Working Smart
Studying the Brain
Here comes the next frontier in training.
It’s the brain. Evidence suggests that an athlete’s gray matter is fundamentally different from another person’s. And if this is the case, then the brain — more than ever — controls all three aspects of performance: physical, mental and emotional.
In the April issue of Discover magazine, author Carl Zimmer [...]
Practice Design
Lately I’ve been working with coaches on practice design.
They want to know how to make the most of the time they’re given.
For more efficient and effective practices, start with the advice I heard legendary high school basketball coach Bobby Hurley give at a clinic last year in Iowa. “Write down your practice, and then follow [...]
Your Team Captain
What do you look for in a captain?
At the school where I coach, The Montclair Kimberley Academy in Montclair, NJ, you never have to wonder. Each season the athletic department spells it out with the “Captains Award.”
It’s given out each fall, winter and spring season to “that male or female captain who has exhibited the [...]
Are You Great?
Spring has brought the usual array of new baseball books, and one of them should catch the eye of coaches everywhere.
It’s called “The Genius in All of Us: Why Everything You’ve Been Told About Genetics, Talent and IQ is Wrong,” by David Shenk.
The content shouldn’t come as any surprise if you’ve read books like “The [...]
The Agony of Defeat
ABC’s Wide World of Spots had it right years ago when it opened the show with the phrase “The Thrill of Victory, and the Agony of Defeat.”
You see it all through March Madness as one team advances and the other goes home. It’s sad but true: the more time, effort and passion you invest in [...]
Another Blot on Women’s Sports
Female athletes are acting more and more like their male counterparts. And that’s not good.
Wednesday night provided the latest example, when Baylor’s Brittney Griner punched Texas Tech’s Jordan Barncastle in the face.
Griner will be sitting out two games. Baylor coach Kim Mulkey said in a statement issued late Thursday that Griner will be suspended for [...]
Being the Best
We just finished two weeks of watching athletes who fought to be the best. Now March Madness gives us another example.
Tina Charles recently became UConn’s career leader in scoring and rebounds and stands as quite possibly the best player in the country entering the tournament season.
“She told me when she came to Connecticut, that she [...]
Problems and Possibilities
Every problem disguises a possibility.
And so it is with all the snowstorms, which, among other things, have complicated life for baseball and softball coaches around large parts of the United States.
Fields are covered with snow. One coach in Virginia told me he doesn’t expect to even see green until April.
Even so, the schedule will not [...]
Canada’s New Hero
I first heard of Sidney Crosby years ago when a sports writer friend mentioned a young man who was supposed to be the next Wayne Gretzky. Hockey insiders had even anointed him “The Next One.”
Now, of course, this young man no longer has to be the next Gretzky. It’s quite enough for him to be [...]
How Did America Get So Good?
Today the United States sets the record for most medals ever won at a Winter Olympics. Whether the men’s hockey team captures the gold or the silver against Canada, America will own 37 medals.
By contrast, 30 years ago, when the 1980 U.S. hockey team pulled off the Miracle on Ice, the entire American squad won [...]
