Children need the physical activity, but not the stress of over-competitiveness that can be prevalent in some youth leagues. Kids need to be allowed to be...kids, not Mom & Dad's little multimillionaire athelete in training. Some children have too much structured activities and it's like they're working full time jobs. For many it's not a healthy life style and they burn out/stress out. There's enough of that waiting for them in their adolescent and adult future years. A variety of unstructured creative play and activities is more desireable for the pre-teen age group, imo.

I learned at an early age not to complain of boredom within my Father's hearing...he'd hand me shovel and tell me to dig a ditch or something.
Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
dang workaholics


Heh, mine ride a bike to school every day in all types of weather. Half an hour there, half an hour back. That's stamina taken care of.
Ain't that the truth. My first taste of freedom was riding my bike (the first car came much later) anywhere and everywhere within a 10 mile radius of the house. From the fishing/swimming hole to the ice cream stand to a friends house in the next town. I rode that bike daily and it did me a lot of good.