Wednesday 25 April 2012

Gym and my views on the AUDL

3 mile cycle on monday and tuesday, 2 mile cycle today plus gym:

5 min cycle to warm up
3 * 10 Bench press 45kg
3 * 10 squats 60kg
3 * 10 press ups
3 * 10 lunges 20kg (10kg per arm)
3 * 10 leg press 100kg
1 minute plank
30 seconds side plank on each side
10 ab crunches
2 * 20 bicep curls (10 kg per arm)
2 * 20 dumbell lateral raises (10 reps of 6kg per arm) 
2 * 20 dumbell front raises (10 reps of 6 kg per arm)
warm down


Want to build core in coming weeks so will be trying to get in some ab crunches and planks during lunch breaks/in the evenings/mornings.


On something ultimate related, getting kind of into the AUDL! Watching the tape of the Columbus Cranes vs Indianapolis Alleycats!
Good, if a bit sloppy, game! Enjoying the announcer, shame about the camera work! Will probably watch some more games in the future. Not sure I'll pick a team to support. No New york or New Jersey team this year (though the NJ expansion has already been bought for next year apparently) so may support them next year if it keeps going and gets stronger/more interesting!
So far, in my limited experience, though, I have to say, the format makes it more watchable for me! I don't want to have to order dvds from the US to watch high level ultimate and I like some of the changes to the rules.
Looking forward to keeping up with the rest of the season!

Monday 23 April 2012

Alumni Cup

So, we started the weekend slow, gained a bit of momentum, but were never going to challenge too many teams. We avoided finishing last and had a couple of good games but only got 1 win all weekend.
We had a real mix of a team with only a few subs. Many teams were in a similar situation with subs to us, but most had put together a team with a higher number of talented players to take advantage of the weaker players on our team. We had one win against Sheffield "Phat 'eds" alumni which was well earned and we took a pleasing amount of points from Manchester "Halcyon" and Loughborough "Haze" in our group games considering they went on to be in the 3 v 4 final.
We lost a big part of our team to injury in the game against "Haze", and then went on to lose our quarter final in sudden death in a game we could have really used him for, which would have put us in the 9-12 bracket instead of the 13-16 bracket. Still, we avoided a last place finish and I had a good time and the current students definitely had a strong weekend coming off the back of their Uni Mixed Outdoor National Championship title, the Open team took 6th and the Women's team lost a hard fought final to come home with second place.

No injuries to myself, supported the uni teams when I had the chance and had fun, so it was a successful weekend. Now to start the buildup to Bruges with Ka-Pow in what should be an even more fun weekend.
It will be my first international club tournament (Paganello excluded) and so I may get nerves before the first game, but if history is anything to go by, they shouldn't stick around once I remember that I'm just doing what I do.

Highlights of the weekend: Double helixing hammer to Nick for a score in our last game, and breaking zones all weekend!

Friday 20 April 2012

Alumni Cup/Uni Nationals this weekend

3 miles cycling yesterday. 1 mile cycling already today and will do another 2 miles if it's not still thunder and lightning-ing when I leave work.

This weekend is Uni Open and Womens Outdoor nationals with the Alumni cup alongside.
I know the Skunks open 1st team and womens team will be looking for high finishes, but I really don't know what to expect for the Alumni team.
1. We have a very small number of players. At time of writing, only 8... I expect that, like my uni days, I will end up playing almost every point.
2. I have no idea what the competition will be like.

Should be a good laugh though. 3 aims:
1. Don't get injured before Brugge next weekend.
2. Support the skunks teams whilst not playing.
3. Have fun!

Go skunks!


Current Logo                            Logo during my time at southampton


Wednesday 18 April 2012

Gym

Today I only cycled 2 miles as it was raining in the morning, but did go to the gym in the evening.

5 min cycle to warm up
3 * 10 Bench press 45kg
3 * 10 squats 60kg
3 * 10 press ups
3 * 10 lunges 20kg (10kg per arm)
3 * 10 leg press 100kg
3 minute row (10 resistance level)

The week so far (Mid-week Ka-pow)

Monday: 3 miles cycling... nothing that interesting.

Tuesday: 4.5 miles cycling and Ka-pow weeknight training.

Training was good, despite only 6 people training. Started with a cutting/throwing drill. Was fine with the cutting, but the throwing was kind of difficult. A little bit of wind, combined with a specific aim for throwing. I usually aim to throw a catchable disc for the cutter to run on to. When I was taught, the idea was that the cutter should always be there if he has cut well and the disc should be catchable. The idea behind this drill was to put it a little further out in front of the cutter with a bit of angle, with the idea being to put it in a place where it is a slightly harder catch for the cutter, but to make it really hard for the defender to get anywhere near. This makes sense at the higher level where the defense is really tight and gives the cutter a better chance to get the disc out of their hands quicker, but I found it a little tough to adjust my throws, and throw the disc a bit harder and with more of a roll. Started with only away/under cuts, but then included deep cuts and a varying force as well, which made it even harder. Something I need to work on.
Second drill was based on man mark defending, concentrating on a cutter's feet in order to follow their movement and put pressure on/block a catch. This included the throwing element from the first drill as well. I felt ok at the defending, but didn't get any blocks.
Because we had quite a low completion percentage, and because the light was going, the decision was made to just move on to the physical punishments for the drops/end of the session.
First was the following drill.

5 press ups -> 30m sprint -> 5 press ups -> (in a pair)10 quick gut passes each at about a 4m distance -> 30m sprint back to start
We did this twice with no rest.

Because of drops in this drill there was another physical punishment/drill to follow. Once you got a hand block in this drill you finished that set and then were out of the punishments.

5 press ups -> 30m sprint -> 5 press ups -> (in groups of three) 3 man break mark drill until someone gets a hand block -> 5 press ups -> 30m sprint back to start

As there was 6 of us, there were 2 of the 3 man break mark drill going on, the other group had a hand block first so they repeated the steps up to the three man break mark drill and did that with Pichler, until I got the second block (after getting fingertips to 2 discs previously) and so I finished the set and was out.

The 2nd repetition was pretty much the same except it changed from the 3 man break mark drill to the 4 man break mark drill (as two people were out from getting blocks). Once someone else got one, he finished the set and then the last three in were supposed to do it again with the 3 man break mark drill until there were only 2 left, who would do further punishments. Unfortunately, one of them got cramp, so the further physical punishments were foregone and instead, the 3 players who had not gone blocks had to serenade the rest with a lovely rendition of "100 bottles of beer on the wall" whilst we were warming down.

It turned out to time a warm down pretty well, and we did get through the entire song, but we must have seemed like some kind of cult, chanting in the middle of the park.

Good training!


Monday 16 April 2012

MT2 Reflections

Pretty disappointing weekend for Herd 1. 7th place, whilst not bad, was not our aim. Getting beaten by our 2nd team was also a pretty bad showing. We lost it by playing badly against a team playing really well, and they thoroughly deserved the win, but in the grand scheme of things it shouldn't have happened.
Games:
Tough game against Flump to start. We went down 3-0 and were behind for almost all the game. Sudden death at 10-10 and they had the disc just outside the endzone and almost took the win. We got the D and the final point. This served as a wake up call for our next game against Golden Ants.

We went out hard, went up early and controlled the game. Nothing spectacular but a good win. This put us top of our group with just a seeding game (1 v 3) to play left on Saturday against Brighton.

This game was a big low light for me. Sufficed to say, we started slow again going 3-0 down and they coped a lot better with the conditions than we did. I finished the day in a pretty bad mood, mostly due to getting point blocked three times by the same Brighton player, but also thinking that, even though we were in a pretty strong position at the end of the day, the struggles we had during the day meant that we probably weren't in the best position mentally going into Sunday.

Game 1 on Sunday was our quarter final against DED. We started slow AGAIN and never really threatened their lead until the end. I don't remember the final score, but we didn't play well enough to deserve a win in this game.

Game 2 was the 6 v 7 crossover against Herd 2. It really shows what a strong team they are to have gotten themselves into this position and they came into the game wanting it more. With a commanding lead when the hooter went, we staged a small comeback but not enough to draw close enough to truly challenge their lead and they finished us off. Again in this game we started slow.

So lastly, the 7 v 8 game against Peeps to finish the weekend. We knew we wanted to finally put in a good performance against Peeps and it turned into our best game of the weekend. It was also one of the best spirited games of Ultimate I have probably ever played. Finally earning a win, closing out the game against a Peeps resurgence was a good way to finish what had otherwise been a fairly disappointing weekend.

Personal aims: On defense I had a good number of lay-out bids and was close on a few but didn't get any. I did however get two run through Ds near the endzone line which were converted shortly after into points so quite good. Bit disappointed by getting scored on long a few times but overall fairly happy with my D.

On offense my movement of the disc through the handlers was pretty good, but a few of my hucks were still throwaways. This will still be a big aim moving forward. My dump cuts were better this weekend than at Mixed tour 1.

On the sideline I was still vocal but again showed my frustration too much. When I realised this I tried to change my attitude and from then I felt I was a positive voice.

Secondary Aims: I got one point block, so i'm happy with that. We didn't play much Zone defense this weekend, which I was a little surprised about due to the weather and I don't remember playing it very often so can't comment on my zone D aim. Zone O I thought I played well, distributing the disc well with only a few turnovers to my name.
Tertiary Aims: No injuries and the weather wasn't as horrible as predicted!

Hoping for a big showing at mixed tour 3! It really seems that when Herd start slow, we struggle, so we really need to get our heads in early in games in order to help our overall tour ranking for this season.

Friday 13 April 2012

Personal Aims for Mixed Tour 2 this weekend!

Fitness first: Yesterday I did 3 miles cycling and by the end of today I will have done 3 miles cycling as well.

Now, on to my aims for Mixed tour 2 this weekend. These are just my personal aims not the aims of Herd 1.

- Defense: I feel on defense that my style is preventative. I feel I rarely get scored on because I have good awareness of the play relative to my man marking assignments, which translates to good positioning. I want to be a difference maker though. Yes I can sky a pack of players occasionally and I will pick off long discs if I am able to poach near the area, but I don't get all that many blocks on my man marking assignments. I got one in the final game of Mixed Tour 1, which I felt really gave the team a boost, and I want to do that more without giving up too many open throws with missed bids. This will be difficult but is one of my aims for this weekend.

- Offense: I play handler, and a few times last tour I failed to complete on easy swing throws. This is not good enough, so my main aim is to be consistently accurate with "easy" passes across the field. My secondary aims are to make good decisions on hucks and to make good dump cuts.

- Sideline: Last tour, sometimes I let frustration show, and other times I was the most encouraging vocal player on the sideline. My aim is to be consistently encouraging and loud for my team mates.

Secondary tournament aims:

- 3 point blocks in one day was nice last tournament! I'm not expecting to repeat this number, I would be really satisfied with a strong force that didn't give up too many break side throws, but one would be nice.

- Zone Defense: If we play Zone, I get put in any position apart from the Wall. My aims for chase would be to keep up with the play a little better. My main aim in zone defense is playing as deep though. I don't generally get scored on in this position and my aim if I do get played as a Deep is to control the zone as a tight unit.

- Zone Offense: I love playing handler against a zone offense, in fact it may be my favourite situation in ultimate so my aim is to be disruptive if I get a chance to play in this situation by breaking the mark and finding holes in the wall.

Tertiary Aims:

- Don't get injured.

- Don't let the (probably rainy) weather affect catching, throwing or morale.

Go Herd!

Wednesday 11 April 2012

Fitness day!

A day of fitness to coincide with going back to work after a 6 day weekend.

Morning:
1 mile cycle to work

Lunch:
3 mile run (19 minutes 39 seconds- NICE!)

After work:
2 mile cycle to station

Evening:

Gym:
5 minute cycle to warm up
3 * 10 bench press 42.5 kg
3 * 5 back squat 60 kg
3 * 10 press ups
3 * 10 lunges 20kg
3 * 10 leg press 90kg
3 * 20 bicep curls 10kg each arm
3 * 20 dumbell lateral raises (10 reps of 4kg per arm) 
3 * 20 dumbell front raises (10 reps of 4 kg per arm)
Warm down

Saturday 7 April 2012

Kung fu throwing!

Been wanting to try this out for a while. Finally got the chance today due to low attendance at Ka-Pow training:
http://winthefields.blogspot.co.uk/2011/07/kung-fu-throwing.html

Great workout! We did pretty much as it says in the article, except we only did 10 of each throw in the warm up and finished with pulling practice. Ended up with a blister on my finger and aching shoulders but it was really beneficial and I want to try and get out and do this more!

Friday 6 April 2012

3 mile run workout

3 mile run: time 19 min 40 seconds (without wrist weights)

Also, 3 * 40 lat pull downs like usual.
Chocolate milk 

Thursday 5 April 2012

Keeping busy

Didn't do body pump on Monday as have a wound on my hand from the weekend that opened in the shower Monday morning, so would have bled if I had done weights.
Been keeping busy, will fit in gym and 3 mile run before the end of the week but so far.
Monday exercise: 3 miles cycling
Tuesday Exercise: 2 miles cycling
Wednesday Exercise: 3 miles cycling

Sunday 1 April 2012

Ka-pow weekend!

Training Saturday and mini tournament Sunday. Great weekend with Ka-pow.

Training really focussed on getting the offense in our heads for the Sunday, and also teaching the defense which we would go on to use on Sunday as well. The drills we did were useful for reinforcing the principles of the offense, such as the cutting patterns. Great session, despite missing a few players.
Good night out at the Bavarian Bierhouse too.

Sunday games:
Game 1 vs Wessex (Win): Started slow against Wessex and the offensive patterns weren't clicking at first. Pulled out the win. Like I mentioned in an earlier post; wessex have a load of my mates playing and, from going to one of their trainings and seeing them play today, I think they are going to do quite well this year. Wessex only came away with one win from the day and a close sudden death to Dog Eat Disc, but they definitely have a solid offense structure which is very aggressive and moves the disc quickly down the middle of the field. Interesting poaching defense as well can't really remember the specifics though.

Game 2 vs EMO 2 (Win): Standard game against a not that strong opponent. They played a strong pull play which their first team also played. This game was pretty much a warmup for the game against their first team.

Game 3 vs EMO 1 (Win): Strongest opponent we played all day. Solid win for Kapow.

Game 4 vs Dog Eat Disc (Win): We didn't have to win this game, to win the tournament, but we couldn't lose by that many. Turns out we won in Sudden Death 11-10 to finish off a good day.

Good things about the day, our offense was really strong. The O-line got broken only once in our final game, and very few times throughout the day. The defense, at times, was easily broken with our poaching setup, which we learned on Saturday, but really stepped up at some important moments. In every game our D line either got the break to take the half, finish the game, or do both.

Really enjoyed the weekend and definitely looking forward to Tom's Tourney in Bruges. Think this undefeated day could be the start of a good season.

Plus: look at that cool trophy!

EUROPE! KA-POW!