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August 10, 2010
By Tess Udall

We definitely took our time doing dynamic warm-up this morning – everyone was a little sore and stiff from our first day of double sessions on Monday! All of us were really excited for our first ice bath at the end of the day to get some good recovery in.

We started off reviewing some of the one-knee passing techniques that we went over yesterday and worked with our partners on some ball control. After we worked on our rhythm passing as a whole team, we broke up into positions and did some passing with the outsides as we worked on the butterfly drill. The middles worked on blocking footwork and closing to the pins. The setters were working with the outsides doing reps off of our passing.

After position breakout, we all worked on the three types of serving: float, jump float, and jump topspin. At the beginning of a season, we all try each kind to see which serve will be our strongest. We spend a lot of the mornings doing technical, position specific work in order to save our legs.

During lunch, we met with our academic coordinator, Wesley Ellison, to go over her expectations for us in the upcoming semester.

In the afternoon, we started with a circuit warm-up. We each get a partner and go around the stations twice in a row. All the stations are based on functional training to get our bodies ready for the season and working in better condition. It also gets us really warm – we work up a serious sweat in Mem Gym during the summer!

After circuits, we worked with a partner on ball control and warmed up our arms in groups of three. We broke out into positions again, and the middles worked with the setters on quick attacks while the outsides and liberos worked on hitting out-of-system balls. This was the first time we worked on hitting, so it was very exciting!!

After position work, we began drills based around team defense and block setup. This was the first time we played any type of six-on-six, and it went really well! It was good to start playing together again.

After the night session, we all took an ice bath in U-Hall and overflowed the tub because there are so many of us. We had a wonderful Chili’s takeout dinner and talked about goal-setting. I think we are doing a great job so far and I can’t wait to see where we are in a few weeks!!

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