Monday, May 28, 2007

pretty good weekend...

lessee, friday, some dutch drilll... not super soothing after a brutal bunch of points thurs, but...
saturday, got up and ran for 45 minutes, oh, probably 6 or 7 miles
then a 32 mile bike ride, then some chinups/pushups/dips...

today, a 45 minute hike and then a ski, then a 1.5 hour mt. bike ride...

tommorrow, tbd...

Thursday, May 24, 2007

league night...

season wrap up will follow shortly...
we played the ony undefeated team tonight: we had one loss, the night i wasn't there, and we came out lucky. my preference, in an upwind downwind game, is to protect the breaks, so take decent long shots down wind, avoid anything that might turn it over on our own goal line...

we have 2 games every thursday from here on out. since that immediatly follows a HS practice, and i was tired after playing, and running mile repeats yesterday, i was significantly less than enthusiastic... but i went.

we had tons of turnovers RIGHT on our goal line, even my first flat out, breadbasket drop of the while, but i think we protected the break on that one... i played 18/19 points, had an actual layout block, and on game point, 1 hand block and 2 solid pieces that caused 1 turnover, and should have got at least one more... but we gave it up. bummer.

the lowlight, other than the drop... my team mate throws the first pass to me, it hangs, i circle under it, i'm stationary, i hear the d running down, i jump straight up, catch it, and get PLOWED by a current or recent grad U of O player... i get up, and said something loud, and profane. he said, i shit thee not, 'but i'm not contesting the foul.' i'd love to see video. basically, a player sprints 70 yards, and tackles the punt returner. i'm pretty sure this is discouraged in ultimate, and the other teams reaction was priceless... i get levelled, their reaction is, 'whoa luke, don't get so fired up, it was an accident.
truly, i went straight up, from a position i'd held for a full second.' irritating. there was also the full complement of lame complaining, etc... i pretty much just yawned my way through it...

but, given my lackluster mindset going in, i played pretty well, my ho' d was legit, i had to actually make some diving catches and stuff, stopped some goals up high in the endzone... ran better than i thought i would...

still, sore, tight calf, tight hams... we won the second game 11-9, and i took 2 points off that game... i played like 5 hours of ulti today... too much..

so we're probably in 4th of 8. for the tournament, if it's run under normal competetive guidelines, it might be worth our while to move up to 3rd to make a slightly easier quarter... but the 4 semi teams have all beaten each other, and the past 3 years when i won (granted as a captain, different from this year) normal competetive guidelines were out the door, (ex, last year, as the 2 seed in a 9 team tourney, the pools were 1,7,9... 2,4,5... and 3,6,8... so we played 5,4,3,and 1 to reach the tourney... i'm not sure, but i think that's no particular type of legit 'snake'... so, anyway, i'm not too worried about it...

later...

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

fdaasdffad

monday: shitty day of school. no reason. the lesson plans were adequate, but uninspired. my lectures were good, but uninspired. we're out of copies at school. no more copies. one month of school to go, no more copies. kind of a hassle.

practice was fantastic. so, i got that going... warmup, handler drill (trident), goto drill (gladiator), throwers choice (huck or under with an audible), review of our stack endzone, and our arch endzone. good scrimmage, w' a side game of soccer. i sprained my anle mildly in soccer...

went for a 30 mile ride (road) after that, steady pace, 20 miles per hour, pretty good....

tuesday: run, stretch, (i will only do a seated stretch when it's WARM so that we're not sitting around cooling off), and it was warm. gladiator only, then our 2 stack plays, 1, and I - 5, then, our new play, shotgun... nothing special, an off the back play... then scrimmage. i covered a fast young dude brando who had no back down in him: he made some good, no, great plays, and will no doubt be a star in the next 2 years...

then a 90 minute ride, probably averaged 18 or 17 mph... that is significantly slower than 20 mph, but winds, etc...

tommorrow, match play vs. sisters.. in our league, we're 2-0-1, and at the top of the table vs. bend, who is 2-1... this weekend state... if everyone shows, we should hold seed at 4th, but, bend could beat us, or chs jv (just being honest)... i'd love a 4th place finish, but, well, we're 3 weeks away from peaking... and, we'll see.

sisters is a vulnerable team, and it's nice to have a tune up to work on our plays...

bend, the other local team, is all seniors. it's a huge advantage for all your players to be late pubescent... i've got a variety of short pretty fast guys ripping around, w/ great girls, and knowing the guys will all soon be tall fast shredders...

our offense is simple, and sweet. it's about 1/4 of the great NY playbook, w/ a nice endzone flatstack alternate, and 1 good zone. will we execute? i spend so much of my practice amazed at how close we are to GETTING IT DONE... we'll see if it works...

now i'm watching poker... and sending out about 20 emails about state...

ciao.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

practice is coming together... but of course ,we have state in a week, and we're a month from peaking. can't be helped, too short a season.... too soon a season... but the long term goal of producing frisbee players who understand 'how to throw, when to throw, where to cut, etc...', well, that's improving.

watched idiocracy. great movie. highly recommend... good satire.

today, skated... like... well it would have been 32km if we'd done the full laps, but we for sure cut out 6 or 8 km, so, say, 20-25km?

then, biked, like 18 or 19 miles on the mountain bike?

tommorrow, either a longer (30 plus) ride, or i'll chill and grade.

i threw in some guitar for a couple hours today, and watched the san antonio vs. phoenix game. pretty good.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

stuff..

lessee... monday, rest (sick day), tuesday, still not well, but played 'dutch drill w/ kids in 30 mph winds)...
wednesday, practice. promised them scrimmage, so after running, stretching, handler cut drill, goto drill, and huck drill, let them scrimmage.

oh: i have a drill i really like. 3 cones in a triangle, in the middle of field. point is downfield. each player has a partner. you are on one of the two base cones, and your partner loosely forces you to the line. we have two hand signals (deep, or under), and the cutter is fronted by defender who is not supposed to look at signal. defender fronts. player cutts, deep or out and in. player has some lattitude, and can modify cut: goal is to teach throwers to make good decisions. defender is not supposed to see who the thrower is, so while it is kind of fake that way, it basically gives players opportunity to make game like decisions (note, this is a high school drill)...

similar drill: no defense; call cutter to make an out cut, or out and in. i associate a mild penalty for this: if you keep trying to huck, and you can't, you become a perma cutter... and the line can make the thrower become a cutter if their 'huck' sucks... i.e., you are in line, i call huck, i float one up and you have to wait for it. the line goes...'go cut smith, that throw sucked'...

today, run, dynos, drills (which we did till someone caught an overthrown layout, again, different focus for a high school team), goto drill, 15 drill (named for our huck play calls), scrimmage. got into it with the baseball team, who decided to play golf through the back of our huck drill... their coach backed down right away, but i made the point further by throwing into their golf game... i'm a loser... then scrimmage... increasingly good performance, but we're going to suffer at state next week, we're still mid season, i mean, we have 3 weeks of league play after states...

then, league night, against a weaker team, but we had 7 players... one point of 2-3-2 zone, then switched to a 1-3-3, then modified the 1-3-3 so that it was two middle players who trade out on the mark, the other drops... so it's a 1-3-3 but the 1 changes... it was effective. i think it's a natural modification to the 1-3-3-, but best done by smarter teams where when the marks can change without giving up the middle...

so we win,13-4, and the switzer v talbot game goes 13-11 switzer. this puts us at the top of the table, cuz when we played talbot (loss) i wasn't there, but we beat switzer when he wasn't there... so... i think we are #1 by tie breaker... better to be lucky than good...

personally, tried to tone down the huck game. i had one turnover, up 8-0, where i called a team mate out of bounds, bad move in hindsight: he thinks he toe'd in, so i apologized for second guessing him, and noted that i was inclined to be generous, given the lead... i turfed a swing up 13-2, ouch, threw a bad hammer that dropped at the feet of my receiver (i believe QB always takes Turnover, but, come on)... other than that, thew at least 8 of the goals... so, ok... nothing special...tried to be a set up guy for the game, but did throw a couple bombs late to put it away.

frankly, i feel a combination of a step off, a step slow, and that i'm reading the plays a step too fast (i.e., i make a jab step cut that seems money, but no throw... so i end up directing the stack, and making opportunistic cuts...

other than that, lame week. no weights, basically a 'taper' week. this weekend will be a bigtime cardio weekend...

oh, wednesday, after practice, did go up to mt. for a 1 hour hike, and sweetest corn skiing EEEEEVVVVVVERRRR....

Sunday, May 06, 2007

sdfgsfgsfgsfg

ok, ok bear with me, more ultimate to happen

today a 2.5 hour roadbike ride, in shorts and a tshirt, a far cry from getting out of a car in 11 degree temps yesterday... then i ate twice more, then a kayak... first ever... lots to learn... it was tippy, i didn't tip, but it was fun...

this week, we're supposed to have 70 degree weather (if you read this, you know it was ridiculously cold last week. welcome to central oregon)

i'm splitting all practices now: varsity plays v. varsity for 2 points, jv v. jv, i let a couple players swing, to figure out who will move up to varsity, and to let defender/cutters get handle opportunities.

we're pretty much a Vertical stack team, but we've seen enough Horizontal stack to at least have a defensive concept... Tommorrow, intro to Arch Endzone... thanks to idea from boston... Jim, or Al, or someone, love to hear from you sometime about how you used it... (you did say you used it, eh)...

constant individual throwing work w/ camera, some 'freeze play' in scrimmages, that's all we'll introduce. 2 weeks until state. way too soon for our wintery weather... and our new team...

things i've not addressed to my liking: ZONE (basic intro, but not enough nuance), more play...

things i'm working on... running to endzone so that comebacks are shorter, moving stack down field to be ahead of the play, but still leave room for huck: what I stress is the habit of players to stack too far from disc, but crowd thrower during flow... trying to teach close stack, and stretch field in flow...

the team suffers from losing a top sophmore to an ongoing achilles, and two 4th year seniors (one to early graduation, one to shoulder surgery in preseason). I had no idea how much their loss would affect the team, but, that's life. it's just a game, and the other players are stepping up.

Hopefully, we can come in 4th again, and maybe MAYBE improve to a higher seed over the next 2 years. Hard to say: the teams on the warm side of the mountain have more opportunities for quality comp, and a longer 'growing season'...

that's all.

Saturday, May 05, 2007

asdfghjkl

friday, coached only, weather said 40, w/ 35 mph winds, felt 20. cut practice short... flipping miserable for da kids...
today, lessee, at mountain and using tele gear before or close to 7, climbed i don't know 2000-3500 feet vertical (repeated laps, and too much math for right now) to ski 2 runs of EPIC knee deep powder with no one around... then 16 km skate, 8km in like 30min, 8km in 26 minutes, total cardio like 2.5 hours, then biked around to look at stuff, drink a cup of coffee, brief unibike stint, lifted weights (squats, vertical row, millitary press)... in garage, so fairly light weights, tried to be explosive...

'yes, laugh..

now meal 4, grading tonight, tommorrow, i'll bike, and paddle, might... MIGHT run some mile repeats...
need to throw too...

Thursday, May 03, 2007

afggfgagf

Good day, up at 5:30, 30 minute run, up to school, AP test prep for the kids from 7-8, taught, coached from 3-5... pretty good... then, I missed my ride to go ski b/c i was coaching, so i went to league night, i was soooo slow... but i busted out some goals thrown, and had one highlight high layout catch... so kind of fun... that said, we went , 0-1, 1-1, 2-1, 3-1, 5-3, then they pulled ahead to 7-5, 7-7, 8-7 us, (half), 9-7, 9-9, 9-10 (and for some reason they start to implode, lots of calls, arguing with each other), 11-9, 11 all, cap on due to dark, game to 13, i get scored on, 11-12, i think i threw the 12-12 goal, win 13-12. I played all 25 points, unfortunately, basically jogging most of it, occasional timely hard 'd'... i'd like to think it led to the 3 two point runs we made... threw like 6 goals, caught 1? Not too bad...

coaching...

throw, run 1/2 mile, marking drill, run 1/2 mile, swing drill, run 1/2 mile...

new version of the line drill. instead of the usual goto drill, cutter runs 20 yards, plants and cuts, then catches the come back... i'm trying to teach that they need to run down field, towards the endzone, past the play.

then, a fun drill, pair marking, the mark is a basic force forehand or backhand... not a 'hard flat mark.' defense must front, thrower signals with hand deep or under, run it. short scrimmage, better focus on running the 'o', finally getting kids to try to overthrow cutters in drills... coached a couple kids on throwing. Big, BIG fan of video for teaching.

One girl, who's throws tend to be a little outside in because of arm/had position, so i'm showing her, outside in, inside out, and her question is, why didnt' you show me this the first time... a year ago, and the question is, well, i show everyone how to do the basics, but you are good enough to understand what's going on. that said, teaching people that a little hyzer helps so much is easy for some harder for others.

But w/ digital video, reviewd immediately after throwing, progress is so quick...

Tuesday, May 01, 2007

stuff

Frisbee:
We went to Eugene Sunday for the State Tournament. We got whomped. This is the single gender state, and we went over with like 14 guys, and 9 girls... Missing a few key players (and of course the 2 injured starters for the guys), it was a great learning experience for the kids. Chuchill, South Eugene, and Crescent valley are talented, have a system, and execute on the goal line.

The lessons I was able to highlight for the team, are the value of the short passes, and executing on the goal line. Basically, when I get outside to practice at 3:00 or so, I usually find the kids lofting a variety of fun throws (chicken wings, bad hanging mid range throws, etc), and they are starting to see that that is time that they could best use working on realistic practice throws. They are in good spirits: They see the progress, and are consistently willing to work for it.

We have a basic offense in place, vertical, short stack, a couple of basic sequence plays, and a simple endzone w/ a 3 basic options, all of which we are increasingly using in practice.

The team is young: I have a group of 25 freshmen and sophmores, so the future looks bright.

The biggest challenge for our team is geography and schedule: here in the high desert, snows continue. High winds are common, and our season doesn't really start early: the valley teams play longer, but most importantly, they have several quality teams that get to battle it up on a weekly basis as close to year round as they want...

There was a nice article in the local paper this week: Apparently it was mostly Summit until the editor made them change it to an all city thing, which I think is for the better. It's actually a pretty good article, no dogs, no frolf.

In league play we're 2-0. This is after getting pummelled as X/Y teams at the kickoff scrimmage/tourney. That lesson took hold, and the team is picking it up. We Won 13-3 scoring several tough up winders in the first game, then, the B-Team (w/ a couple swing players), lost the first half 7-5 of game two, and the 'A' team came in and swapped points to 9-7 when i made the risky move of having them call time out on our on goal line going upwind. I just told them to relax, and calm down, and they scored the upwinder, and the next 6 to win the game... so they outscored Bend High by 8-2, including several nice goal line executions.

Personally, Sunday, the tourney, monday, weights in the AM, skills and drills with the team, and played 2 points during the 20 minute scrimmage, then a 95 minute bike ride (road). Today, ran for 30 minutes in the morning before school, then a 90 minute mountain bike ride.