It’s no mystery that in the majority of sports, the athletic ability of a player is a factor in deciding who comes out of the game, meet or match victorius. Some high school sports see off-season training as unnecessary and leave it up to the athletes themselves to stay in shape if they choose to do so. Off-season training should be required because it plays a role in every sport, it builds team chemistry and for some team sports, it fulfills the responsibility athletes have to their teammates.

The athletic ability of an athlete affects the outcome of every sporting event. Therefore it would make sense that the athlete would want to be in the best physical shape possible, in order to give themselves the best chance of winning. According to an article posted by “Breaking Muscle”, written by Conor Doherty, a hockey and soccer coach, the off-season needs to be used because thereis more time to focus on getting stronger for your sport. During the off-season for some sports, it’s hard to actually play the sport, but that doesn’t mean you can’t improve by using that time to get in better shape.

According to a story published by “Break through Basketball” written by Trent Ryan, one of the best ways to build team chemistry is to do things off the court, such as off-season training. During most off-season workout programs, athletes that play the same sport spend multiple hours a day working out together. Spending so much time together ensures bonding time between the athlete which according to the same source, leads to several victories down the road. Not only will team chemistry lead to wins, sometimes it leads to the best teams and athletes ever.

There are individual sports, such as some events in track and singles in tennis, but for the large majority, success in sports relies on entire teams. Some high school athletic teams don’t have the funding for an off-season training program, so the athletes that truly want to win, train by themselves. Some athletes who participate on that same team don’t train during the off-season. Therefore when the competitions come, they can’t perform as well which ends up hurting the team’s success as whole. It is not fair for the entire team’s success to be damaged because one athlete did not get better during the off-season. This makes it a responsibility on the athlete’s part to not allow that to happen when they sign up for the sport.

Although some programs are not well-funded, it costs little to nothing to go on a run with your teammates or get together and improve your skills in some way. Every athlete should be required to do off-season training because it will help them succeed in the sport, it bonds them with teammates and it’s not fair to their teammates if the team’s success is damaged by that one athlete.