Best way to convert RAW ?

Edit:  upon re-reading the OP it's clear the question had to do with LR and not just the broader subject of "best way to convert RAW"  I'll let my response stand however in case there are readers who shy away from shooting raw for sports because of fears about extra raw file processing  requirements.

I'm guessing one of the "best way" concerns for you is how easy it is to process multiple raw file images in substantial quantity versus optimizing the rendering of a select scene.  I shoot several hundred images at a lacrosse event and still have 200-400 shots (NEFs) after culling in the camera (D300s). Uploading to Aperture takes  two or three minutes while multitasking so upload time isn't an issue for me.

Aperture creates preview jpgs for sorting and first level decision making on all the NEFs. My first action is to temporarily assign a 3 star rating to images that I decide I want to "process" further ... I treat maybe 25 to 75% of the images that make it past my in camera chimping. [I do NOT want the camera to produce jpgs along with the NEFs because that just clutters the scene and has no value to me.]

What I love about working in Aperture (and similar PP tools)  is that it holds all the editing adjustments in a sidecar file and doesn't burn them into your original image file. You only do that when you export a "version".  Non-destructive editing makes management of your work so much better. This argument applies regardless of whether you shoot raw or not.

When I start working on a string of action shots, I can save the adjustments for the first image and rubber stamp them on the rest of the set giving me a leg up on editing those shots. Some of these are adjustments available to me because the file is a NEF and some are unrelated to NE conversion. Aperture simply augments the Adjustments panel with a small section of RAW Fine Tuning sliders. Example: basic tweaks are tonal range compression/expansion, color "vibrancy" and saturation and accentuation of definition. If there is a continuing  color cast I can adjust that in the "stamp" set of adjustments. I then make cropping and horizon adjustments that are specific to the first action shot and any other tweaks that I might not think apply to subsequent frames.  When I move on to edit other selected ( 3 star) frames I can hit them with the  start-up set of adjustments in one key stroke and then simply adjust cropping and horizon as needed for those particular images.

I guess my point is that a sports shooter doesn't have to shy away from shooting NEFs and only NEFs. The software handles the raw conversion for me and does not impose any more work on me compared to how I would work with a set of jpgs.

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Marabou Muddler
http://MMuddler.smugmug.com/Sports