It’s a sunny, breezy afternoon at Kahala Community Park. In the middle of the open field, a Pop Warner football team is running drills under the direction of several coaches. Just over the fence, preschool children are playing on a jungle gym. And in between, in a single batting cage in a shaded corner of the park, 13-year-old Kolbee Kealoha is taking swings, one after another, at softballs lofted by her coach.
As she does once a week, Kolbee is practicing, but not as part of a team. The St. Francis School eighth-grader is getting some extra instruction from a private hitting coach, former University of Hawaii softball star Kelly Majam Elms.
Kolbee’s father is looking on nearby. A former athlete himself, Eddie Kealoha sees the value in the specialized training. Although this is only Kolbee’s fourth session with Majam Elms, he said his daughter is already reaping the benefits of working with the former All-American.
"Oh, there’s a big improvement," said Kealoha, a former UH slotback who now works for TheBus and also coaches his daughter’s club team. "Just technique-wise, it’s a lot better now than it was before, when I was trying to help."
Like Kealoha, parents across the country are paying for extra help to give their kids a leg up in athletics. Sports coaching, including one-on-one instruction, clinics and camps, is a $6 billion industry in the U.S., according to market research company IBISWorld.
In Hawaii, lessons typically range from $30 to $60 per session. Despite the expense, many parents who decide to hire private coaches see it as well worth it.
While motives vary, the most common reason parents turn to specialized instruction is because they see it as an investment: Better play can bring college scholarships and maybe a high-paying sports career.
Private coaching is most common in baseball and softball or individual sports like golf and tennis because they focus on skill more than strength.
Many young local golfers who aspire to play on the PGA or LPGA tours sign up with Kevin Ralbovsky’s KMR School of Golf at Koolau Golf Club. Past students of the Kaneohe school include pro golfers Tadd Fujikawa and Stephanie Kono.
At age 15 Fujikawa was the youngest ever to play in a major PGA tournament after qualifying for the 2006 U.S. Open. He is now on the eGolf Tour. Kono, a three-time All-American at UCLA, competed on the Symetra Tour this season following a rookie campaign on the LPGA Tour.
Ralbovsky says the advantage of having personalized instruction is the ability to "go over more detailed technique and adjustments that you can’t get in a large group. It’s usually the small details that really separate the skill levels." With so many diverse and equally important aspects of the game — chipping, putting, driving and bunker play — specialized training is particularly important in golf, he said.
In team sports, kids don’t always get a lot of individual attention because the coach’s focus is on getting players to work together.
"Coaches need to work with their teams," Majam Elms said. "They need to run their practice."
Like many personal coaches, Majam Elms spends hours watching video of her clients, analyzing their swings and figuring out what needs to be tweaked. That kind of learning aid can be invaluable to improving a player’s game but is difficult for a coach to provide for an entire team.
For certain team sports, particularly football, strength and endurance are key assets. So at Tactical Strength and Conditioning in downtown Honolulu, trainers work with athletes of all ages.
Tactical coach Darin Yap agrees that scholarships are a big motivation for high-schoolers and their parents but says younger clients are usually in the gym for a different reason. Many parents of his younger athletes just want their child to build confidence.
"They just want their child to enjoy the sport," Yap said. "The better they are at it, the more they’re able to enjoy the sport."
Yap added that parents view athletics as a way to keep their kids healthy and out of trouble, so getting youngsters to stick with sports is a high priority.
Private coaching isn’t just for the offspring of the well heeled, although it can stretch a family budget. Ralbovsky estimates the average price for a typical private golf lesson is $40, about half as much as an adult lesson. He said serious high school players would probably have a one-on-one session about once a week.
Ralbovsky said his KMR School of Golf, a nonprofit foundation, accepts only elite junior golfers. He tries to cap enrollment at six, who play a lot of mainland tournaments. The school offers scholarships, grants and need-based tuition waivers.
"I didn’t want it to be just for rich families, but for the most deserving," he said.
At Tactical, one-on-one sessions with trainers cost $75. Once they have a routine down, children eventually switch to small-group sessions of four to five athletes, at $45.
Majam Elms said she tries to make her lessons affordable. For hitting sessions, she recommends one per week for a half-hour ($35) or an hour ($55).
Eric Ige, a carpenter from Wahiawa, has coached his daughter Shayna since she was 5 years old. Even so, he has utilized private coaches over the years, starting when Shayna was 9. Now 16, Shayna is a junior middle infielder at Maryknoll and began training with Majam Elms this fall.
"It was a very good decision," Ige said of hiring private coaches for his daughter. "It was a sacrifice at times financially because it’s an added expense. You just gotta prepare for the lessons, save the money. It comes down to that: What are you willing to do?"
Ultimately, the big question surrounding private coaching is this: Is it really necessary in order for a child to excel in his or her sport?
Hawaii Pacific University women’s volleyball coach Daryl Kapis said that in his experience, he hasn’t seen much difference between players who have had private training and those who haven’t.
Majam Elms’ parents never paid for private coaching, and she became UH’s career home run leader. But that doesn’t mean she didn’t get individual instruction — she was coached by her father.
For her, that worked. But that’s not always the case.
"Lots of parents understand that they’re not as educated in the sport," Majam Elms said.
There are many arguments against parents coaching their kids, especially the potential impact on the parent-child relationship. Although he had coached his daughter with her club team for many years, Ige realized he could take her only so far.
"Being that she’s a teenager, teenagers don’t always get along with their parents, they tune their parents out," he said. "So probably the last couple years, I kind of pushed her: ‘You need to go play with this other team already because you’re not gaining anything from me. You’re tuning me out more than listening.’ It works out good this way."
Shayna Ige now plays for Altima’s under-18 team. And while she was still adjusting to working with Majam Elms, she hit a home run — a rare occurrence, according to her father — the weekend after her third session.
For Eddie Kealoha, finding the right coach is key before committing to private lessons. Many of Majam Elms’ clients like working with her not only because of her accomplishments, but also because they can relate to her, he said.
"For girls it’s a lot easier to listen to another lady than a guy or a parent," Kealoha said, adding that daughter Kolbee "doesn’t want to miss coming out to practice with her."
Ige is a huge fan of individual training; he often encourages other parents to send their kids to private lessons and clinics. In his opinion, Hawaii is behind the rest of the country in that regard. While at a softball tournament in California in 2009, he and other Hawaii coaches got to talking with a few of their mainland counterparts.
"They would ask, ‘Who’s your players’ hitting coach? Who’s their fielding coach?’ When they go to practice, the coach of the team just needs to put it all together," Ige said.
He believes many parents are hesitant to take advantage of local camps and clinics because of the cost: Registration fees often run in the hundreds of dollars. But the benefits are incalculable, he said.
"Hawaii’s got really good athletes. I think more parents really got to embrace the fact that there is a lot of talent in the state," Ige said. "But a lot of people still don’t buy into (paying for extra training), and that’s too bad."
