Thoughts.

This Wired article about why we sometimes slip up and do the things we’re trying so hard NOT to do hints at the power of the human subconscious and its relation to sport. It’s definitely worth a read, especially if you’re a Neuroscience/Psych nerd like me, and points at two big takeaway points for ultimate.

Wired.com: It doesn’t seem practical to say, “Don’t try to think about not spilling wine on the carpet in a stressful situation,” when being at the party in the first place is stressful.

Wegner: Sometimes you’re stuck. The great leveler is making these processes automatic. In sports, people do things over and over until the action is automatic. It becomes so automatic that you don’t have the same mental process to engage. The whole thing has become unconscious. That only comes with practice.

The person who wants to avoid saying awkward things on the first date — well, by the 30th date, they’re not doing it anymore. They have to just brave it. In sports we know this, but we don’t think of social life the same way.

There’s one big takeaway–you need to hone your skills to the point that you stop thinking about them.

The other takeaway? How you phrase and frame your efforts (more particularly, how you talk and how you think) has a huge effect. Going into a game thinking “I can’t drop a disc” means you’re gearing your subconscious to think about dropping a disc and stopping it–all it takes is a tight moment, some extra stress, to engender exactly the outcome you’re trying to avoid. Thinking “I will catch every disc” doesn’t generate those same connotations. Talk in positives.

For those of you who’ve been away from RSD of late, it’s worth noting that Jim Biancolo has thrown together a Greasemonkey script, “Toadless,” that filters out some 70% of RSD, for better or worse (I imagine more than 70% of RSD readers would claim for better).

Check his guide for full instructions.

Mark (Static) | Mark (Dynamic) | Downfield

You’ve got the disc on the sideline. The mark is counting, “two, three…”

You think your buddy Charlie is about to get open, but he slips on the plant and you turn to face the dump as the mark reaches “five.”

All season long you’ve practiced looking at the dump on stall five–it’s a quick turn, look, step out and throw, or wait for a cut from the dump and throw.  Simple.

This time it’s different though. As you turn, as the mark mouths “five,” he moves with you. All of a sudden that mark that was just in your way as you tried to throw upfield is in your way and completely blocking your throws back. The dump defender is taking away the upline cut. The only option you’ve got is a tough inside-out flick.

This is NOT what you practiced. You turn the disc over.

This is the power of the simple anti-dump adjustment, one of the most prevalent and potent adjustments the mark makes dynamically.

The real power of this adjustment comes when you go from making this a “sometimes” play (as in, sometimes the mark decides to shift over) to an “always” play (as in, the mark ALWAYS shifts over on stall 5 on the sideline [etc]–you even have a call for it so the downfield/dump defender can adjust accordingly).

As you know, the dump is one of the most important components of ultimate strategy, so adjustments you can make on defense to pressure it are always worthwhile (assuming you can actually execute on said adjustments). You can vary the count at which this shift is made–perhaps you shift earlier, on stall 2 or 3, against a weaker thrower, or a team that habitually looks offline earlier, and you can vary the extent to which you move around at other positions as well–I’ve seen it against horizontal offenses where in sideline situations the third, far-side handler defender will flare out into the lane to really discourage early-stall count throws (and then book it back once the thrower commits to the dump–I’m thinking particularly of this year’s Carleton v. Colorado finals video, where the amount on pressure Carleton puts on resets is an unheralded factor in their early lead and eventual win).

Other dynamic adjustments to the mark I’ve seen:

• Throwing a flat/straight-up mark for a couple counts early to get in the way and pressure hucks in flow, before shifting to a more conventional mark to pressure breaks/resets. I’ve seen run as an adjustment against just a team’s stud thrower (who presumably is making all these throws) or against a whole team or handler corps if the team as a whole likes to huck. 

• At one point DoG (and DoG-coached college teams in NE) implemented a truly dynamic mark (as opposed to the planned shifts I’m talking about here); in this case the mark would leap from one side to the other, shifting the force entirely, in order to shut down hucks going one way or the other. This had the downside of making under cuts relatively easier (what with all the shifting downfield defenders had to do), but the goal was of course to shut down the deep game and when the communication worked (it took a lot of work on the sidelines to communicate when to shift back and forth), it met its goal.

The main advantage to making these dynamic adjustments is the shift in control they confer. Typically a defense has to throw a zone, something radically different from the “normal” man D to take control of a game and force the O to respond; even things like changing to a force-middle defense are something the offense reads and adjusts to in a short span (at a high level).  With some simple but well-coordinated work on the mark and downfield, the D again gains an upper hand of a sort–just as a cutter has an advantage on her defender because she can choose where and when to cut, a defense that plans on adjusting dynamically gains a second or two of control that the offense must respond to.

It won’t always be the case that those couple seconds will stop the O and get a turn, but barring a psychic offense or a failure to execute, it will slow them down–if not contain them.

There remains a lot of untapped potential in using the extra sideline eyes (or even other players on-field) to guide the mark and the rest of the team’s defense–more on sidelines in a later post, but think about the potential of a well-coordinated defensive line, adjusting on the fly, yet in sync thanks to some outside guidance. The very best defensive lines develop this sort of chemistry over time, but how might we plan and guide this development?  How do you institutionalize it?

There remains a TON of room for defensive growth here.

We’ll wrap up (probably) with downfield adjustments next week.  Am I missing anything here? Fill in the gaps in the comments.

I started typing this out as a response to Brad’s comment on the last post about goal setting, and it grew into its own post.

Brad,

Thanks for the link.

I agree that flexibility with goal setting is important; I find that this comes naturally when you add timeframes. If my goal is to train twice a week for a month, I naturally have to re-evaluate it at month’s end (or perhaps sooner, if I can’t meet the weekly requirement). It’s important to note that a lot of research out there has goal SETTING as the important thing–as they say, shoot for the stars and you might land on the moon. We don’t have to do everything we set out to do, but it gives us much-needed direction. It’s OK to change direction to continue working towards what makes the most sense for you.

A lot of issues that the article you linked gets at have to do with the nature of the goals set. For one, they’re entirely outcome-based. Profit. Market share. These are goals that depend on somebody else, namely the consumer, to meet. They’re also goals that are handed down from on high–so you’re setting goals that may or may not be realistically achieveable, are not entirely under the control of your employees…and then expecting magic. It’s no wonder indeed that it leads to problems.

I’m a really big fan of focusing on process. The example of Southwest, who worked to cut down their turnaround time to 10 minutes–that’s something entirely in their control, something their employees can manage with enough practice and improvement (assuming 10 minutes is not a wholly unrealistic number), is a good process goal. They didn’t say “let’s double our profits by reducing turnaround”–that doesn’t necessarily follow, but because they focused on the process they still made good things happen.

There’s a saying, “that which is measured, improves.” It doesn’t say it improves organically, just that it improves, and I think that’s the trap a lot of the corporate goal-setting falls into (and incidentally is why I’m very, very leery of incentive-based restructuring of the American healthcare system). We need to be very careful of what we choose to place stock in measuring (this same warning applies to stat-keeping as well).

I sent this out as part of a longer email to the team today. Good goal-setting makes a world of difference in any aspect of your life, not just ultimate.

Set measurable and attainable goals to work towards. It’s easy to rally yourself to work hard for a few days, a week, maybe even a couple months, but you want to be working towards some ultimate (pun intended) goal. Working without goals is journeying without a map–you’ll get somewhere, but perhaps not where you want to be, and certainly not as swiftly as you could’ve.

No doubt you already have some goals in mind (e.g., “improve my throws,” “get into better shape,” etc). I want you to break those goals down into more bite-sized chunks. Thinking in broad strokes is good, but taking the time to design details will pay off. If your big goal is to improve your throws, commit to making 50 passes every day, or throwing for 10 minutes every day. Instead of working the broad scope of all of your throws, really hone in and focus on putting touch on your step-out flat forehand until you get comfortable with it. Don’t just work to get “in shape.” Work towards adding an extra 20 pounds to your squat, or adding 2 inches to your vertical, or shaving a half-second off of your 100 time. PLEASE blitz me if you’re having trouble quantifying your goals.

Write your goals down. Put them somewhere you’ll see them every day, as a constant reminder of what you’re working towards. Set goals that are reasonable enough that you’ll complete them in time. Set and maintain 3 process goals–3 things entirely in your control and entirely doable (e.g., “throw for 20 minutes every day for two weeks”)–and to continue to set more ambitious goals as you meet your old ones (“throw for 1 hour every day for two weeks”). It’s important that your goals have a timeframe–this will guide your work and provide some motivation. If “add 20 pounds to my squat” is a good goal, “add 20 pounds to my squat by next month” is great. Even if you don’t meet the goal, you’re still working hard and gaining knowledge of what you’re capable of.

I’ve written about goal setting before, give the “goal setting” tag a look if you’re interested in more depth.

Mark (Static) | Mark (Dynamic) | Downfield

This is easily the most powerful role on the ultimate field. DO NOT SLACK OFF ON THE MARK!!!

While a mark cannot be expected to take away a whole section of the field with any consistency, a mark can and should be able to make offense difficult in a number of directions by a number of strategies.

Making an adjustment using the mark has two flavors: static and dynamic.  The latter involves smart use of the former, so I’ll keep this post limited to static adjustments.

Static adjustments are long-term changes (point to point, perhaps throw to throw).

For example, as referenced in the original post, the mark can make a static adjustment to take away the IO break option if a team is routinely exploiting it.  This adjustment can take a couple forms:

• The “Flat Mark”
Instead of shuffling on this axis, as you might in a “standard” mark:

The mark moves like this:


This allows the mark to shuffle or set up a bit more in-line with the thrower, almost in a straight-up force. This can be effective against IO breaks that are made with a wide step; however, throwers who break by stepping through the mark are unlikely to be stopped.

• The “Stagger”
  

This is my preferred way to make the adjustment. Taking a cue from Ben Wiggins’ talk on marking at the ’06 UCPC, the mark can stagger with one foot back:



In this instance, the mark’s left foot is further back; this allows the mark to “block back” more, and creates extra space that a step-through break thrower has to penetrate. This still allows for some open-side pressure, but it’s not as imposing as the “flat” mark, applying a bit less pressure.

• The “Step Off”

This is perhaps the “best” (read: most consistent) way to take away the IO. Check Force Flick for a bit more on the merits of this (he’s describing something slightly different, but the same idea applies).

Essentially, by stepping off, the extra buffer space you’ve created makes it near impossible for the thrower to step through the mark, or to get a quick release past you (extra space means extra time to react). The big trade-off, of course, is that this mark really concedes the around–perhaps not an attacking around for yards, but a dump cutter can be led pretty easily into the backfield for good horizontal position.  You’re trading the certainty of stopping breaks to your specific area for less pressure on throws to other spaces.

Adjustments to take away the around employ similar methods to the “flat” mark, only the mark is angled to take away the backfield while conceding the inside a bit more; a “staggered” mark or a “step off” mark can work too, but unlike the inside, where the mark’s ability to penetrate the mark is essential, an around break goes around the mark (duh), so the crucial thing is less to prevent the throw and more to pressure as many angles as possible–it’s difficult to stop the throw entirely without completely conceding upfield throws, but you can at least force passes into a smaller lane or backwards.

All of these adjustments have their weaknesses, of course. Once a team/player is capable of making static adjustments, the next level is making the mark dynamic, able to shift between states on the fly during the stall count.  More on this in a later post.  Again, look at Force Flick for ideas on how this should work.

If you’ve yet to discover it, the The Eternal Battle of Love and Hate is churning out a fair bit of women’s content of late relating to nationals.  Nice to see blogs like this and Movin’ On Up pop up to fill the coverage void.

We need more people to step up and contribute their coverage, and more importantly we need to consolidate it somehow so it presents a cogent view of our sport.  I’m not quite sure how to go about this short of the emergence of another news site with dedicated staffing; my ideal vision has something less rigid and more web 2.0, open and collaborative.  I’m willing to help put in some of the work but at a loss as to what direction to channel efforts into.



Any readers out there have ideas or visions?  Should we just continue to wait for somebody else to blog or write about it, and remain in the dark?

This is a fairly old article, but one that bears continual revisiting.

Researchers looked at perception and elite performance and found all sorts of clues that the elite see things more clearly and decisively (and can therefore respond earlier) than novices (I’d suggest Blink if you’re looking for a more in-depth treatment of the matter). They also found that things like field sense are absolutely not innate, and suggest that free, unstructured play is key to getting the experience and developing a broad, flexible sense as opposed to a narrow-minded one. Check out this blog post for a bit on the difference between explicit and implicit learning–remove coaching and especially structure from the equation, and you tend towards the implicit–given that something like “field sense” is rarely taught explicitly (if I asked you to explain “field sense” to me–what to look for, when, what leads you to make one decision over another–would you be able to do it? In a way I could understand and apply?), you need to go the other way.

As frustrating as low-level, amoeba play (or loosely organized summer league, etc.) can be, or as much as you might think your disc-using non-ultimate games (I’m thinking of boot in particular, but schtick counts too in its own way) are not going to help you improve, recognize the opportunity inherent in these games. Try throws and strategies you wouldn’t normally. Experiment with new positioning and decision-making processes. Expand your repertoire and your mind.

What sorts of games do you play to grow?