TRUC Camp Week 1

Had my first serious coaching situation tonight. It was the first day of the first week of TRUC. Basically, TRUC is aimed at bringing the Impulse program to all of Pittsburgh high school students, who may not be able to play for or tryout for the team. It's also the warmup/tryouts for those high school players who do plan on trying out for the team. It's a 4-week program with two divisions (North on Wednesday and South on Thursday) who practice once during the week and play games against each other on the weekend.

Like I said, the overlying goal of TRUC is to bring the success of the Impulse team to all players in PHUL who want to improve their game. We currently have 60 guys signed up, and are still hoping for another 10 by this weekend. We set a goal of having at least 60 guys join the camp, so we've gotten that far.

Anyways, our first practice was tonight (the North location) and we had roughly 30 guys show up. The focus of this week is to throw to space, swing the disc, cutting aggressively and making a play on defense.

Now, that may seem simple and all, but for a high school player whose never played competitive Ultimate outside of his team in PHUL, learning these things is fundamental to become a better player.

The use of various WUFF Camp drills helped us this week and will continue to be a staple of this part. For throwing to space and swinging the disc, there is no better drill than Mike G's 3-man weave. Run effectively, a team is unstoppable. I wish I could describe the drill (or have a picture) but maybe you should just spend a week in Wilmington with Mike G himself. Basically, it's a quick handler motion (HAMO) drill with three lines that involves one handler getting a disc upline from the middle handler, he fakes a huck, pivots commits to his reset (the guy who just threw to him and went upline and has now come back from his cut and away from the handler with the disc). Whenver the second handler gets that reset pass, he immediately turns and throws into the space available for the third handler who was also running upline, but has now retreated and has made a cut away from the second handler, who has the disk. It's one of the best drills out there and if run correctly during a game, opens up so much space.

As a coach, the best way explain aggressive cutting is to continue to hammer it into the players minds. Whether that's pulling them aside or telling them publicly when they made a good cut, it's important to make sure the cutter is always sprinting from his initial cut to his clearing.

Slowing down when making an incut will be a D every time in competitive Ultimate. A rounded cut is easy to defend every time in competitive Ultimate. If a cutter is "dangerous" and is just half-assing his cuts, he'll be D'ed every time in competitive Ultimate. It's a simple case of wanting the disc more than your defender and doing that by being explosive out of your fakes.

I just found one of Jim Parinella's blog posts about cutting that I feel is something everybody should look over:

1. Cut sharp.
2. Cut hard.
3. Cut decisively
4. Think, but only before or after the cut.
5. Know when to just run.

He goes into more detail about each of these steps in his blog post, but doing these five things will make you a much better cutter. This is something that I've always tried to follow when cutting. And while being fast gives me an advantage, you can't run around like crazy out there. If you're going to be fast, you have to be smart.

Much of this week focuses on the basic fundamentals of stack offense, but defense wins games. Our mindset heading into this first week was to get the guys to play aggressive and intense on defense - essentially making a play. This week, it was all about working hard and trying to get that into the minds of the players. As the camp goes on, more defensive strategy will be taught.

South camp is tomorrow night. It'll be much of the same as tonight's, but if something else is noticeable, I'll post about it. North vs. South games on Saturday.

Forge Update

Got word yesterday that I made the first round of cuts for Forge. Not sure of the exact roster, but my guess says it's somewhere around 28-30 guys still on the team and that the next round of cuts will put the roster to 20-22. Still a lot of work to be done, but it feels good have made such a good team.

Up next is C.U.T. in New York from June 6-7. Should be a great test of where I actually stand on this team. But I'd be lying if I said I didn't have a good tryout. I felt good out there and felt like I was competing with the best. Hopefully my defensive presence is something that continues to shine on this team. That's definitely one my strengths.

Other than the Forge announcement, not much is happening. I start "coaching" TRUC next week. Already 40 guys signed up and hoping to get another 15 or so over the week. Can't wait for it.

On the injury front, the groin is still an issue, especially during Saturday of the second weekend of tryouts. I think the only way to combat this issue is to make sure I ice it the night before practices/tournaments. That seemed to work last time. Anybody have any other ideas? It sucks.

That's all for now. Heading to Columbus in a couple hours to watch Pitt at College Nationals. Should be a great time.

Not Ultimate, but WOO!

So, this is one of the few times I'll post a non-Ultimate entry.

But, damn, I love Pittsburgh.



Go Pens!

But as for Ultimate, Pittsburgh Impulse 2009 and more Forge updates to come later this week. I've literally been running a hard mile everyday and doing a good abs workouts (8 minute abs), so I'm hoping my core is getting better. We'll know come Forge tryouts.

But for now...Go Pens!

Forge take two and working hard

Day two of Forge tryouts took place last Sunday. It was a pretty good day, with an intrasquad scrimmage at noon and then a scrimmage against Pitt at 2.

During the Pitt scrimmage, I was talking with Wes about my ultimate career right now and said something pretty cool to me:

"If you play for Forge, you can be more than just a role-player on Pitt-A next year, you can be a player."

I think that's an important piece of advice, and I'm going to follow that (not just Forge, but working hard) this summer. I'm ready for the A-team. It's been 4 years coming.

Anyways, the night before, I iced off-and-on my groin injury and it apparently worked. I played to two intense scrimmages and walked away sore on Sunday, but no injury.

Right now, we're in the midst of a two-week break before another tryout weekend the 16th and 17th. I believe it will be run very similar to this past tryout.

In the meantime, I'm working on sprint workouts, going to the gym when I can and throwing as much as possible. It's the summer, I can do this.

Not much else to talk about personally on the Forge end.

Impulse 2009

About a month ago I applied to become the coach of the 2009 Impulse team. I didn't get it.

A couple weeks later, I reapplied to become the assistant coach of the 2009 Impulse team. Got it.

I'm pumped.

I've always wanted to coach an Ultimate team and what better way to start than a championship-caliber (they lost on universe last year) youth team from Pittsburgh?

To make this a quick post, basically Nick and I talked an extra 15-20 minutes after my interview the other day about coaching and player development. And, despite having never coached before, Nick and I have a very similar philosophy and we agreed on everything that it takes to coaching a youth club team to a national championship.

National championship and Pittsburgh are all you need to know now.

"Tryouts" will be taking place soon. I'll be updating.

Forge tryouts started

First day of Forge tryouts today. 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Yeah, six hours with an hour break around 1. It was a long day, but I definitely knew that going into the day. Hell, I wouldn't be trying out if I didn't think I could make it.

And speaking of making Forge, there's a saying I've heard a couple times that I don't quite understand. It goes something like this:

"I don't think I'll make the team, but I'm just going to tryouts to get better."

It's not the last part of that sentence that frustrates me, it's the first. Regardless if you'll make the team, you should head into any tryout expecting to make the team. You should give it your all and show the captains/coaches that you deserve to be on the team. If you walk into a tryout and aren't 100% sure that you can make the team, then you won't be giving 100% when you're trying out. There's no way around that. If you don't think you can make a team, especially one as competitive as Forge, you will always have that in the back of your mind and won't be trying your hardest. I've seen it in a few players on different levels.

I've even done this before, back when I started out at Pitt as a freshman. And even as I continued to make cut after cut during the fall, I never thought I'd be make the A-team come spring. And sure enough, I wasn't giving 100% and didn't make the last cut.

Anyways, Forge tryouts were intense, but nobody said it would be easy. A lot of good drills that tested different aspects of the game with intrasquad scrimmages to three between every drill or so. I was definitely able to showcase a few of my skills (my speed in the beginning and my throws in the second half).

On the injury front, the groin problem showed back up. Very tough and painful to start accelerate. I was able to get some good step-outs on my throws, but I could definitely feel it.

Tomorrow: Intrasquad scrimmage at 12 p.m. and then scrimmage against Pitt-A at 2 p.m. We'll see how the groin feels and gauge how much I play on that.