Here come the Irish.....and I am not talking about Notre Dame

We are nearing the end of our first week of training camp. We have been holding two training sessions a day with some strength and conditioning in the morning. Things have gone really well and the girls are starting to gel as a team a little more. This weekend will be a good test for them as we are playing two practice games against the Ireland U20's team. They are flying in today and staying at our hotel for the weekend. It will be a good chance to play against someone other than ourselves and be able to see where we are at after the first week.

Burn Your Boats

Burn Your Boats! That is the slogan for our team this summer. I actually stole the idea from the University of Michigan Men's Basketball Team. My little sister was their student athletic trainer this past year and she told me the story of how and why they used that slogan to finish out their season. The story is told perfectly in this video on YouTube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlNngcDNFS0&feature=related

The reason it really applies to our team is because no U20's team has ever qualified to advance to Division A. Right now our team is in Division B. So in order to get there, this team has to do things that they have never done to get things that they have never had. If we continue to do what all the teams have done in the past then we will get the same results that they have. So it is a truly motivating story that I hope the girls can really embrace and make their own.

Driving on the wrong side of the road

I am still trying to get my feet wet with all of my responsibilities, and one of those happens to be the laundry. Well the hotel wanted to charge us a fortune for them to do it, so I had to find another way to get the job done. I got directions to a launderette (laundromat in American) somewhere in the Leigh town center and thankfully Sergio was able to put me on his car insurance.

So I was all set to head off on my laundry adventure when I remembered that Sergio's car was a manual and I was in England. Driving in England equals sitting on the other side of the car while driving on the other side of the road. It also means roundabouts (see above diagram) which are used instead of traffic lights at a large amount of England's intersections. All of these different elements combined can be very stressful. Luckily I learned how to drive a manual within a week or two of coming over to play for the Mystics. Remembering what side of the road to drive on and what to do at a roundabout took me a little bit longer to master.

Needless to say I felt a little nervous driving in England again after I have been driving an automatic back in America for the last year, but I managed to get myself to the launderette and back, while only stalling the car once and driving on the other side of the road twice. Definitely a success in my book. Seeing as I'll be driving the laundry twice a day for the next two weeks, I am sure I will dust the rust off pretty quickly.

Day 1-Start of Training Camp

Today was the first day of Training camp, and my first chance to meet all of the girls. I know two of the girls in camp (Kelsey and Charlotte) from playing with them on the Mystics and I know a couple of the other girls from playing against them, but it was really good to get to meet them properly and put some names with faces.

We had lunch, gave out the kit and had a team meeting. Then Adidas, who is our team sponsor, came in and everyone got fitted for basketball and running shoes.

Then it was time for our first training session. The best thing about where we are staying is that the sports hall (or gym for my Americans) is literally right across the street. Very convenient.

I thought that the session went well and that we could have a pretty good team. However I have yet to know what the competition will be like, so it is hard to judge this early. But I do believe that we have the right group of people for the job.

Sorting the "kit"......

After arriving at Manchester airport I went straight to the U20's training camp location which is in Leigh...about 20 minutes outside of Manchester. From there Trudie and I had the job of sorting out the "kit". For my American friends "kit" is basically your gear and can be used to describe anything from your practice jersey/ shorts to your game jersey/shorts and pretty much anything in between. The word "jersey" in England would describe something more like a vest top....strange I know...but just go with it.

After that we traveled back to Manchester where the Great Britain Senior and World University Games Team camp is located. Trudie and I helped do the same with their kit, which proved to be quite the task as there are 26 girls in their training camp.

Then it was time for a staff dinner, that I could barely keep my eyes open at due the jet lag.

Definitely time for me to go to bed and get rested for the first day of camp! Really excited to meet all the girls tomorrow!

Reunited and it feels so good....

Manchester, England here I come! I am off to my old stopping grounds where I spent two seasons playing with the Manchester Mystics. However this time I am coming back for a different reason. I am starting a new adventure as the Assistant Coach/Team Manager for the Great Britain Under 20's National Team. I will be reunited with Sergio Lara-Bercial who was the Head Coach of the Mystics during my two seasons. It is thanks to him, that I have been offered this amazing opportunity. The two of us along with the third member of our crew, Assistant Coach Trudie Hopgood make up the staff that will be taking a group of 12 girls to the European Championships in Ohrid, Macedonia.

I am excited for the chance to learn and grow as coach, along with the challenges of making everything run as smoothly as possible.