Montreal DragonFly

Ciao DragonFlies!

 I have to admit that it was a great practice…  and loving the new coach.  As most of you have noticed…  practices with Jennifer have been more focused on techniques then anything else.  Just because the pace and the endurance is slower, it doesn’t mean that it’s time for us to slack-off.  This is just the time for all of us to focus on the basics…  learning how to do proper techniques before going foward.  I know that there’s lots to work on and lots to remember.   With time and lots of practice, we’ll get better….  and we’ll reach our goal to beat our race time from last year which was 2.17 min in a 500m race.  I think that Vicky mentionned that this year goal is 2.15min.

 Anyways, here are some pointers to focus on what Jennifer had mentionned during last practice:

• When paddling, put your weight outside of the “boat”.  This is to make the boat lighter when paddling.
• If you notice that when you put your paddle in the water and that your paddle is going all over the place…  Use your upper arm to apply weight on the paddle when it’s in the water and lower hand to be holding the paddle about 1-2 inches from the blade.  This is to have more control.
• When exiting from the water, exit about mid-thigh and go for a further reach instead.  Pulling it all the way back is pointless because it won’t move the boat at that point.  Reaching for more water will.
• Twisting your back will give you more reach.
• Untwisting your back will give you more power in the water than simply using your arms.
• Always look up and look at your teamates…  the pacers…  look at the person in front of you.  This is a team sport afterall.  We have to be ALL in synch with each other.  If you’re not looking up, how would you know if you’re in synch with the rest of the team?

Well, that’s it for now…  though, I know that there’s more…  but, lets work with this for now.  We still have a few more indoor practices.  Lets take advantage of this time to improve on our techniques and the opportunity to have Jennifer, coach of the women national DB team, coaching-us.  Ask her question!!!  Don’t be shy!

 See-you at practice!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 26th, 2009 at 9:36 pm and is filed under Practice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.