I often find my friends who aren’t involved in coaching world have a trouble grasping the amount of time we put in thinking about our program or the sport directly. We will go out to a movie and they will come out talking about the music and different action scenes. I often say, I could use this clip for when I am talking to the team about self-talk, or how to build confidence. This would be a good moment to bring up team and commitment to each other. My friends laugh at me and would often say give it a rest.
Over Christmas or first part of summer I will try to read books as a type of escape from myself. The Lord of the Rings are my favorite books, but there are so many examples of leadership in them. I bought the movies to show sacrifice, and fulfilling a role with the help from friends. I also enjoy a good spy novel. The Bourne series is very fun read, but again I read this type of novel because I enjoy the strategy that the spies employ to get out of some situations. But mostly I tend to read coaching books and business books on leadership. I find the leadership strategies in business and sport over lap a lot. Phil Jackson's Hard Court Warrior, Leading with the Heart by Coach K is one of the best team leadership books, Education of a Coach about Bill Bilechik rise to an NFL dominant coach, and one of my favourites golf is not a game of perfect.
The hardest part to understand from a coaches point of view is winning and losing and how it affects our psyche. I find that after a loss, I have a much harder time getting my thoughts away from volleyball. Losing drives me to an obsession, and sometimes makes it feel lonely. If we win on Saturday night then Sunday is a fun day, able to watch football and be talkative to people who are around. After a loss, I tend to not sleep very much, I will go and watch last nights game again to see if there were anything that I didn’t notice, early warning signs that I should be aware of. I can be in a large group of people and not here a single conversation going on around me. My close friends have learned to just leave me alone during this time. My friends in the coaching world will check up on each other especially after a tough loss. We don't try to give advice in these situation just a quick reminder that we have a job in sport, and they are hard to come by.
Once practice starts up again on Monday and the team starts working hard, we start to prepare for the next weekend then, I am happy. I feel real lucky to have the committed group that we do here at Brandon. This past weekend was not our best performance to date. Arguably could be the worst we have played at home this season. we have a pretty good home record going in league, and Brandon is a tough gym to come into and play. We are proud of how tough it is to play here. For that reason losing this weekend at home in our tourney made it even more difficult.
The concensus from my discussion with different members of the team, was now everyone understands how important quality practice is to our result. This weekend we just showed up and played after having 14 days off. We just talked briefly about the opposition and worked on our systems. We played everyone quite a bit more than we did during the first semester. On new years day I had a couple of the players text me with their new years resolution. WIN. Knowing that the athletes spent their new years eve talking about what needs to happen in the second semester is very exciting. I find that on a team if a coach cares way more about what happens then the team, it can be a very frustrating situation. When the athletes demonstrate that they are commited and involved the more successful a team will become.
The fact that we came back into this weeks practice with a strong commitment is hopeful. I am still stinging from the weekend. We tried hard this past weekend but didn’t work as a collective whole. I am re-watching the matches and making sure we know what we need to do. Realistically we are close to beating most teams in Canada, all we really need is everyone to work hard to improve 5%. For each player and coach that 5% is something different. Some players need to find time for extra passing reps, some need to make changes on some technical issues, others need to take better care of their nutrition and physical fitness. Each of us have that 5% we can do better. We know deep down what it is. If we decide as a whole that we can reach for that 5% we will have a successful season. Players have heard the coaching staff say things over and over to them. Players are aware of what their role is on the team now and how can they improve it. We asked our team to do two things in the next couple of weeks. One is to keep the game in mind when they are training. It can be a simple as our libs is in a defensive drill, she is to set the ball to an attacker at leftside. She uses her forearms to deliver the ball the entire time she is in the setting position. When asked why she explained, I am the libero, I cannot overhead pass a ball legally to a hitter in front of the attack line. This is her way to keep each drill game like in her head.
I heard a story of a boxer who refused to do situps in the ring. His reasoning was I never want my back against the canvas. That only happens in a loss. So he would get out of the ring do his situps then get back in the ring to continue training.
The second is to compete in drills. To find ways to turn some easy drills into competitions. When in a serving and passing drill, serve strategically to beat the passers. Keep a running conversation with them, put pressure on each other. Challenge each other.
WE will see what the second semester brings. But right now this coaches brain is in a good spot.
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