INTRODUCTION: Expertise in sports is a result of an arduous process that emerges as a result of interactions between multiple sport-specific constraints (Güllich, 2017; Phillips et al., 2010). The study compared the impact of significant constraints on expertise development in physical versus technical demanding sports. METHODS: Two groups of world-class athletes participated in the study: 1) Cross-Country Skiers (CCS; n=10) and 2) Freeskiers (FS; n=8), competing regularly at the highest level (e.g. World Championship, Olympic Games, Freeride World Tour). The athletes rated by a Likert-type scale the importance of different constraints for their expertise developmental in a questionnaire subdivided into two age spans: 1) 7-15 years and 2) 16 years until present. RESULTS: The total amount of training was similar between CCS and FS (10.698 and 12.162 hours, respectively). The CCS define their training to be more specific compared to FS (98 vs 75%, respectively). No differences were found in the distribution between organized versus non-organized training, but the CCS reported the importance of being part of an organized group to be higher compared to FS (score 4.1 vs 2.1, respectively). CCS report a significantly higher need for coach involvement compared to FS (score 4.1 vs 2.25). Both CCS and FS report a high level of importance of facilities and enjoyment of performing their sport from a young age until present. DISCUSSION/CONCLUSION: Despite differences in sport specific demands for CCS and FS they share several common elements and pathways to expertise. The differences in the need for specificity, the importance of being part of an organized group, and the need for coach involvement might indicate that the FS take a higher level of personal ownership and self-organize their training to a larger extent compared to CCS.
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