Getting Ready for Alberta Open

The new Agon suits look great, girls are really happy with them. Let's hope they last longer than the sketchy ones we got from Turbo last year.

When you see the whole group in them it really looks like a powerful "team" not just a bunch of girls in suits. I guess that is actually what we were going for. The objective now will be for every player to have the white of their suit out of the water with every shot. Shouldn't be a problem for these dynamos.

I've taken a break from writing about the shooting technique from last week. Still waiting to get some concrete biomechanical data to mull over before too many comments. There is no rush on that since I am not encouraging any drastic changes in shooting before we go to the Alberta Open next week.

Speaking of Alberta Open, holy crap! Got the draft schedule today and it is asking us to play 4 games a day on Friday with 2 of our teams, no way! We won't drive all day Wednesday to be available to play Thursday to Sunday and then sit around doing nothing Thursday while waiting to kill ourselves Friday. There is only 1 US team this year, playing teams in 3 divisions, and no eastern teams. Lots and lots of Calgary teams though.

Jesse is planning on taking his laptop to Calgary this year so I may do Blog updates while I am away. Not sure if I will do journals too since that would double up the writing and electronic communication. This could be a problem since I might need to be at the pool 14 hours Friday (7:00-21:00) and longer on Saturday. I shouldn't have any trouble sleeping on the way home!

Agon Suits

Today was a big day for many of the girls as they got to try on the new Agon suits to check sizes. This was important since some have worn Agon suits with only a front lining and we are getting both front and back. That is required with the possible transparency issues we might face otherwise. I didn't order small enough suits for some Bantam girls as they are possibly going down as far as size 22 or 24. Kelsea for sure, others, we don't know.

We worked more on press defense and offensive movement to help passes tonight, something we have not done in over a month as it was all about gaps and drops the past few weeks. It may take a quarter to get them into the right frame of mind this weekend but it will happen pretty fast once there is an opponent they don't know well. Some of the Bantam girls were actually surprised to be told to HOLD on to the offense unless they were driving, too many soft kiddie scrimmages the past month I guess.

I am also interested to see how the billet plans work this weekend. It is not something I generally like to do as it splits focus away from team and onto hosting, sharing, exploring new relationships. Quite the opposite of what a competition is about when they turn their focus inward to their own knowledge, skill and ability to perform with a well known team of their own, sometimes at the expense of that new "billet friend".

Another thing I expect to see happen in a big way this weekend is the Cadet Girls stepping up play to show me how they plan to make it very difficult to let other girls take their pool time away as the season progresses. Having added 3 new Cadet team members last week I know the regulars are all checking how that impacts their own role. No worries there, I know who everyone is and what they are capable of.

If you are following the Women's national team in Italy right now they are 1 win away from qualifying for their 3rd Olympic Games. Friday they play Greece to make it to the medal round of the Olympic Qualification event and that is a huge game in all their lives. Let's hope the western girls on that team, Csikos, Braden and Riddell pay a big role and contribute to a win. Heather should be in the stands for that one, bringing Bushido cheers to the team.