Pre-Season Work

Over a period of eights weeks, Emily and a few of her teammates did the soccer of equivalent of "dry land training."  We met two or three nights a week and sometimes 4 girls showed up, sometimes as many as 8 girls showed up (depending on vacations, camp schedules, etc.).  These girls put in some serious work.  Last summer, I focused on getting them ready to run on the large field for 80 minutes; this summer, we started with the assumption that they had a good foundation, and instead focused on strength, agility and speed work.  Over the last few weeks, the workouts have started with a mile run, so they are still getting their conditioning.  But we did short sprints, agility ladders, medicine ball work, parachute work and ended each and every session with the dreaded 400.  Almost every night, as they groan about the 400 (always a relay, to make it interesting), I tell them that the dreaded 400 is what is going to get them through the final two minutes of a tied or 1-0 game - that they will find something deep inside of them to push through, because that's what you do when you run a 400.  I saw a little bit of in them last week at the Twist Tournament and it made me so happy inside.  These kids make me so proud - I am just so impressed that they put in so much work, without a soccer ball, to improve not only themselves, but also their team.

The do their cool down in socks - claiming that the brand new track massages their feet...

Cookies?  My middle school track coach used to make us hold cookies in our hands while we sprinted (at practice) - if the cookies broke, you were clenching your fists when you ran.  I've been talking to the girls about form the last few weeks and they were intrigued by the idea of running with cookies so they did their last sprint of the summer wearing the parachute and holding cookies! :-)

The final week of the summer, Emily's coach asked me to hold optional conditioning practices for the entire team.  The first night, 14 girls showed; the second night, only 10 girls showed.  It ended up pouring for about 15 minutes, but once everyone was wet, we just kept going (taking a few parents by surprise, I'm sure!).  I think the girls had a good time and they definitely thought that it was funny that the football players and coaches at the field took cover during the rain while they pushed through their workout.