A worthwhile read on youth sports

Here's a lengthy feature and a cautionary read on youth sports:

Children may be vulnerable in $5 billion youth-sports industry
Parents and athletes feel the pressure to compete at all costs
Todd Jones, Mike Wagner and Jill Riepenhoff
The Columbus Dispatch
August 29, 2010

Julie Fetty ripped through a laundry basket filled with baseball and softball uniforms at the same time her husband, Brad, donned a coach's shirt and scanned his smoldering cell phone.

The late-afternoon clock was bearing down on the parents, pressing them to get their four kids to four Hilliard locations to play four games - all starting between 6 and 7:45 p.m.

This was the grand finale of nine youth soccer, baseball and softball games for the family in a 20-hour period over two days.

"We are constantly on the run," Brad said. "Half of us at one place, half at another place..."

Go here for the remainder.