I love watching finals at Nationals. The superior skill, fitness, and structure is superb to watch, but one of the things I love watching is the attitude of the players. Watching these games always reminds me that top players still make the same mistakes I do: they get broken, they get beaten, they throw it away, they drop it.
The big difference between me and these players (apart from the skill and fitness) is what they do after any of these things. Where I get frustrated, down on myself and ruminate, these players do not. Where I feel like a failure, these players have more resilience. They use any lapse as immediate motivation and have a faster transition/reaction.
In the open final at nationals, one Colony player was wearing his heart on his sleeve, almost to the point of histrionics. Some of his reactions were unpleasant to watch, and had a visibly negative effect on his teammates. The effect of our attitude on our team is something we should never discount. To be the best players we can be, we need to use any frustration from errors as motivation to do better next time, rather than self-indulgently wallowing.
The most important thing I have learnt from watching the best is about attitude. Every player gets beaten and broken, throws away and drops the disc. The best players approach any game with the attitude of acknowledging and minimsing this, and only ever responding to disappointment with improvement. This is the attitude that I plan to emulate.
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Showing posts with label Skill of the Week. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Skill of the Week. Show all posts
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Friday, April 8, 2011
Skill of the week- Reading Spin
Have you ever found that you have perfect positioning, your defender is two metres behind you, you're calm and focused, you attempt a one handed catch and it simply bounces out of your hand?
Have you ever found that you don't expect to catch a disc, but you throw a hand out anyway, and the disc just seems to stick in your hand?
Most of the time this has to do with which direction the disc is spinning. Learning to read how the disc is spinning is as important as learning how to read the flight of the disc, and this post will be dealing with how to do just that.
First of all, when catching (and especially one handed) you need to stop two forces, the linear force, and the rotational force. To catch a spinning disc one handed, you need to catch it at the back (to stop the linear force) and on the side of the disc spinning toward you (to stop the rotational force). It is, actually, that simple. Here's a diagram to help visual people:
So how do you know which way the disc is spinning? Regardless of whether someone is lefthanded/right handed, or throwing forehand or backhand, the disc will always spin toward the thrower. If you go out and watch someone throwing, you'll see what I mean.
One of the very best things about learning to read spin is that once you get it, you don't have to actively think about it when throwing. You will automatically adjust your catches to cater for how it is spinning. Spend an intensive few throwing sessions practicing to read spin and catch the disc one handed, and you'll be amazed at how your catching improves.
Have you ever found that you don't expect to catch a disc, but you throw a hand out anyway, and the disc just seems to stick in your hand?
Most of the time this has to do with which direction the disc is spinning. Learning to read how the disc is spinning is as important as learning how to read the flight of the disc, and this post will be dealing with how to do just that.
First of all, when catching (and especially one handed) you need to stop two forces, the linear force, and the rotational force. To catch a spinning disc one handed, you need to catch it at the back (to stop the linear force) and on the side of the disc spinning toward you (to stop the rotational force). It is, actually, that simple. Here's a diagram to help visual people:
So how do you know which way the disc is spinning? Regardless of whether someone is lefthanded/right handed, or throwing forehand or backhand, the disc will always spin toward the thrower. If you go out and watch someone throwing, you'll see what I mean.
One of the very best things about learning to read spin is that once you get it, you don't have to actively think about it when throwing. You will automatically adjust your catches to cater for how it is spinning. Spend an intensive few throwing sessions practicing to read spin and catch the disc one handed, and you'll be amazed at how your catching improves.
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