The Time Out

We are on a bit of a winning streak and are sitting 5-1 in the league.  The team is training well and making improvements.  As coaches we are continually trying to move our group forward. During this past weekend we sat down as a coaching staff and had a good discussion about how we wanted our time outs to work.

One of the main elements we decided  on is to be positive and keep the discussion about remaining in the moment.   I find the easiest thing to do as a coach is to discuss the errors that have been occurring. In reality at that moment what has happened before must stay in the past.  We want our focus to be about what we must do so we can score now.  We need to give a specific message to our team.  Quite often when I am mentoring young coaches I watch and listen in their timeouts and discover they often rattle off 7 or 8 different things for the team to focus on. This is too many points for the group.  Another mistake I find that inexperienced coaches spend a lot of timeouts talking about energy and communication. They are very generic things. I believe that we should focus on things that are specific. A good example is a ball falling in between two people.  As a team we need them to make a decision faster.  We want them to decide the person who is in the best position to make a positive play.  We have a rule, back row calls off front row, middle back calls off back left and back right.  This is specific, not just a general discussion on call the ball. 

How we get the athletes to reach this is also important. We will often ask questions to specific athletes in the time outs. I feel that asking questions to specific players draws them out of their heads and into the conversation.  This gets the team thinking of a certain situation and they come to an agreement together. "They are scoring a lot from the right side today.  Is there anything we should be doing that can slow her down? If we serve a different location will that have an affect on the type of set?" This allows us to guide our team to the answer we are looking for. Of course there are times when  we need to build confidence in the team and quickly state a solution give them the answer. The thing is current research  has shown that retention happens better when we people discover skills and strategies for themselves.

Against some teams we will use our time out as a strategy.  Most coaches I have come across tell their players that after a timeout you should take a little bit off and put it in.  We use this to our advantage.  Jaki Ellis off of U of Alberta would go on huge runs of points when she was serving against us.  We really struggled with the pace of her serve. Finally we decided to try  to save the timeouts for when she would be serving.  Our hope was she would serve a bit easier allowing us to side out more effectively. It seemed to work for us.  Now we discuss timeouts as part of our game plan strategy.

The last thing I would like to mention is a phrase my friend Ken Briggs from MacEwan University use to say to me. "Don't over coach"  To me this was wise advice.  I repeat this to many young coaches.  Too often we look for a quick fix when steady is the way to go.  Simple clear timeouts are the most effective.

Advice on Coaching from a Musician.

I was reading the Blog Talent Code.  It is written by Daniel Coyle the author of the book with the same name.  In his blog he was talking about an Eagles documentary he watched and directly about how Glen Frey learned to write songs. http://thetalentcode.com/2013/08/13/how-to-be-creative-starring-jackson-brownes-teakettle/  if you want to read the whole article.

Reading this blog really resonated with me.  His message of musical development can easily be about developing as a coach.

 Here are Danile Coyles steps that he took away from the documentary about learning to be a great song writer.  I then put my spin on how this relates to coaching.

1. Proximity,
Glen Frey learned how to be a song writer after he moved in above Jackson Browne and saw how Jackson wrote songs.  He discovered it wasn't just a moment of inspiration.  I feel the same process applies to coaching.  The more gyms a coach can get into and the more coaches you watch or work with, the more success you will have.  I used to think I worked hard as a coach at planning until one summer I met Frank Enns.  Watching the detail Frank put into his practice and game plans was amazing.  Compared to him I felt that I was just showing up to the gym throwing a ball out.  I was a drill coach, worried about a good drill that was cool not the purpose of the drill. I learned that taking time to make a proper practice plan would lead to success in games.

Then I had the opportunity to work with Rod Durrant ( U of Calgary),Keith Hansen (Red Deer College) and Ron Thomson(GPRC). All three of these guys showed me how to run a practice.  They were all strong on demanding  the best out of the players yet keep a positive relationship with them. I would watch their practices and then go back to mine and try to emulate what I saw in theirs The last 8 years I  have been blessed with the opportunity to work with National Team.  Lupo Ludwig and Scott Koskie  and before them Naoki Miyashita and Mike Ling coaches with our national team have allowed me to build further on my knowledge of the game and the proper planning needed.  The summer of 2012 in particular Lupo and Scott allowed me to sit in on their practice planning session.  This helped confirm my thinking and to expand on how to build a great practice.

2.Habit,

 If you want to be a coach then you need to coach.  This is why it is difficult for some players to transition quickly to coaching.  There are a lot more skills to coaching than just being able to explain a skill or system.  Dealing with people is ever changing and a  techniques for this is often learned through trial and error.  In my developmental stage I would coach everything I could. I would try different techniques that I thought would work on different groups and mimic coaches I knew until I found out what works for me.  During my crazy time of coaching in my 20's I coached or assistant coached 11 volleyball teams in one year.  To be honest most of that time wasn't very productive but I was involved. Unknown to me I was learning how and when to jump into a drill, when to wait it out for the players to figure it out. I was immersed in coaching.

3. Looping,

Daniel explain looping as circling back over the process, looking at it and then redoing it. Change a piece of the song and then go over it again. Same thing is involved in planning a practice.  I need to write it down get a feel for what I  want to accomplish. I try to plan the next practice right after we finish our recent  practice while it is fresh in my mind.  I write down the basics of a plan that I want to accomplish.  Then in the morning I will go over the ideas and then put them into a detailed practice plan.  I count reps, I put the players in the drills in the order we want them appear in the drill.  If a player needs an extra set of reps we will build that in.  For example a hitter vs the world drill.  We would go Shanlee first, Tori second, Gil third then Shanlee again.  Everyone on the team hears and  knows the order and the drill runs smooth in transitions.  After this process of planning I look for mistakes,  I often try to match up certain players in the game play.  We often don't go A vs B, we split them up.

4 Wrap up
Very few coaches get to start at the top and are successful.  Most have to work their way through different coaching levels and experience in order to get to their top.  I still am searching out new information and trying hard to stay up with the current research.  The best professional development I usually have is discussing skills and planning with other coaches of all levels.  I find having to explain why I do things to beginning coaches is another way for me to check on my own reasoning.

I often get asked if I have a message for  up and coming coaches.  I guess the message is to be ready to put the time in the gym.  Coaching  is a fun and rewarding career  but takes a lot of focus and passion.

Camps and teaching.

I have been hearing some complaintsfrom different people because I have been neglecting my blog.

I have no excuse as to why it took so long for another entry, I just found myself distracted with other roles that I need to fulfill for my team.  This summer I am part of the organization and presentation of 11 volleyball camps over an 8 week period. These camps are used as fundraisers for exhibition travel and scholarships.  I find that fundraising has taken up a big chunk of this summer.  We have planned a special trip for our team and we need to fund raise close to 50k this summer for everything.

I really enjoy the camps and working with the young athletes and coaches. it gives me a new perspective on learning.  Especially when we are working with the 11 and 12 year olds. I haven't been a part of this many camps in a summer since for 15 years.  Seeing different camps and their structure has led me to think of why and how camps are organized.

I find that often we start off at the young camps without putting things into context. The main purpose of volleyball is to score on the opposition.  This is usually done through an attack. Quite often we would start with partner passing and working on passing and setting skills.  These are two really important skills but neither lead to the score.  I find that in young volleyball we have a celebration when we get three contacts. Pass to a pass to a pass.  to me that isn't the way volleyball should be played.  The last few years we decided to start our camps off with attacking.  Since that is the ultimate goal,  I feel we should start there.  In the Edson And Vermillion Camps we had young athletes (11-14 years of age), so this was a bit chaotic. But with starting with attacking and reinforcing the attack we had more attempts than ever before.

This is our typical start to camp.

I believe timing is the biggest struggle for the athlete when learning to attack, so we start there. Once they figure out when to begin to move towards the ball the rest seems easier. We have the athletes Start right from a set ball the very first time they try to attack.  A setter will toss the ball straight up to them self and try to set the ball for the attacker.  The attacker is told to wait for the ball to leave the setters hand then begin their approach.  One of the big problems is the setting skills are really weak and we haven't covered it yet.  But just ask them to push the ball as high as they can into the air and you will be surprised how well the drill works. 

From this point we work backwards, now we ask for the attacker to make sure they are taking off on two feet as they jump.  We will continue this until most seem to get the two feet take off. Then we ask the right handed attackers to face the setter when they take off and make sure their left foot is closest to the net.  Then we move on to trying to get a longer second step and so on.  The athlete now has a context of what they are trying to do.  

Once we have a basic grasp of attacking we then move to passing.  Our goal is to keep passing fairly simple at this level.  We us two simple cues. First is platform, strong straight arms that are level. The second cue is the ball goes where you lean.  This allows the athletes to make adjustments on their own. If I need the ball to go further ahead, I need to lean forward more, need the ball to go more to the right then I just lean more to the right.  Leaning this way helps create a  natural platform that is oriented towards the target.

Then we will put the two skills together.  The athletes will self set over the net to a passer, just like a freeball in a game.  The ball is then passed to the setter and then caught.  We have the ball caught  so the set is more controlled for the attacker.  We tell them the pass and the attack are the two most important concepts and we need to make sure our second contact is good. The setter will toss to self  and set to an attacker just like we did in the first drill.

We will have the attacker stay in for 4 attacks in a row.  There is a tendency for young coaches to have the athletes follow the ball. One contact and cross the net.  But I believe they need multiple reps at the same skill.  That way they can hear a correction and try it right away or figure out an adjustment on their own with passing. We will have three groups attacking along the net at the same time. Splitting the court into thirds. this will allow for more reps and less people standing around. 

At the start of the drill it might seem scrambled but we have found if we stick with it long enough they will get better.  When I first started to coach camps through this more discovery method I found it was hard to let go of the control. One skill coach controlled drills always look smooth but when we apply them to a game situation they break down.  How often do we hear the phrase if my team only plays like they practice.

The next progression is to split the three groups up into two and split the court in half.  We now play a  modified game.   It is basically the same start to the drill. A ball is set over the net to a passer. The ball is passed to a setter who catches it.  Then a  self toss and set to an attacker who attacks it.   Now we have two or three defenders on the other side of the net.   They try to dig it up the ball and catch it for second contact.  The setter then self toss and set a hitter on their side and a game continues.   

This leads them closer to a game and they see all the concepts of what is necessary.  All this happens in the first two hours of the camp.

 From this point the athletes understand the basic flow to a game, now we can begin to teach the other skills and have the athletes understand where they fit into the game.

I do believe there is a need for one skill drills, but only after they have an idea of where the skill fits into the game.  Then we can break the skill down more and use the one skill drills as a method where they feel what the skill should be like.  But we then need to put the skill back into a game situation, or a part of the cycle of the game.

We believe the best passing drill, is pass-set-hit.  The best serving drill is serve-pass-set-hit.  The best blocking drill is pass-set-hit-block. The best defensive drill is pass-set-hit-block-dig. The more we can put the skill into the context of the game the better the athletes understand its use and why it is necessary.  I once heard Karch Kiraly speak and he said something along the lines that he couldn't beleive how many drills women teams do with no blockers.  In a match maybe only 2 percent of the game is played with no blockers. 

The first 2 weeks were at Jasper Volleyball Camp.  I wrote about this camp in a blog post last year. http://coachingbobcats.blogspot.com/2012/07/jasper-volleyball-camp.htm.  

Winning and Losing Advice for Parents.

Winning and Losing Advice for Parents.

I started reading a new book titled “The Art of Learning” by Josh Waitzkin. The movie "Searching for Bobby Fisher" is based on the author’s life. In the book he writes about his rise through the chess ranks and about the growth of people and especially about the need to lose, and how to deal with it. Realistically it could be anyone growing up through sport. 

This past weekend I attended the Art of Coaching volleyball conference in Calgary. Laurie Eisler (University of Alberta Head Coach) used a line I thought was brilliant. "Be engaged emotionally in the wins and be engaged intellectually in the losses." This was directed at coaches at the time but I think it is applicable to parents as well.

In the book “Art of Learning” Josh writes about the role a parent plays in this process. He suggests that the parent’s everyday conversation should be about effort and lessons rather than results. Be happy with young athlete’s successes. This does not mean parents should trivialize winning and losing. Telling a young athlete that wins and losses don't matter makes no sense. They know it matters. They put their heart on the line and have it crushed when there is a loss. Josh suggests that a parent should start with a hug. Let the youth know they are there for them. Then tell them how proud they are of them because simply getting up on the stage or on the court is a triumph. "Disappointment is a road to greatness," Josh Wrote. This is one of the most important lessons an athlete can learn.  It is important for an athlete to understand how they bounce back determines their character. When the athlete seems ready to talk about the match parents should ask their son or daughter to focus on improvement by asking them to explain the game.  Not necessarily specific skills and tactics but general things.  This leads to an understanding of reviewing the game. 

Examples might be: Were they overconfident entering the match? Were they "psyched out" before the match began? Did a big trash talker get them angry? Did a reaction from a player or coach distract them?  This is healthy reflection. Parents need to leave technical and tactical training to the coaches.Trusting the coach is important part of the learning process and this process can be eroded quickly with mixed messages. This helps athletes learn that from every loss there is a lesson that can help move them forward in a positive direction

Another powerful concept that I recommend for parents is to determine what is a successful experience. On my university team a successful experience differs for many players.  The starting left side should have a difference definition of success than the 15th player.  If they both determined simply seeing playing time on the floor as success, one will be very disappointed. The reserve player will determine success in developing their skills, getting a better understanding of systems, helping make players better and bringing positive energy to the team.

On our U-14 club team we determine success as athletes falling in love with the game. We want the athletes to enjoy coming to practice and develop their skills and tactics.  We play everyone evenly. Sometimes this means losses, but our success isn't based on a win-loss record.  We talk to parents about discovering other success criteria. Hopefully we are all on the same page by the end of the year.

Research shows that athletes who base their experience on personal achievement in terms of wins

 and losses drop out of sports at an earlier age.  This is because as they move up levels they can't 

maintain their records.  They come across other athletes who will challenge them and this affects 

their mental state.  Since they are no longer receiving the accolades they once did they decide to 

withdraw.  On the other hand athletes who focus on effort and improvements remain in their sport 

longer.  Often reaching higher levels in their overall career

http://t.co/fzAwFeXQOU  is another good blog from Sport IQ.

A Quick Study and Pet Peeve.

As season ends a person  would think things would slow down for coaches, but really recruiting heats up.  As a by product of recruiting  I have the opportunity to watch a lot of matches. I like to use this time to do more than evaluate players often I will do a little study of my own.  This year the study came up from last summer.  Last summer as a mentor coach I spent a lot of time with Dan Gilbert and we discussed lots of different parts of the game. (See Gilberts 7 things). http://coachingbobcats.blogspot.ca/2012/08/gilberts-and-his-7-things-first-guest.html

  In particular we discussed warm-ups.  We often discussed what is important in the hitting portion of the warm-up, number of contacts or quality of contacts.

I have a pet peeve of coaches tossing balls to attackers during their 5 minutes of attacking.  Yes I realize almost every coach does this during their warm-up. I have to admit I used to do it as well.  But as I start to analyze different things about the game it has made me dislike this part of warm-up.

Supporters of tossing balls to attacker say it is because they get more contacts.  I wondered if this was really true.  I decided to count contacts during matches I watch.  I just used the U-17 provincials in Manitoba to do a quick study. In the 10 matches I watched the average player had 7 contacts.  I would pick the first middle player and then count how many time she had an opportunity to swing on the ball.  I chose middles because I think this is important part of timing.

 The range of tossing to attackers was extreme.  The one coach who tossed to every player in all three front row positions had 7 contacts. But only four then were from the setter to the attacker.  Another coach who toss directly to her setter and then had her set the attacker  had 7 contacts,  but all 7 were from a setter. A team had two coaches tossing in two lines and had the players hit 2 balls each before they changed to the setter controlled drill.  They had one more attempt than the other teams. This makes me wonder if getting 1 more artificial contact is better or not?

I personally believe that coming from a setter directly is way better.  We are teaching the athletes that their timing is always in relation to when the ball is in the setters hands.  With this explanation a toss ball from the coach doesn’t give the visual cue we ask the attacker to look for.

With our team we start with both  setters on the same side of the net for 1.5 mins.  One will set left side and the middles will hit their shots infront of her.  The other will set rightsides and middle attacks behind her.  They do this for 45 seconds each and then they switch.  Our players serve  to  passers and liberos who pass to the setters.  Leftsides will pass and attack out of the leftside of the court, the libero passes out of rightside. After 1.5 minutes our second setters sets alone for 1 minute. We move to 3 passers with the libs passing out of the rightside still.  Then we have our starting setter then finishes off the last 1.5 minutes.

This type of warm-up moves us closer to the actual game plus we still get 8 or 9 attempts. The number varies on if many serves are missed.  We have coaches standing on side if a serve is missed they will toss a ball in to keep the movement going.

Inspire

Since the beginning of our existence 8 seasons ago our Vball team has worked under the direction of two words. Loyalty and honour. These words were important to me personally because it was how I was brought up through hockey. If you were loyal to your teammates and coaches and carried yourself in a way that was honourable you would be respected and considered a success.

During my trip to NZ and Tonga I had a lot of time to think about our team and success and failures we have had. I feel we need to move forward and create a buzz about our program. We need to modernize our thoughts. I find the athletes of today our very socially conscious. They care about a wide variety of things. a few years ago our team was heavily involved in raising money for building a fresh water well in Africa. It was an idea one of the players brought to the team. I decided what can we do to modernize our main goal? First we have to define who we are. When thinking about our program and reading through our press clippings I found we pride ourselves on being built through Brandon and Manitoba athletes first. We know we have to add out of province athletes to help keep us Nationally competitive. But when looking for out of province athletes we look for certain things. They must demonstrate our core values. Be very coachable, hardworking and well skilled. They must be community centered. Often out of province athletes become captains and part of our leadership teams.  We want the right out of province athlete who can help inspire our young females.

 I was reading the Talent Code by Daniel Coyle. In the book he talks about the need for an ignition to the start of a person desire to be successful. The person hears about about or meets someone that stirs in them to think "well if she can do it why cant I". I think of the possibilities of our players who are being that ignition right now. If you think of our team and the local girls whether they know it or not they are inspiring young females. Kellie Baker was our team MVP this year and Meaghan Robertson was our Female Athlete of the Year, both are heavily involved in coaching club volleyball. Kellie at the U-16 and Meagh at U-14. every practice they are telling athletes I was right where you are w hen I was your age. Now Gillian Leech, Mary Thomson and Jodie Baker are also staring to coach they too are starting to inspire young females. All of them are saying If you buy into this sport or what ever you want to do you can find success, but it isn't easy.

We have signed a letter of intent with Savannah Guttman from Dauphin, she will be our first ever player from that area to play in BU volleyball. Hopefully she can be the ignition for more players from up there to choose to excell and want to be part of BU Vball.

I think back to my early coaching days with the Killam Spartans. Nikki Kelndorfer and Christie Towers made ACAC teams from that club. Within a couple of years that small town club was producing college level athlete left and right. One year in Grande Prairie we had 4 athletes from the club on our team. Nikki and Christie were that ignition.

I really believe our mission for BU volleyball should be to inspire, to be the ignition for young athletes.

Inspire to me means many things, it is our team goal to inspire young females to pursue excellence in their field. To demonstrate the commitment it takes to be successful, whether it is in volleyball or different life skills. I believe if we look at each day as a team with the goal to inspire each other to new levels of success it will help us achieve all our goals. If we look at each day as an opportunity to inspire a young athlete who looks up to our team then that will hold us accountable to the community as well. If we think I have to work hard physically this summer and need to talk to my teammates so we inspire each other to be the best. It gives us a sense of purpose

Mighty Peace

Mighty Peace.

Tomorrow is an exciting day for me. I have been asked to come back to Grande Prairie to present at the Might Peace Teachers Conference. When I taught here in Grande Prairie I attended these conferences. I am actually pretty nervous to be back presenting in front of friends and colleagues.

When I was invited they asked me to do an all day session.  I want you to know I can talk about volleyball all the time. The organizers asked me to do sessions that would appeal to all groups. They said explain what you think coaches need to hear.  This was a big challenge. How can we make this useful for everyone? 

I know from my experience at the convention I loved when I could walk away from a session with one or two new things to try. With that in mind I have uploaded all the drills here https://www.dropbox.com/s/6qydtk5a7pll72n/MPTC%20presentation.xlsx?m

At least this will be a beginning point.

I feel the session will be generated by how the group asks questions.  I have a basic plan in place and can work through it, but really hope the coaches will ask questions.  I am going to use twitter as an avenue to ask questions also for the shy teacher or inexperienced coach.

When I was beginning to plan for this I thought what makes a successful program.  I contacted a variety of coaches and we came to conclusion it was planning.  The more a person is planned the better off they will be.

Coaches who turn a program around usually do it through structure. Planning for high school team and club team will be different for each setting.  A team needs to take into account of where they need to be successful.  Do they need to win the league to make provincial? Is there a Zone Tournament that decides? These will affect their planning.

When I was teaching and coaching in high school we had a zone tournament that the team needed to win in order to get to Provincials. We really only needed to win that one tournament to get to the provincial championship.  Of course we tried to win each one but we ear marked each tournament for different things.

 

At the beginning of the season we would plan for the entire year. The first tournament we usually focussed on our serve reception patterns and defensive relationships.  The second tournament was mostly block defense relationships.  The third tournament would be about offense.  We would schedule a tournament where the younger kids would play more than the veterans.  This allowed the vets to support and help the younger kids, plus it also allowed for comfort and confidence in the young athletes in case of injuries.

We want to think of things in terms of planning chunks.  We can review things we have covered but our main focus in the tournament was a very specific thing.  We would focus most of our time outs on that topic.  Discuss it in our post game meetings. When I was a young coach I wanted to fix everything right now, but we found that the athletes were getting overloaded with information.  One topic at a time usually worked the best for learning.

This structure helped guide the process.  Plan for success.