1) Lu and I feel that some people need to step up their sense of urgency. There are less than 3 weeks left til Sectionals (18 days) and it's shameful when people aren't coming to practices/conditioning. We need everyone to step it up and make everything they can because when you don't show up, you're not letting yourself down only, you're letting the guy who got his ass out of bed to make it to a rainy day of ultimate practice, your brother.
On Sunday, we couldn't even hold down a full sized field and had to play mini. That's effing BS. You can't let your friends down like that. Maybe you had a rough night the night before, so did a lot of us, but I scheduled practice sunday also b/c you can't expect to be 100% on the Sunday of a tournament. We played in shitty cold and misty/rainy weather without you and I am glad I did b/c it really simulated having to play men down and in crappy conditions (both personally and environmentally). It's tourney sunday, you're not going to be freaking fresh as a daisy, you're going to be hurting and so will everyone else. What counts is how you overcome these feelings of fatigue, sickness, pain, etc.
Lu had a lot more moving stuff to say that I can't remember word for word, since it didn't really apply to me since I make all the practices. In summary, step up your sense of urgency, both mentally and physically. Our season is about to get real.
2) We have 2 more practices this week (about 8 practices total until sectionals). Tonight I set two VERY simple goals for this week. And everyone must comply by them. They are both defensive:
A) Do not get beat in to the open side--this is the primary option of nearly every team in the nation and it is your job to not let that be a viable option this week. I dont care if you get beat deep Wed/Thurs, but you WILL NOT get beat in to the open side. Front your man, or stay even with him, do whatever it takes to stay in between him and the disc on an open side in cut. Ultimate is pretty simple. Teams have a primary option (open side incut) and secondary options (throwing deep/break side) and we WILL shut down this primary option this season and force teams to fall back on their secondary options.
B) Do NOT get broken while marking. You should keep a mental tally if this happens in practice (I will be trying to break the mark lots when I have the disc) and we'll talk about the count at the end of practice.
3) Husayn made a good point: all of you should be thinking about Ultimate constantly now. When you have a chance to get to practice early, talk to your teammates about Ultimate (our zone d, problems you're having, etc). Talk to those more knowledgeable. Read up on anything Ultimate related
-Here're two sites I read or have read in the past and recommend:
- http://www.brown.edu/Athletics/Mens_Ultimate/zipstips/ (this is for fun but it has some great advice from, in my opinion, one of the best players to ever have played the sport of Ultimate
Cya all Wednesday/Thursday night 7:30- @Grand Street.
Love,
Q
PS: Workout tonight, for those that missed but have asked to know what we did so they can do it tomorrow:
-3 sets of stairs (with double bunny hops instead of one leggers
-3X raichu abs (15 each), but instead of planks, during the "resting period" between ab sets, we did as many pushups as we could in 30 seconds, so use a watch/stopwatch
-marking drill
-5 suicides (free throw line, back, half court, back, repeat= 1 suicide)
-BREAK: over the fence, back over the fence plyo stretches to the top of the key/3 point line
-another suicide
-BREAK: toe touches to top of key and back
-another suicide
-BREAK:lunges to top of key and backward lunges back
-another suicide
-side shuffles half court and back followed by suicide (without repeat, so just free throw line/back/half court/back)
-repeat side shuffle (facing other way) + suicide
-repeat side shuffle + suicide
-REST
-repeat again facing other way
-REST
-3 suicides
-be tired
-speech about the next 3 weeks, think about ultimate
PPS:
Vassar has been practicing at 6am, four times a week this season. Although I absolutely despise that team, that shows dedication to me.
Step it up, Haze. Every one of us has to come to practice and work their ass off. We will reap the benefits during tournaments.
We have what it takes to be great. So every day and every practice, ask yourself "what can I do to help my teammates?"
~Q
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