate me having Ginger play [in her age group] and shattering their kids' scores," he says. So this summer, the only junior events Ginger will enter in her natural division are the four largest international tournaments.

Playing up, and so often, means Ginger and Robbi spend more time around teenagers and adults than kids their own age. Homeschooled by their mother, Gianna, they already are isolated. Their parents recognize the hazard, so at tournaments they get the girls together for pizza with other fast-track kids still young enough to appreciate, say, the Disney Channel.

"Ginger loves Raven and Hillary Duff," Gianna says. "She wants to be an actress." And of course ... a golfer, seen by the family as very much a career option. "I tell the girls that, just like Venus and Serena, they can use their sport to open doors for other things they want to do," Gianna says. "That they have the rest of their lives to do other things. I don't see that [focusing on golf now] as much of a sacrifice."

So far, the girls seem unburdened by the grand plan. They smile and giggle a lot, even after a round like the one Ginger turns in at the Open qualifier. The course distance is much longer than her father anticipated, 6,700 yards, brutal even for an LPGA event, so Ginger fails to card a birdie all day. Typical is the final hole, in which she expertly digs out of trouble by hitting off pine needles beneath a tree, then easily nails the green from 80 yards out, only to two-putt for a bogey. With her sister and mother walking the course behind her, Ginger finishes the round with an 89, well out of contention and a dozen strokes above her handicap.

Unfazed, Ginger says, "We're going to be superstars and everyone is going to notice."

After the round, the family drives to a nearby steakhouse for lunch. The hostess hands kids' menus to Robbi and Ginger, who is as hungry as her cleated feet are tired.

"Wait!" Robbi says. "Ginger, you can't use this menu anymore."

Ginger notices the writing -- <I>kids 10 and under</I>. She does a little shimmy in her seat, before ordering a big, drippy adult burger. Sometimes, growing up can be as cool as playing up.

<I>Tom Farrey is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine and contributor to ESPN.com.</I>
&sbtopic11=Also See: Playing up&storyid11=2142012&byline11=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto11=4&sbphoto11=1&sbbyline11=By Colleen Hacker&sbheadline11=The perils of playing up&topic11=Also See: The perils of playing up&sbsubhead11=Though there's value in playing up, impressionable athletes shouldn't forego the experience of playing kids of like age and skill.&sbstory11="Playing up" is a strategy we often see in soccer, one of the sports I'm familiar with as sports psychology consultant to the U.S. women's national teams. It's very common for highly skilled girls to play up for part of the year, against girls who are more talented. In fact, the women's national team on occasion plays a boys' national-caliber team, as there are advantages to going up against players who are quicker, stronger and bigger.

But those games are only a couple times a year. As with any team or athlete, there needs to be balance in the scheduling of opponents.

To really develop all of the skills of competitive excellence, athletes should play at least 60 percent of the time with people who are of commensurate ability. You want an environment in which, on any given day, the people around you could be better. It teaches skills that are hard to learn if you're always playing up. Plus, at the youth level, there are social and emotional advantages to playing with athletes who are a lot like you.

I'd also say that 20 percent of the time, athletes should compete with players they are clearly better than. There are lessons to be learned when you're 10 strokes ahead of the field. You learn to be gracious in success, and how to play with and keep a lead. It's difficult to keep a lead; that's why it's front-page news when a PGA or LPGA golfer leads for all four rounds.

Many NCAA Division I programs set their schedules with this balance in mind. You'll see the occasional David vs. Goliath match-up, the games a team knows it probably can win. Then 20 percent of the time a team will find it helpful to play up -- to compete against opponents that really stretch its abilities. They encounter more sophisticated strategies, and a larger repertoire of skills. Strength of schedule matters, not just in the BCS.

So, there is value in playing up. But don't forget the value in playing with kids of like age and like skill.

<i>Dr. Colleen Hacker, a professor at Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Wash., works as a sports psychologist with professional, Olympic, collegiate and youth athletes. She is co-author, with former U.S. women's national soccer team coach Tony DiCicco, of "Catch Them Being Good."<i>

 
&sbstoryid11=2142047&linktext6=&linktext7=&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext7=Travel teams hit the road&storylink7=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2146831&headline7=On the road to wherever&subhead7=When the AAU dropped the gauntlet by creating a national title for 8-year-olds and under, newly formed teams around the country hit the "Road to Memphis."&story7=Near the end, just four kids remain. In a game of five-on-five basketball at the AAU national championships in Memphis, Tenn., there are just four players on one side, marinating in the full-throated pleas of grown-ups who fill a middle school gym with so much desperation the boys struggle to think -- and breathe.

"Can I have a sub?" Ethan, a blond 7-year-old, asks during a timeout. One minute is left on the clock. He's been on the court most of the second half and shines with sweat.

"Nobody left," says his coach, Rod Greene, waving at his bench of fouled-out players.

Twenty seconds later, Ethan picks up his fifth, too, and takes his seat, panting.

So now there are just three on the court for the Basketball Town Pharaohs of Sacramento, Calif., who hold a rapidly vanishing lead. Their opponents smell the blood of a wounded animal and move in for the kill. No one here has ever seen anything like this.

When the Pharaohs began their national title hunt last September, there were 15 players on the team. They were an elite 15, having made the cut at a tryout open to all boys age 8 years old and under. But travel ball, with its ambitions beyond city limits, requires a real commitment of time and money from families. There are professional-grade uniforms, weekend tournaments in distant cities, and expectations of return on investment.

Some parents became upset when their kids weren't playing as much as others. Greene and his assistant coach, Mickey Hope, tried to diplomatically tell them that their kid just wasn't as good as the others. It's a Darwinian exercise, travel ball. So soon the team was cut in half, with Greene and Hope taking the best players, including their respective sons, Devin and Jay.

Second-graders last year, Devin and Jay's immersion in basketball is near total. They play no other sport, and they play nearly year-round, with three practices a week and up to four games on weekends between their travel and recreation teams. Their fathers hire a personal trainer, a former pro in Greece, to work with the kids on footwork and muscle memory. The boys can now yo-yo the ball, shoot on the run and score from 20 feet (on 10-foot hoops). They are so skilled that they become frustrated when playing with most classmates. At recess, a dime pass gets dropped or leads to a double dribble.

"It's been hard on my son," Hope says. "He'll play at school with his friends, but some of them don't even play competitive ball yet. So [in games] he can't play with his friends. It sucks. He has to play with the fifth graders. I really considered putting him back in the first- and second-grade division because of that. But I couldn't do it. Wouldn't be good for the [rec] league."

Greene nods, adding with a little smile, "He'd score 40 a game, easy."

"That's why this tournament is fun," Hope says.

The kids have been hearing about the "Road to Memphis" -- wherever that is -- since Greene and Hope formed the team and shared their dream of a national championship -- whatever that is. Truth be told, Greene says, the Pharaohs probably wouldn't exist if the AAU last year hadn't created an 8-and-under tournament, if the carrot had never been dangled.

"I've just always been competitive," Greene says. As a hurdler in high school, he survived on grit more than talent, placing third in one big race -- after falling down. As sales manager for a vacuum cleaner company, he moved more product than anyone else in the country by outdriving rivals for sales. He still holds that job part-time, making $50,000 a year while helping Hope run a local youth basketball league.

Greene doesn't believe in burnout, the notion that too much of one thing induces boredom. He's sure that won't happen with Jay and basketball. "See, burnout happens when you think you have all your goals accomplished," he says. "But it's like sales; every month you can always sell more." National championships, which ensure that only one team in the country can fancy itself as the best, actually prevent burnout, he insists.

Still, the Pharaohs nearly didn't make it to Memphis. Any team can enter the tourney, for a fee of $625. But they almost had to cancel the trip when one player went to a baseball tournament instead. Another quit because of playing time. A family emergency kept another kid at home. That left Greene and Hope with six players.

So they hit the recruiting trail. A month before the tournament, friends directed them to two other Sacramento-area kids, Jake and Ethan. Neither should qualify as ringers; Jake is the smallest kid on the team, Ethan the youngest. When Ethan smiles, one can see all the new teeth coming in, jagged at the ends like a picket fence. They are the least skilled kids on the team and know few of the many plays. But their parents agreed to get the boys to Memphis, giving the Pharaohs a total of eight players, just enough for a bench.

Greene will need them all against the Maryland Heat, who brought 15 players, plus about 100 boisterous fans to the Hickory Middle School gym. Actually, half of those fans are in Memphis for another D.C.-area team; they've agreed to show up and agitate for the Heat as long as the Heat throng reciprocates at their games. They roar at the refs for every perceived foul and get their way. The refs call a tight game, inevitable kid traveling, fouls and all. One by one, the Pharoahs take a seat.

"Stay awake!" Greene says to Devin, who is slumped in his chair. "You're coming [in] for the fourth."

Like the Heat, the Pharaohs are 2-0 in pool play. The winner gets a bye straight to the quarterfinals. But the Pharaohs' 16-point halftime lead has shrunk to 31-22, and they are losing players fast. When Devin pushes a Heat player who is shooting, he fouls out and reacquaints himself with the chair. One ref looks at the other quizzically, as if to say, Can they play with only four? The other ref holds up four fingers and nods.

When Ethan fouls out with 41 seconds left, the lead is just five points. The Heat players swarm, smothering the three remaining Pharaohs, and pick off inbounds passes with their little hands. But amid the cacophony, the $22-a-game refs fail to notice the timekeeper mistakenly let the clock run for seven seconds near the end, an error that Greene says he caught but kept to himself. The Pharaohs hold on, 32-29.

At the buzzer, as parents rush the floor, Jay collapses at center court and cries. Tears roll down the curves of his round, Zen-like face. They are tears of stress, of trying to dribble out of trouble for the past hour, of trying to keep the wolves at bay.

"WHOAAAH!" Greene roars, sprinting into the locker room ahead of his little crew. The boys plop down on the bench, exhausted, if proud. "You guys get tomorrow off," the coach announces.

Pushed as far as little kids can be or perhaps should be pushed, the Pharaohs earn themselves a day at Graceland with the ghost of Elvis. Whoever he is.

<i>Tom Farrey is a senior writer for ESPN the Magazine and ESPN.com. He can be reached at tom.farrey@espn3.com.</i>

<i>A postscript: The Pharaohs would lose in the quarterfinals, then again in the losers' bracket, placing ninth out of 30 teams. The top-10 finish earns a bye next year into the AAU 9-and-under national championships at Disney World, for which other teams must qualify. Greene and Hope plan to be there.</I>
&sbtopic7=Also See: Travel teams hit the road&storyid7=2146831&byline7=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto7=5&sbphoto7=1&sbbyline7=By Mike Golic&sbheadline7=Traveling comes at a high price&topic7=Also See: Mike Golic on the price of travel teams&sbsubhead7=The pressure that comes with playing on a travel team can be intense, and sooner or later something's gotta give.&sbstory7=I have three kids between the ages of 10 and 15, and each has played on travel teams. The biggest change I've seen over the past five years is how much more intensity there is in adults wanting these kids to commit to one sport, year-round.

Parents and coaches are telling kids: If you want to be good at this, you're going to have to concentrate on this one sport.

In other words, do you want to get a college scholarship? And that's tough for the kids because they want to believe in and listen to their parents, and unfortunately this is sometimes that the parents are selling.

We played a ton of different sports when I was growing up, from swimming to baseball to basketball. Playing multiple sports is important for the body development of young kids. Now, kids focus on one sport too early. You see it a lot in soccer, where you supposedly have to play it year-round if you want to be any good.

My daughter Sydney is 10, and her travel soccer team has been together now for nearly three years. They've lost one game, and her coach is fantastic. He's really teaching the kids well. He doesn't put a lot of pressure on them to win. He's definitely one of the good coaches who understands and encourages these kids to play other sports. But the nature of travel ball is they play outdoors in the spring, outdoors in the fall and indoors in the winter. Some kids play on two or three teams at one time. They go from one game to the next. It looks like they are enjoying it, but they are just being pulled in so many directions that at times you wonder.

The travel team holds an annual tryout, but it's basically the same group of girls each time. Sydney is a good enough athlete that she could probably miss one of the seasons if she wanted to and still make the team. But as she gets older, that will be harder to do. That's where the pressure comes in to give up the other sports. You know: If you want to be Brandi Chastain or Cobi Jones, this is what you have to do.

Sydney, who also participates on a swim team, will have decisions to make -- because especially with swimming on the high school level, you practice in the morning and then after school, too. Soccer practice is every day. Something's gotta give.

I don't want to damn all the parents who want their kids to get a scholarship and an opportunity at a college education. I just hope they keep it in perspective and understand that, OK, there are percentages here. Make sure your bases are covered and your kid is well-rounded.

<I>Mike Golic, a former NFL and Notre Dame player, is a college football analyst for ESPN and co-host of the "Mike and Mike" show on ESPN Radio.</I> 
&sbstoryid7=2146842&linktext6=&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext3=Baby steps&storylink3=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2148778&headline3=One step at a time&subhead3=Laying a foundation for future success in sports, parents are exposing their toddlers to developmental activities like swimming and gymnastics.&story3=Someday, if all goes as planned, Matthew Dolliver will be taking his cues from a high school coach. He will be standing on a basketball court or soccer field or baseball diamond, getting ready for the next game, fit and strong and physically confident. For now, though, the orders are delivered with a childhood song and a gentle nudge.

<i>You put your right hand in ...</i>

"Everyone put their right hand in!" a thin, female instructor enthuses to the seven preschoolers lined up before her on a blue carpet at a Seattle-area gymnastics center.

<i>You put your right hand out ...</i>

"Now right hand out!" she affirms. Still, several kids thrust their left hand. Others hop around like jumping beans.

<i>You put your right hand in ...</i>

"Matthew, right hand in!" she says, trying to make eye contact.

<i>And you shake it all about ...</i>

"Now let's do the hokey pokey! Let's go in a circle!"

<i>... That's what it's all about.</i>

When finished, there are laughs and smiles everywhere. But don't be fooled. Parents aren't paying $50 per session just so their kids can have fun. This hokey pokey is all about developing the body awareness and basic physical tools to someday participate in organized sports.

Though not consisting of games, classes like this are the first layer of organized sports. Their characteristics are structure, investment and adults in charge. These programs set the stage for everything else to come in today's ramped-up youth sports landscape -- from early competition to travel ball to paid coaches.

With many youth sports programs now beginning play at age 4, and some as early as 3, that transition could come next year for Matthew. Or next week. No matter when it arrives, his mother, Barb, wants her shy, 3-year-old son to feel as if he is enough of an athlete to compete with other kids.

Barb Dolliver is far from alone in using a structured environment to introduce her son to sports. Across the country, kids under the age of 5 now make up 32 percent of the students at gymnastics clubs, roughly twice what it was a decade ago, according to a USA Gymnastics official. And the vast majority of those 820,000 kids are not signed up with visions of Carly Patterson or Paul Hamm dancing in parents' minds.

"Matt doesn't get enough play time with kids his own age," Dolliver says. "I'm hoping he can use the balance and other things he learns here to move on to other sports."

A legal secretary until she became a full-time mom, Dolliver stands with the other mothers on a second-floor viewing area at Gymnastics East, the sprawling Bellevue, Wash., facility where Matthew takes classes. To her left is a trampoline and running surface where Matthew refines his gross motor movement. In front of her are parallel bars where instructors help him work on his strength. Behind her is a foam-padded obstacle course that challenges his coordination and fine motor skills.

As a girl growing up in West Seattle, a working-class area on a hilly peninsula just across the bay from downtown, Dolliver was introduced to sports like most kids of her generation, informally, in backyards all over the neighborhood.

"I really had fun as a kid, not so much doing [team] gymnastics but having fun outdoors," she says. "We would find the biggest lawns and roll down them, or do cartwheels."

It's different for Matthew, who grows up in a large home on a small lot in a dense subdivision 20 minutes to the east of Seattle. It's a destination community for professionals, with interesting rooflines, manicured gardens and a Starbucks at the bottom of the hill. But Matthew cannot do the carrot rolls because the backyard is a sliver of green grass, and a driveway swallows much of the front lawn.

Besides, Dolliver isn't comfortable letting him play alone out front, given how often she hears about sexual predators and registered pedophiles. Local TV news loves to report on where they're living -- fear always drives ratings -- and though she hasn't heard of any creeps within a couple miles of the neighborhood, her maternal instinct says, don't take chances.

"You just get nervous about it," she says.

Matthew does not complain. Inside his home, he finds plenty of adventure -- at the end of his right index finger. He'll log on to Disney and with a click of a mouse make JoJo the clown jump rope. Or he'll pop in his Bob The Builder CD and make something cool with Bob's very own hands. Dolliver tries to limit Matthew to 30 minutes a day on the computer, but he always wants more.

"I worry about him not developing the same way we did when we were kids," says Dolliver, who ran track and competed in gymnastics as a teenager. "We didn't have computers. Now it's like, what would we do without one?"

All that sitting in a chair can change a kid's body. A decade ago, the Gymnastics East instructors began to notice that many of the latest preschoolers could not touch their toes without bending their knees. Their hamstrings weren't loose enough. So improving flexibility is now a primary, if hardly exclusive, goal in the lesson plan.

"Watch the feet," says Roberta Diles, co-owner of Gymnastics East. A small, Australian woman, Diles is walking toward the trampoline as several preschoolers bounce around. A blond, curly-haired boy to Matthew's left is jumping flat-footed -- another trait of modern kids. A generation ago, kids learned to use the balls of their feet by running around in bare feet. Now, they rarely go outside without shoes, lest they step in glass.

Parents' recognition that preschoolers need to be more active has been a boon for Gymnastics East, the largest facility in the state of Washington, with 2,200 students of all ages. Demand was so great for classes this fall that on the first day of signups, a line started forming at 6:30 a.m. By the time the gym opened at 9, there were 200 people, mostly mothers and nannies, in the queue. Neighboring business owners got frustrated as loading trucks were blocked from the parking lot. Tensions grew as people tried to sign up their whole carpools, only to be sent back into the hot August sun to register each kid individually. A week later, clerks were still trying to file the first batch of 800 registrations, many for kids under 5.

The upshot is Matthew won't be taking classes in Bellevue this fall. They were all full. So instead, Dolliver will drive him 15 minutes east to the club's satellite gym in Preston, in the Cascade Mountains. She's OK with it. She's just glad he likes gymnastics.

Now if Matthew can only figure out which mainstream sport he might like. Dolliver recently placed him in a local rec program that exposes kids to three weeks each of soccer, basketball and tee-ball. But he's so new to these sports, they seem to be one. Back at his house in the family living room, when asked his favorite game, he curls up on mom's lap and says quietly, "Sports Sampler."

Then he hops down and asks Mom if he can play a little more computer.

<i>Tom Farrey is a senior writer for ESPN the Magazine and ESPN.com. He can be reached at tom.farrey@espn3.com.</i> 
&sbtopic3=Also See: Baby steps&storyid3=2148778&byline3=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto3=6&sbphoto3=1&sbbyline3=By Trev Alberts&sbheadline3=Kids should take baby steps with sports&topic3=Also See: Trev Alberts on when to introduce kids to sports&sbsubhead3=Parents should beware the fine line between encouragement and pressure when introducing children to athletics.&sbstory3=We're one of those families whose kids took gymnastics classes in preschool, and were introduced to a structured sports environment earlier than I ever could have imagined.

I grew up in Cedar Falls, Iowa, in a hard-working, middle-class family. We had a three- or four-bedroom house that sat on an entire acre. When my dad put an addition on the house, there was plenty of room to expand. We still had ample space to play in the yard. Or we'd run across the street to the park, where we'd play basketball, baseball and football, depending on who shows up.

Now, it's just the opposite. My kids -- ages 8, 6 and 2 -- are growing up in a big house with not much of a yard. Like many families in East Cobb, Ga., we have a little bitty lot with no green space. We live in a dense neighborhood just north of Buckhead, where land is at a premium because it's close to downtown Atlanta. A pool takes up most of our backyard, so the kids play in the driveway.

We introduced our daughter, Ashtynne, to gymnastics two years ago, when she was 4. If you saw my wife and I try to touch our toes, you'd know she is not going to be next Mary Lou Retton. But her friends were enrolled -- peer influence is huge even at that age -- and she enjoys it. Her mom enjoys it, too, sitting around and talking to the other moms.

Ashtynne has gotten a lot out of gymnastics. When she was 4, she would cry because she couldn't complete one of the exercises that the other kids were doing. She'd run, jump on a box, and try to do a little flip. But she was too afraid to bring her feet over the top. I told her, "You just can't quit." And finally, as a 5-year-old, she did it. She learned to deal with failure, and gained a real sense of accomplishment.

I think organized sports are great for kids. Still, it's so different now from how I grew up -- and we did just fine. I didn't start playing organized ball until fourth or fifth grade. I didn't put on football pads until eighth grade. A lot of people now think that if you don't put pads on your kid in second grade, you're going to be left behind, and that's just wrong.

I watch parents and I understand what they're doing, but it's appalling. A lot of them have their kids in sports because it makes them feel good. It's about the parent, not the kid. I see kids having those negative experiences and wonder if, down the road, they'll remember that. Some kids just aren't going to get interested in sports until fifth grade or so. But are they going to want to play then if they had a bad experience at age 3 or 4?

My dad let us decide what we wanted to do. I was in band, choir -- not just sports. I was exposed to a whole bunch of experiences. He let us do our thing, and when we decided what we were passionate about, tried to give us the necessary support. Right now my son, Chase, is 8. He doesn't play a lot of sports because he's just not interested. And I'm not going to force anything on him.

Times have changed. But kids haven't.

<i>Trev Alberts, who played at the University of Nebraska and in the NFL, is a college football analyst for ESPN</i>

&sbstoryid3=2148785&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext12=&linktext13=&linktext13=Scientific selection&storylink13=http://www.espn.com/espn/news/story?id=2152993&headline13=Numbers crunching&subhead13=Computer-assisted athletic assessment helps take the guess work out of deciding the best sport to pursue.&story13=Growing up across the 101 Freeway from Stanford University, where the sound of helicopters hunting gang members fill the night sky, Tehuna Mahoni never played sports on a regular basis. Her Tongan immigrant parents worked long hours trying to make a life for their four children, and found no room in their schedules for the games and ever-increasing commitments of youth sports.

In elementary school, Tehuna missed out on the early exposure to sports such as soccer and lacrosse that are so popular in wealthier surrounding towns. When she got to middle school, so scant was her classmates' interest in sports -- other than chasing boys, that is -- there were no teams for girls.

But in the race for a college athletic scholarship, Tehuna, now 13 and facing a series of life choices, has one advantage: She knows with scientific precision the sports and disciplines to which she is best tailored.

They are, in order:

1) Track and field -- Discus
2) Softball -- Catcher
3) Softball -- First base
4) Track and field -- Javelin
5) Rowing -- Open

The recommendations are right there on Tehuna's <u><a href="http://www.sportspotential.com/results/Tehuna_Mahoni" target="new">personalized Sports Potential evaluation</a></u>, accessible on the Web.

"I'm going to give discus a try," she says, "even though I haven't heard of the sport."

Through an after-school program in East Palo Alto, Calif., Tehuna won an essay contest that gave her free access to the scientists at Sports Potential, a local startup company that usually charges up to $250 for an assessment of physical and athletic ability. The company pulled out the measuring tape, fired up the handheld computer, and put the tall, thick-boned girl through a battery of 30 tests that makes the NFL combine seem cursory.

They calculated the circumference of her calves and biceps, the breadth of her hips, the length and flexibility of her legs, the span of her arms, the size of her hands and shoes, her resting heart rate, body-fat percentage, and height and weight.

They checked her balance with a wobble board. Her concentration with a visual memory quiz. Endurance with a shuttle run. Agility with a one-turn exercise. Grip strength with a hydraulic gadget. Reflexes with a yardstick dropped between her thumb and index finger. Coordination with a ladder test. Speed with a 25-meter sprint. Vertical leap with a measuring device.

Then the scientists fed that raw data into a computer program that compared Tehuna's characteristics to her age peers, as well as elite athletes from 50 sports and 100 positions. Administrators from Sports Potential collected the base information over the past three years from pro, college and national team athletes.

"It's adding a little bit of science to the process of sport selection, as opposed to it being completely driven by luck and socio-economics," says Steve Spinner, founder and president of the company.

Growing up on New York's Long Island, Spinner discovered his best sport by chance. He was playing middle-school soccer when the high school track coach stopped by and noticed that Spinner, after three hours of running, was barely winded. The coach challenged him to try cross country. He made the high school team, then went on to run in college. "I said this is great, but isn't there a better way that I could have found out about this talent for endurance sports?" Spinner says.

Two decades later, Sports Potential is his answer. Launched in December by Spinner, a former Internet executive who hired sports scientists to provide the expertise he lacked, the company offers its product in a small but growing number of health clubs across the country. Backed by former U.S. senator and Basketball Hall of Famer Bill Bradley, who chairs its advisory board, the company also wants schools to adopt the assessment as a means to address the obesity epidemic, by getting kids like Tehuna involved in sports.

Ana Mahoni, Tehuna's mom, sees financial and academic benefits, too.

"Hopefully Tehuna will get recognized by someone willing to train her, that she'll get good at it, and then down the line probably get a college scholarship," Ana says.

Though late to play sports, Tehuna would seem to have a chance, based on her raw material. With calf, hip and hand sizes in the top 10 percentile for girls her age, she has an ideal physique for softball, according to her Sports Potential profile. Indeed, twice in middle school, competing on a lark, she won first place in softball throwing contests. "But I don't like the game," she says.

More to the point: She doesn't like objects being thrown at her, a fear she noted in her Sports Potential questionnaire. So besides softball, the ice hockey and lacrosse recommendations in her chart are highlighted in red, suggesting sports she could excel in -- if she confronts her fear. And if she gets training, of course.

Tehuna's assessment includes a list of local clubs and facilities where she can find coaching in specific sports. Eventually, Spinner wants to get the individual national governing bodies of sports to subsidize the training of athletes who take his tests, in exchange for Sports Potential identifying potential stars of the future.

Spinner knows that bears the faint echo of the former government-run, Eastern Bloc sports factories. "Those [systems] were all about taking choices away from people and pushing them to do something whether they had an interest in doing it or not," he says. "We're an American company trying to do it the American way. It's an opt-in service that someone can choose to pay to take. It's information, not decision-making."

As for Tehuna, she plans to act on the recommendations when high school begins in September. And not just because she likes sports. Or because success could pay for college. Called "Shyness" by some classmates, a nickname tattooed on her right forearm, the big girl with the soft black eyes is starting to feel like she's ready to do something with all of that natural power.

"I just want to be really good at one sport," she says. "And to be outgoing."

<i>Tom Farrey is a senior writer with ESPN.com and ESPN The Magazine. He can be reached at tom.farrey@espn3.com.</i> 
&sbtopic13=Also See: Scientific selection&storyid13=2152993&byline13=By Tom Farrey&startPhoto13=7&sbphoto13=1&sbbyline13=By Tony Gwynn&sbheadline13=Nothing special about the sports specialty&topic13=Also See: Tony Gwynn weighs in on keeping options open&sbsubhead13=Much like how Gwynn used the entire field as a hitter, he recommends that athletes keep their options open by playing a variety of sports.&sbstory13=It's important for a kid to find the right sport.

In my case, I didn't realize until I was a senior in college that baseball was probably my best opportunity to make a living in sports. I was a guy who played high school and college basketball, really just kind of played baseball on the side until I got to college. Twenty years later, it all worked out. But it's like what I tell my players at San Diego State -- you gotta figure out what you do well and apply it in a game situation.

Not that playing basketball all those years hurt me. In fact, it helped me because you need a good set of hands to be a good hitter. I was a point guard, so you have to learn to use both hands. I had to dribble a basketball without looking at it. When it comes to hitting a baseball, it's about getting your hands in a position where you think a baseball's going to go. And that calls for seeing a baseball without really seeing where your hands are, but understanding where your hands have got to go. My basketball training really helped because for the first 12 years of my career, I was a guy who hit the ball the other way. I could almost take a ball out of a catcher's glove and hit it down the left-field line.

To be honest, I don't think I would have been as good at baseball if I didn't play other sports growing up. Focusing full time on baseball at a relatively late age kept me from burning out. I liked the newness of having to learn a new sport and the intricacies of how to play baseball. Loving the game is important, and if you're burned out, you really don't dig down deep to figure out what this game is all about. I'm still not burned out, even in retirement.

With some kids, you can tell they're natural baseball players. I don't know if it's a mindset or what, but when you see a kid who can take what you say and apply it on the field, especially at an early age, you can tell -- I can tell, at least, when you come across a kid who has got it. But "it" is probably more mental than physical. The most important component is having the mental capacity to understand what I'm talking about.

But it's important to play more than one sport, too. Parents ask me all the time, "Johnny's getting ready to go to high school and he's always played football and baseball, so do you think he should continue to play football?" And I say, "Yeah, I think so, because I'm sure there are things in the game of football that help you in baseball, just as there are things in basketball that helped me in baseball."

Some parents are so set in putting their kid in one particular sport, and I don't know if that really helps them. I would hope that kids play multiple sports because maybe if you play them long enough the right one will come to you.

<i>Tony Gwynn, who played 20 years with the San Diego Padres and retired in 2001 as one of the greatest hitters ever, is an ESPN analyst for Major League Baseball and the Little League World Series. He also is head coach at San Diego State, his alma mater.</i>
&sbstoryid13=2152994&linktext8=&linktext10=&linktext12=&biotext1=<img align="left" src="http://www.espn.com/media/nba/2005/0906/photo/bradley_m.jpg" width="65" height="90">
One of the first pro athletes to become a politician, Bill Bradley played on the New York Knicks championship teams of 1970 and '73. He delayed his NBA career after graduating from Princeton so he could spend two years at Oxford University on a Rhodes scholarship. He was elected to the U.S. Senate in '78 for three terms, and ran for president in 2000, losing in the Democratic primary. Among other pursuits, he now is chairman of the advisory board of Sports Potential, the Bay Area startup that recommends specific sports to kids and adults based in part on a detailed series of physiological tests.
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