A two week pre-season and ice baths

I have decided that our training camp in Leigh is like a complete college basketball preseason all rolled into two weeks. I had no idea how difficult it was going to be to get a group of girls to gel and learn how to play together in two weeks. While at the same time introducing all the technical aspects and offensive and defensive schemes. There is no way to fit it all in with such a short time line so as a staff we have to decide the things that we have time to work on and the things we don’t.

I am so accustom to having an entire preseason to prepare, both as a player and now as a coach. Trying to squeeze it all into two weeks has definitely been a challenge. However I am sure my girls back at San Jose State would not mind preseason only being two weeks long.

Today was ice bath day.! Everyone got in a bath tube full of ice and water and had to stay in for 8-10 minutes each. This actually went over a lot better than expected.

Back to Business!

Well we are back in Leigh after our two day break, and that means back to business. By the end of this week we will have to cut the team down from 14 to 12. This does not have to be the final 12 that will go to the European Championships in Macedonia, but it needs to be the 12 that we are taking to our test games in Estonia. So this week will definitely be a lot more intense and competitive.

The girls had a hard two sessions today, and afterward decided to do some lactic acid prevention ….... or something like that. Never the less it provided me with a pretty funny picture.

End of week one

We have come to the end of our first week. It has been a hectic and busy week, but it has definitely been good. We ended up splitting the series with Ireland 1-1. We won the first game on Saturday by 6 and ended up losing by 20 on Sunday. I am not quite sure what happened to us in the second game, we just did not play very well. I am not sure if it was because they were tried or ready for the two day break or what. I just hope that it does not take away from everything that they have done this past week, because they have all come so far in just the little time they have been here.

We now have two days off and most of the girls are headed home. I am heading to the Great Britain Senior Team’s hotel in Manchester to stay there and help them out for a couple days.