<p>I have a son (sophomore) who is interested in WP. He is homeschooled and has great EC's and leadership, but he is lacking in sports. He cycles and has done a 180 mile ride, so he's in excellent condition, but we are concerned about not having a team sport on his application. </p>
<p>I wonder if anyone here knows whether not having a team sport during high school is a deal-breaker for the academies. Since he is a sophomore, we could get him into something, but he would not have time to really excel. I wonder if a non-competitive cycling team would count for anything. It is difficult to find competitive cycling teams. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>There was a long discussion last year on this topic. Team sports are preferred to individual, school sports are easier to indicate achievement. Net - it's not a deal breaker, just takes some extra work (circa 95% of the class has varsity letters). The people that have been most successful have a demonstrated level of achievement in their individual sport (eg, Tae Kwon Do champs). You'd be better off to find him something competitive.</p>
<p>timely - from my understanding, a competitive, contact, team sport is the ideal in WPs eyes.<br>
One of the field force officers on prospective.net posted on this topic last year, and I will summarise his thoughts:</p>
<ol>
<li>Being a cadet at WP is a contact sport - you need to be able to hit and take a hit, and gut out the though times (mentally and physically)</li>
</ol>
<p>He emphasised that team sports were important and that the level of competitiveness was key, especially when considering a candidate with third tier sport.</p>
<p>I just wanted to come out and say that I am living proof that it is possible to get into WP without a Varsity letter. I participated in Cross-Country (No varsity letter) at my high school and also participated in the JROTC Raider Team and JROTC Orienteering Team (Could not get varsity letter because it is a JROTC sport). What I suggest your son should do is at least join a "tier 1" or "tier 2", at his high school and do his best to get a letter, and if he doesn't want to do that he should join a competitive non-high school team. However, the key thing is to keep his grades and leadership ECs up. Those are what got me into WP. Oh yeah, another thing, if he isn't involved in as many sports, I <em>think</em> that WP will look more heavily at his CFA score, so make sure he does really good on that.</p>
<p>I agree that excelling in team sports is preferred. However excelling is the key. Even if there is no competitive cycling team in your area, there are likely races that he can enter as an individual. He will be able to demonstrate the same commitment to performing/competing at a high level as the high school varsity athletes. These accomplishments, even with no team available to him, will be evidence of his passion for training at this level. He has the time to set and reach goals that he will be able to discuss in his essays and interviews. He may even decide to up the ante by training for triathalons, which will do wonders for his conditioning.</p>
<p>You may want to have him get in touch with your MALO in order to be on the radar screen.</p>
<p>timely: I will offer a slightly different opinion and perspective based on the assumption that your son is not intending to seek an appointment as a "recruited athlete". My son is a USMA plebe ( non- recruited athlete).</p>
<p>For the non-recruited athlete candidate, the heaviest weighted factor ( about 70-75%) used by the academy is academic apptitude and performance. The next factor (20%) is leadership ability and experience. Physical apptitude is weighted 5-10%.</p>
<p>My recommendation is that your son focus on the academics (being in the top 10% of SAT takers would be great) and leadership (show willingness to lead youth/school organizations). </p>
<p>Regarding athletics, have your son continue his cycling (its great exercise) and try his hand at cross country running. I suggest this for a couple of reasons. First, cross country running will compliment his cycling and the "learning curve" for cross country running is closely tied to one's conditioniing, something that your son has already developed through cycling. Second, if you son can demonstrate some reasonably good times in cross country (ie. 6 minute mile, 13 minute 2 mile ), the academies can directly relate that to a level of physical fitness - something that is more difficult for cycling. </p>
<p>Also have your son exercise to improve his candidate physical fitness test score. Normally, this means lots of pushups and situps. A good score of the candidate test will put your son in good standing.</p>
<p>"Whole candidate score - that by which USMA admissions judges the candidate is made up as follows: 60% academic, 30% leadership and 10% PAE. The 60% academic is comprised of the SAT/ACTs, the candidate's transcript and the level of difficulty of courses the candidate has taken, and the level of competitiveness of the candidate's school. The 30% leadership comes from extracurricular activities, athletic activities, community service activities, teacher recommendations and the interview conducted by the field force officer. The 10% PAE is the physical aptitude test."</p>
<p>Thanks for all the suggestions. Since we homeschool, we have to work a little harder (okay, a lot harder) to find team or competitive sports for our kids.</p>
<p>The cross-country suggestion is something I hadn't thought of. There is a summer league track team in our city. Summer league isn't super-competitive, but he'd at least have some official times to show.</p>
<p>He's been interested in doing some martial-arts, but I just don't think a year and a half will be enough time for him to really excel in that.</p>
<p>He is in excellent physical condition. He has a pull-up bar in his doorway and requires himself to do 5 pull-ups every time he goes through the doorway. :-) I am also hoping that the fact that our family has a farm on which he helps will count for some non-traditional physical fitness points.</p>
<p>He is advancing through the ranks in Civil Air Patrol, so that will be good for leadership, and he's involved with quite a few other EC's, too.</p>
<p>Speaking of EC's.....oh, I guess I'd better start another thread for that. Thanks again!</p>
<p>If yall are interested in Martial arts, one and a half years would be fine. I speak from 7 years experience in ATA Taekwondo. I would suggest a more physically rigorous MA like krav maga, jujitsu, capoeira, Judo, or Hapkido. You'd be surprised, excelling at what you do isn't that hard if you like it. </p>
<p>Also shows leadership, responsibility, and discipline. Great kudos for those!</p>
<p>timely - Yes, WP is looking for athletes who excel in their field, but more importantly, WP is looking for a competitive spirit in its candidates. To quote the WP Candidate Book (Smallwood) "True athletes are competitive by nature and that is what is required in officers who can lead others, especially in combat. ..... Can you imagine a second lieutenant who is not competitive trying to lead a platoon of men up a hill into enemy fire?"
In non-recruited athletes, it is more about the willingness to compete , will to win (and ability to deal with failure, by dusting yourself off and trying again), than the winning itself.
Good luck to your son.</p>