Update Club Practices, College Nationals

It's been awhile since you've heard from the Goby Bloggers. Thought I might step in and put in a few words on whats been going on lately.

I think most of us have still been getting settled in to a summer routine. I started working this Tuesday with Kevin at a company called Team Wendy - a step towards Regionals - as we spend much of our time talking about Ultimate as we develop helmet padding for soldiers abroad. Don't get it twisted, it's legit. I tried to get Mark a job there, but I guess it wasnt meant to be this year. I think Mark has been interviewing for a few jobs here and there, deciding where he wants to spend the rest of his summer. Best of luck to him. Anyway, though we've been busy, we've been fitting in as much work as possible.

Club practices have started in Cleveland, and right now it's just a lot of pickup. The team is headed by former Goby John Richey, and local Shawn McCarthy (AKA MC). I think right now they are trying to get a gauge on the scene this year, see who is committed, and keep the interest level up in the beginning by running a lot of structured pickup. I think it's a smart move by them, and I've actually been impressed by the level of professionalism and leadership demonstrated by the captains. They generally start with a little warmup, then break into teams and every point or few points they focus on a specific task - breaking the mark, swinging the disc, forcing backhand, vertical stack strings, etc. That's the way any scrimmage should be run. Players need to know what to focus on, they need direction, even when playing a seemingly innocuous pickup game.

What I've been even more impressed with is the number of Case people showing up to these practices. I think it's the most we've had since I started playing, and I really hope they stick with it. To name a few I think I've seen Jason, Corbett, Solomon, Kevin (of course), Ed (of course), Franz, Evan, and a few others. That's really exciting, and the veterans on the team have really been stressing the younger players to come out. Good to see them out there. Though I have been practicing with the Open team a little here and there (since they have open pickup to the city), I am not planning on playing with them over the summer right now - I'm trying out for the Co-ed team. However, what I have noticed is a lot of hard work being put in, especially by the Case players. I know I made it a point to mark up on Kevin a lot, and focus on playing solid defense on him, and on offense breaking the mark and not turning it over. We're breaking a good sweat out there for sure. I also had a couple co-ed practices over the last couple weeks, and those have been going well too. Last Thursday we had our optional conditioning practice, and I ran it with former Goby Will Link and captain Mac. We ran hard, and I definitiely need to put more time into conditioning. The thing I really liked about the co-ed conditioning practices is that we did all of our conditioning with a disc - the highlight the importance of disc skills when you are physically exhausted. In other words, running repeat 800's is great, but it really doesnt simulate gameplay at all. I'm looking forward to the next couple of weeks with the team.

If you follow College Ultimate at all, you know that Nationals was in Columbus this year, so naturally with it being in our backyard, all the locals made a trip down, including myself with long time Ultimate friend Weston, and a few of his college teammates. I went down with him in 2007, and had a great time. It's always nice to watch top level Ultimate to know what you're striving for. I said it before in my Regionals post, but there are a few things that standout as dividers between top level teams and the rest of the competition. 1) Fundamental disc skills, 2) Athletiscm, 3) Spacing on the field, 4) The mental game - intensity, focus, determination. Those are the qualities we need to work on. Beyond that though, the weekend was relaxing, and it was nice seeing players I havent seen in a long time. I picked my boys from Carleton to win it all, and they did, barely facing any competition throughout. Want to know whats scary? Most of the top level players on that team are sophomores, they're only going to get nastier. Shoutouts to Pbob, Evangelides, and Grant. Ya'll are sick.

Watching Nationals was great for another reason. It reignited my motivation to work hard and do work this summer. More on that in my next post.