Athletes: Per Game Students

Athletes, how many hours per week on average do you spend being a student of your game?

Do you do any of the following:  

1) Follow a favorite player within your sport and view how he or she prepares for the game? 

2) Follow a player-to-coach relationship? How does the player respond to instruction?  

3) Do you follow any old time players in your sport? 

4) Have you noticed how your sport has evolved in to the game it is today?  

5) Do you notice what your favorite player(s) do in warm-ups? And, why they do it?  

6) Learn new ins and outs of your sport? What can you bring new to your sport?

It is great to become a faster runner, skater, rower, etc. It is great to work on your physical weaknesses and strengths. But, you can be a physical prodigy and still have major flaws in your on field, on ice, on court, or even on sand performance if you have no idea what is going on. For example, there have been plenty of extremely athletic NFL players who have failed in the NFL. Then, there have been players who excelled in the NFL that do not look like physical specimens. I'll name a few of them now: Darrell Green, Jerry Rice, Troy Brown, Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, London Fletcher, all of the long term and successful place kickers and punters (basically), more recently, DeSean Jackson, and many more.

I am willing to bet that at some point all of these athletes can answer "yes" to the above questions. Can you as a solid athlete?

1) Watch someone like Sidney Crosby, Pavel Datsyuk, LeBron James, or Joakim Noah prepare for games. All of these athletes will be starting playoff games soon.

2) Look at the way Gregg Popovich talks to Tony Parker and to Tim Duncan.

3) Old-timers like Jerry Rice had a renowned off-season workout regimen. Even fans knew about it. The hill.

4) Baseball has changed so much as a sport that guys are bigger not including the PED-talk.

5) Every team has their general warm-up. Some players do subtle things in warm-up preparation because they know they perform well. It works. Does something different work for you? Is it physical? Is it mental?

6) As an athlete, do you bring a speed component to your sport that has rarely or never been seen? For example, is your first step the best ever? Is your slapshot the best ever? Is your pump fake the best ever? Is endurance great?

With heart,
Derek

Derek Arledge, CSCS       www.teempt.com        TEEM Performance Training