The irony about "breaks" when you go to school a thousand miles away from home is that you end up feeling more tired when you come back than you did when you left! It was great being home for three weeks catching up with friends and family, but trying to see everyone, play volleyball to keep the rust away, and driving 15 1/2 hours through the night to get back for our first practice certainly took its toll.
Although I was exhausted by the time we rolled into campus, I was excited for our first practice of the season! Unfortunately, it only consisted of seven of us due to flight delays/other external factors, but we made the best of it, and it was good to get on the court again with the guys that did show up. Serve receive felt decent, hitting was consistent, and the jump serve went pretty well. Definitely room for improvement in all categories, but after catching up on sleep and getting my body back to a usual routine, I feel like I'm starting to hit my stride. A small setback with a pretty badly jammed thumb on my hitting hand on Tuesday, but with lots of icing and tape, I'll be good to go come our first match.
We finally have an assistant coach, and he seems to be fitting in nicely. The head coach for the women's team at Coast Guard, he brings a lot of strong conditioning drills, and I feel that practices have sharpened up since his arrival. Kind of quiet, but starting to open up little by little. I think he'll benefit us this season.
The conditioning this week has been rigorous. Today was our first off day after 3 double-sessions in a row, and it was much needed. I can't remember the last time I was this sore, although I'm pleased with how good I feel physically when I'm on the court. I'm interested to see if this is going to continue all season though, as I can't imagine doing four months of this in a row!
So far the transition to outside has been great. Although I miss the blocking duties of playing opposite, I am REALLY enjoying middle back. I feel like I'm settling in nicely, and am excited to have more opportunities to get touches in the backrow, as right-back seems to get the least amount of action. Hitting this week has been a bit shaky due to the amount of tape on my thumb affecting my contact, but come Monday I should be fine without the tape-job, and will be back to normal in no time.
I've been talking ball with a couple friends back at home, and an interesting discussion that's been coming up is in regards to when to make your decision on where to put the ball as an attacker. I'm starting to wonder if I need to consider adjusting my personal method.
Although the sports are different, I always liked John Wooden's philosophy of making the opponent adapt to you instead of you adapting to them. I realize that as a hitter, you need to be aware of where the block is, but after figuring out where it is, I'm going to hit the shot which I can get the highest, strongest contact at. This is probably why the majority of my kills end up as tools off the block. The strength of this is I feel I'm able to make my decision much quicker than my friends (all who say they wait almost until contact point before committing to their shot). Obviously if it's a trap-set I'm going to adjust, but for the most part I stick to my method of making my decision probably by my second step of my approach. Any feedback on other people's thoughts on the subject would be appreciated.
Now that I'm back on campus, I'll be writing on a more regular basis once again. I'm thinking about having monthly interviews with other players, whether it be other collegiate players, professionals, or even Olympians. After messaging some people I know and seeing the results, I'll decide whether or not that's realistic.
Back to watching the Celtics/Cavaliers game. Practice from 1-4 tomorrow, I'll update afterwards.
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