Why are More Athletes Born at the Beginning of the Year?

Cristiano Ronaldo, Michael Jordan, Adam Goodes, Cathy Freeman, Muhammad Ali, Babe Ruth, and Simone Biles are all born at the start of the year. Interesting? Maybe. Coincidence? Maybe not.

According to lots of different studies the month that you're born in can have a massive impact on your sporting success. This is something called the relative age effect. Often junior sports are grouped into age categories, however kids develop at completely different rates.

A study in 2015 showed just how that translates to athletic performance. Michael Romann and Stephen Cobley looked at 60 metre sprint times for kids aged 8 to 15. They then plotted their times against their precise age. They found that 8 year olds born at the start of the year ran about 10% faster than those born at the end. Experts reckon that coaches mistake this gap in skill or physicality for raw talent, not age, but all of a sudden a lot more attention is paid to the early developers with things like extra coaching, extra gear & extra training. This can lead to the late bloomers and December babies being left behind.

The 'relative age effect' goes beyond the sports field too. A study in 2005 looked at academic test scores for grade 4's all over the world. What the results show is that year 4's born in December would on average score 4-12 percentile points lower than year 4's born in January. This means a December born grade 4 might score in the 68th percentile, while a January born grade 4 could score in the 80th percentile. The difference between a perceived learning difficulty...and a gifted student, may not always be intelligence but rather the month of their birth.

Sports clubs are still working out realistic ways to deal with the relative age effect but things are already evening themselves out. In the last 5 years, players drafted into the AFL have had birthdays from all over the year.

There is a bit more to success than an early arrival. What's really important is that you work harder than anyone else at whatever you want to achieve.

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