Be the Best Parent for your Athlete

At the upcoming parent meeting and social on Saturday November 11th at 6pm, Dr. Smoll, nationally renowned leader in sports psychology, will be presenting tools that we, as parents, can use to support our athletes. A University of Washington practitioner, researcher and educator, Dr. Smoll has been instrumental in developing the new national standard for sports psychology.

Dave Lyon, SPAC’s Program Director felt very strongly about getting Dr. Smoll to speak to our community. “I feel this is THE most important event our parents can attend all season.” Dave, a huge proponent of developing the whole athlete, talks a lot about how we as parents often undermine our kids despite our best intentions.

“Look,” says Lyon, ” we all want to help, protect and support our kids. We want them to be as successful and happy as they can be, and often we follow our intuition as to how to best do that, but unfortunately, often our intuition is wrong.”

I personally have attended one of Dr. Smoll’s lectures in the past, and felt that the experience was truly transformative. He speaks candidly, using very relatable examples of how we as parents can create the healthiest most enjoyable experience for our athletes – how we can support them and help them find success in athletics and in life. He presented tangible tools – literally helping us find the elusive words to say to our kids when they most need our support AND, maybe more importantly, helping us avoid saying the things that undermine our athletes. Learn more about Smoll through his UW website.

We urge all parents new and returning to attend this fun evening. Food and drink will be served and an opportunity to socialize and reconnect with all of your fellow SPAC parents will follow the lecture. So start out listening to an inspiriational speaker who will help you parent better both on and off of the race course, and then have a blast with all of your SPAC friends.

If you haven’t received an invite already for the event and would like to attend, please email Kristin Szabadi. Hope to see you all there on November 11th!