Real-Time Results for Big South This Weekend
If you are interested in keeping track of teams playing in the Big South Qualifier this weekend, here is the website for real-time results.
Ankle Braces Effectively Reduce Risk of Ankle Injury
Check out this informative article about the benefits of ankle protection.
What I Did On My Summer Vacation...
Along with other fun activities, I improved my volleyball skills at FRVBC's summer camps. I found out about all the great camps they offer on their camp website. I signed up on SignUpToPlay as soon as I could and counted the days until camps started. I had so much fun in the gym with my friends. I can't wait for my school team to start practicing again so I can show off all my new skills!
April Showers Bring May Flowers
This month Front Range is organizing our spring fundraising: spring plants! This is a great chance to subsidize your club dues and spruce up your home. And your neighbor's home. And your relatives' homes. And your coworkers' homes. You get the idea. Be sure to pick up information from your Team Rep.
Letting the Score Do the Teaching
At Front Range, we’ve always been advocates of letting the ball do the teaching. By this we mean that we let our players use their natural athleticism as they learn how to make the ball do what they want it to, especially in passing and digging the ball.
While we make sure our players are developing sound mechanics, we don’t want them to become too mechanical and not intuitive. We let the players develop individually within the range of sound movement principles by increasing the speed and range of balls they’re learning to handle.
Recently we’ve begun to let scoring do the teaching, too. Here are some things we’re doing in the practice gym this season and why.
Volleyball success depends on two dimensions of the game: 1) achieving a high percentage of success in serve-receive, and 2) a strong transition game. A strong serve-receive game prevents the opponent from ever making much of a scoring run on you and breaking out to a big lead. We want our teams siding-out at a 60-70% rate. A strong transition game helps us make point runs on our serve and break away from our opponents.
Michelle Hoffner, coach of 15-1 White, analyzed data from the 2006 JO’s and found that the most successful teams had 2.5/1 or better point scoring to error ratios. This means that when these teams got to serve, they would frequently score two to three points before losing their serve. Their transition game gained them two to three points before losing the serve.
We’ve begun challenging our teams to create stronger transition games by doing things like starting at 10-10, and then only gaining points by scoring two or three points in a row to gain one point on the board. On the other hand, every error causes the loss of a point. We call these 2:1 or 3:1 point scoring games. They’re very hard to win!
What they do is cause our players to learn to play with conservative aggression, not afraid to make an error, rather playing to win wisely and patiently. It’s another way we’re instilling resilience, focus and mental toughness in our teams. Watch for sets being played this way or in variations of it. Ask your daughters how challenging and stimulating they can be.
At competitions, watch for how well your daughter’s team sides out, controlling the other team’s ability to make a run. Also look for the times that your daughter’s team scores several points in a row on serve and cheer them on. It’s the most difficult thing to do in volleyball.
Tim Engels, M.A., sports psychology consultant to Front Range Volleyball Club, is a sports psychology consultant and counselor in Denver, CO. You can contact him at (303) 956-5691 or tengels@qwest.net.
