Moving through the talent pathway offers fantastic experiences and rewards for athletes, but there are elements of high-performance sport that can make young people more at risk of abuse and harm.
These include:
- Over-training and training whilst injured - Young athletes may feel pressured to do whatever it takes to achieve results, gain selection, and keep funding and sponsors. This can lead to overtraining, and training whilst injured. The might avoid reporting illness and injury, because they feel pressure to stay well and not miss sessions, leading to more, longer-term health issues.
- Focus on weight and body image - Young people's bodies change shape and gain weight as they grow. There may be pressure to meet weight categories, eat healthily, and meet the sport’s cultural ‘norms’ when it comes to build. Young people may also have their own body image expectations. These pressures can lead to unhealthy relationships with food and exercise, which can be damaging to the athlete’s developing body, and mental health.
- ‘Win at all costs’ approach - Putting sporting success above everything else can lead to other areas of life being neglected, leaving young people more vulnerable to harm. Their physical and mental health, and their social and supportive relationships outside of sport can be affected.
- Narrow athletic identity - A young person's wider identity can be overlooked if too much focus is put on being an athlete. This can affect how a young person sees themselves, and how they're seen by sports organisations and staff. This can have a negative impact on their health, personal development and relationships.
- Intensity and dependency of relationships - Many young athletes rely on their coaches, support staff or other athletes and will show loyalty to them. These people can have a strong influence over the young person and may work with them in one-to-one training environments. This can make it difficult for the young person to avoid or report someone who may be causing them harm.
- Time spent away from support networks - Travelling and being away from home can lead to isolation from friends, family and other support networks. This can stop young people reporting inappropriate behaviour and wellbeing concerns, and they can go unnoticed by those closest to them.
- Fear of losing a place on programme or repercussions - Young athletes might want to do 'whatever it takes' to succeed in sport, for fear of losing their place on a programme, leaving them open to abuse and harm.
- Ignoring lower-level concerns - If there aren't proper procedures in place for dealing with lower-level concerns, and nothing is done about them, lower-level incidents can continue or get worse.
- Culture where people don’t feel able to voice concerns - If there's an unhealthy culture in sport, young people and their parents or carers might not feel comfortable sharing any concerns they have. This can come from poor leadership, lack of safeguarding training, no clear routes for raising concerns, clubs not taking responsibility and not wanting to listen or change. This is especially true if there are consequences for anyone who voiced concerns.
- Transitions - Young athletes face many transitions on the talent pathway which can leave more at risk of abuse, as they enter unfamiliar environments with new people and new pressures. In particular, transitioning from junior to senior level can come with changes to the training environment, loss of support networks, more intense training, awe of senior athletes who they might want to impress, and peer pressure of wanting to fit in.
Your organisation needs strong safeguards in place to help protect young people on the talent pathway from these issues.
For advice on hearing young people’s voices, see our involving children and young people pages.
Helping to reduce the additional vulnerabilities
You and your organisation can take further steps to safeguard young high-performance athletes and reduce the risk of harm and abuse:
- Take an athlete-centred approach, listening to what athletes say and showing that you value this.
- Training and inductions for staff and athletes, that cover safeguarding, support, managing lower-level concerns, and how to raise concerns.
- Having an approachable and visible Welfare Officer.
- Good communication with everyone involved in your sport, encouraging everyone to feel confident in raising concerns.
- Limit one-to-one working with young people.
- Have in place codes of conduct, safeguarding policies and reporting procedures.
- Safer recruitment for staff and volunteers. This should include vetting checks (such as DBS or AccessNI), references, probation periods and regular reviews.
- Safe procedures for travel and overnight stays, including having a Designated Welfare Officer.
- Have a healthy culture around physical health, body image, and mental health and wellbeing.
- Provide support, especially during transitions and times of change.
- Create an inclusive culture. Ask athletes about themselves and their needs, and be open and flexible to accommodating these needs in training.
- Encourage online safety, with policies and codes of conduct that cover how to communicate safely online. Advice for young people should also include how to use social media safely.
Safeguarding high-performance athletes
Athletes at all levels of sport deserve to train and compete in a safe and healthy, athlete-focused environment. In high-performance sport, it's important that safeguarding arrangements are in place to address the added risks that young athletes face.
We recommend that all high-performance and talent programmes have a Lead and Deputy Designated Welfare/Safeguarding Officer.
Safeguarding and reporting concerns is everyone's responsibility, but Welfare/Safeguarding Officers are the designated people within a sports organisation or programme with primary responsibility for managing and reporting concerns about young athletes. They are also responsible for overseeing athletes’ wellbeing and putting into place procedures to safeguard young people.
Some sports’ National Governing Bodies (NGBs) will have an overall Safeguarding Lead, in addition to having Designated Welfare Leads in their performance programme, who are responsible for the wellbeing of their athletes and staff.
Coaches, staff and volunteers should also be trained and knowledgeable in safeguarding in performance sport.
Your organisation should have strong safeguarding policies, reporting processes, and training for staff. See our full guidance on how to develop these:
Putting safeguards in place for children in sport
We also offer sport safeguarding training for sports organisations, including specialist training.
