Taking Time Off to Train Athletically - Who's Paying for It?

With climbing in the Olympics for the first time ever, my family became addicted to watching all the qualifying competitions leading up to the Olympics.

Since this sport is so familiar to us, and at times it felt like we were watching good friends during the competitions. So it was always a great treat to listen to the athletes that qualified tell their story, their journey of training and so much more.

Most of these athletes were in their 20’s and they were all pretty much saying the same thing:

They took one year off to go full-on training.

So when they take time off to train: In a climbing gym, with a coach, buying equipment, who’s paying for all this?

These athletes are not superstars, they are not sponsored, they stopped working so that they can devote their time to training.

Why is this an important topic to talk about? 

Because of us parents, this is the only reason most extreme athletes have a chance.

This isn’t to wield our power and control, but to remember how to properly support our children so that they do have a chance to take it as far as they possibly can!


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About This Podcast

It takes a village to raise a pro athlete.

For the first time ever this channel takes you behind the athlete’s ‘unspoken’ road and talks to the people that normally get very little mention, but are the ones who are responsible for the underlying success of an athlete.

Marina pulls back the curtain and dives deep into chats with the UNSUNG Heroes – parents, the coaches, the sponsors, the nutritionists and the mindset specialist – revealing the realities of what it takes to support a  child in reaching their ultimate potential in becoming a pro athlete.

This is YOUR village.  

A home for Uncensored Advice for you– the Unsung Heroes of part of the ‘unspoken’ journey behind the athletes!

What to expect when you listen:

Real, Raw Truth

Laughter

The Struggles & Successes

ABOUT YOUR HOST:

Marina Kuperman Villatoro, a mama who is on a mission to help her sons reach their athletic (rock climbing) goals and dreams. 

Connect and be Part of the Strategic Village

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Transcript

Welcome to raising extreme athletes uncensored. This is your reality check in home for uncensored, trusted advice and stories from the Trail Blazers who came before us because it takes a strategic village to raise an extreme pro athlete. This is your village today we're going to be talking about taking time off to train. And who's paying for that time? Yeah, I want to know too. So let's talk. I'm Marina, your host, mother of two aspiring rock. Timers and wife to an extreme athlete. 

So during the Olympics, especially because climbing was in the Olympics, we got very involved in watching a lot about the actual climbers because our ex coach was one of his top top climbers from Chile because he's Chilean and was going to the majority of the competition. So we were able to really find out a lot about information about a lot of the people that were. Winning and actually ended up going to the Olympics. 

And a lot of them were in their twenties right, including his athlete as well. And then you would start to hear like the success stories, the ones that were actually winning and enough to go to the Olympics. And they were, you know, giving these interviews. Oh yeah, I took off 2 years from university or I took off, you know, a couple of years from work so that I could fully train. 

And my husband and I are looking at each other. We're like, well, who are who's. Paying for them because they're not big enough for sponsors to pay them. You know, like, there are definitely those superstars that have been in the climbing world forever. And they're also, you know, competing. And they are fully funded by the sponsors, but they're like four of them. And there were like, you know, hundreds of people competing. So we're like, who's paying for all of this? And then, of course, it turned out to be the parents' right. These athletes who were training were living with the parents, and the parents were paying for the coaches of the gyms. 

You know, they also had to get to, for instance, in the US you have to get to the United States, to the USA climbing team. And even when you get to the climbing team, you still have to pay for the lodge and you still have to pay for a lot of things, even though the team pays for some stuff. And this is just for the competitors, once you get to the Olympics, that you're actually qualified. 

And then a lot more government help is coming in. But up to that point, there is no real government help, right? And this was incredible for us that nobody wanted to give credit to the people that were funding this training, that were funding this reality of these students, I mean, of these climbers, right, they were technically climbing students, right. So this. To me it was more like, how can you constantly be overlooking the people that are behind all of this, right? You can't just have this one tiny sentence someplace written about the athlete and their journey without fully acknowledging the parents involvement and the support. 

Because without that support, without that commitment, there is no athlete. And I think it's really important that we. Explain that and really bring it out into the open because a lot of times it's completely overlooked that we just focus on the successes and the achievements of the athlete without understanding that it was like that iceberg. I don't know if you've ever seen that iceberg image. They show. Like the iceberg is only 10 % out and then 90 % of the iceberg is actually underwater. And, you know, they don't talk about this 90 %, which I would say more than 50 % is the involvement and the support. 

Of the family, of the parents. And I just want to finally bring this out into the open because it needs to be discussed. We need to understand this is where it happens. And once we can start talking to the people that are making it happen, I believe that our athletes will get a lot more from us because now we can learn how it's done properly because a lot of times we don't really know what we're doing right? So this is what I want to talk about. This is what these, this whole series is all about, and I hope that you guys could give me your own experiences. 

Their own. How are you supporting your kids? What is happening in the House? All of that because it's time to bring it out into the open and this is what that village is all about. Please, if you guys enjoyed this episode, please leave me a review, share it with your friends, and let's get this out in the open.