Monthly Archives: February 2011

3 Actions You Can Take Right Now To Make Your Team Excellent

Coaching philosophy, Mistakes, Practice

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We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. –Aristotle

I want my athletes to get as good as they can possibly be while they’re with me…and I’m sure I’m not the only coach who feels that way. So when I stumbled upon an article called, The Mundanity of Excellence by Daniel Chambliss, I knew that I wanted to bring it to you guys. It’s a study on swimmers, but I think it can not only be applied to team sports, but to us coaches, folks in the business world…anyone who wants to be better! The author defines excellence as the consistent superiority of performance…I think that’s a goal we can all get behind! So let’s check out how to be excellent.

Here’s what our athletes need to do in order to be excellent

  • Make qualitative improvements. So what does that mean? In the article, the author talks about how excellence doesn’t come solely from making quantitative adjustments…by just doing more of an activity. It comes from making targeted adjustments within that activity, much like I talked about in The Secrets To Greatness Are Within Your Control. It would be silly for us to tell our athletes that they just need to pass more and more to get better…if they’re passing the ball behind their heads! Yes, they’ve got to do more, but that “more” should be in the context of making adjustments as necessary. Doing more of the correct thing will yield great results. Other examples of qualitative improvements could be eating healthier, trying harder in the weight room, or practicing with more intensity.
  • Practice excellence with the little things. As a swimmer quoted in the article says, “people don’t know how ordinary success is.” Excellence seems to be the meeting together of a bunch of small things that, when done well and with consistency, create a superb athlete. Those things could be going to the trainer, taking warmup seriously, focusing in on the minor angle changes that need to be made to take a pass from really good to perfect. Doing those things daily will put your athletes on the road to excellence. As the author says, “winning is nothing more than the synthesis of a countless number of little things.”
  • Find motivation every day. Athletes on the road to excellence find the everyday things (going to practice, warmup drills, etc.) fun, rewarding, and challenging…they’re able to make them into challenges. The author tells a story of a swimmer who was fiercely competitive, who made everything into a race: who could get dressed the fastest, who could get to the pool the fastest, who could finish their warmups the fastest…he just loved to compete. This desire to win in practice helped him to develop a habit of winning and made competition ordinary. Therefore, the big swim meet really was just another meet, because he was so used to competing every day. Because there was no significant change in his approach to practices versus meets and his training mirrored competition…he became excellent.


I hope that we’re all able to get our teams fired up about this concept…that being good isn’t reserved for some secret society of athletes. But for those who are willing to consistently and attentively work at it.

5 Ways To Make Conflict Work For You And Your Team

Coaching strategy, Team chemistry

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Have you ever had a friend who was obviously upset or sad? But when you asked them about it, they said, “Oh, I’m fine.” Or “nothing’s wrong.” Or “I’m okay.” You know that they’re not telling the truth, but they’re afraid of rocking the boat, so “they’re fine.” The same thing happens with teams. But I know you’re on top of it coach! You know that small, unsolved problems can snowball into gigantic barriers to your team’s success if not addressed. So let’s check out how conflict can actually be a good thing if handled correctly.

5 reasons to embrace conflict as a healthy part of a team environment

1. Conflict causes pain. That doesn’t sound so great, but sometimes it’s what our players need in order to face a major problem. You can only sweep things under the rug for so long! While you guide them through conflict resolution, you can remind them that they can avoid the pain by talking it out with one another before it gets bad.

2. Conflict fights stagnation. Maybe your team has gotten into a negative rut and it’s time to break out of it! Cliques, fighting, or giving each other the cold shoulder are all negative norms that need to be stopped. If your team has settled into a “normal” pattern of bad behavior, it’s time to shake things up!

3. Conflict can end a negative relationship cycle. This piggy backs the previous point. Ignoring things doesn’t make them go away…as a matter of fact, that can make things worse. Given the nature of teams, there are bound to be folks whose personalities don’t mesh perfectly. It’s our job to show our athletes that addressing the problem can be productive and healthy.

4. Conflict can lead to creativity. In my mind, this is what happens when #2 goes well. You get creative. You don’t do things just because that’s the way you’ve always done them. Breaking free of your team’s unhealthy norms could be just the thing you needed to get really innovative with your approach to your team…on and off of the court.

5. Conflict helps to refresh team dynamics. If you’ve got jacked up team chemistry, you might just have to blow it all up and start over. Stories I’ve heard or seen in my past: freshmen do all of the grunt work, seniors start regardless of ability, “cool kids” don’t break out of their cliques…even for their teammates, players only warming up with their friends. If that’s your situation, then make it stop…like, right now. Make your players get to know each and every person on the team, even the ones they think aren’t as good as they are.

We’ve got to let our teams know that not talking about a problem will end up worse for them in the end. They think they’re “going with the flow” when really they’re building up resentment. Let’s encourage conflict resolution as a healthy way to build great team chemistry.

You Think You Can But You Can’t: On The Evils Of Multitasking

Coaching strategy, Time management, Work/Life balance

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The Seattle Times had a nice article about multitasking called, Multitasking Hurts The Brain’s Ability To Focus, Scientists Say. The title kind of gives away the gist of the article, but it talked about how our tech society is changing the workforce and altering our brains. Every one of us thinks that we’re multitasking rock stars, but every article that I read on the subject seems to say that that is not true. We’re multitasking ourselves into ineffectiveness. Today, I’ll focus on two of the consequences and five antidotes to multitasking.

2 consequences of multitasking

  • Important stuff doesn’t get done and important people get ignored. The article talked about the power of the chime…you know the one. It lets you know when you have an email or a text or a Facebook message. The chime is so powerful that you will stop doing work that is interesting, important, and required of you just to see what’s behind it. Think about the number of work stoppages each of those chimes represents and you’ll see why you get to the end of your day and wonder why nothing’s gotten accomplished. And if your family is used to playing second fiddle to the chime, that’s bound to be a topic of intense convo in the future.
  • You get stressed out because of too much information. What if all of those chimes represented something that you’ve got to do…a “to-do” list item? I think that it would get a little overwhelming. It used to be that when you went home, you didn’t know what emails came to you after hours. Now we find out right away…and to an extent that’s good. But that just means we can never shut off our brains from what needs to be done. And it all seems important…even when it’s not.


5 ways to combat technology and regain control of your life

  • Silence your phone. And put it out of site. Amazingly enough, those Facebook messages aren’t life or death…and they’ll still be there later. Even if it’s just for an hour at a time, that’ll be a super productive hour!
  • Set time limits. Maybe you say that you won’t turn the computer on before breakfast and it has to be turned off by nine o’clock at night. Whatever your parameters, it’s good to have an idea of what’s tech time and what’s connect with actual human beings time.
  • Have a desire to get offline. One of the subjects of the article says that he has to battle the pull of his iPhone…he says that he has to work to suppress the urge to constantly check his phone. And that’s the key: wanting to be present and focused on what’s happening now and not only what’s happening in the computer or in your phone.
  • Be a thinker. I wrote an article about leadership (Take These 3 Steps To Become An Effective Leader) that talked about multitasking being counter to thinking. Meaning that we become so focusing on doing, doing, doing which keeps us from thinking and being innovative.
  • Organize your day. In 4 Rock Solid Ways To Get More Stuff Done, I talked about how to manage your time through organization. The tips were: create to-do lists, do the stuff you don’t want to do first, put time limits on activities, and focus (which talked about the distracting chime!).


Give it a whirl and see what you think…and hopefully you weren’t checking your phone and email while you were reading this!

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Bad Mojo: When A Teammate Shuts Others Out

Mental game, Personality tests, Team chemistry

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Over the course of a season, we have the opportunity to deal with lots of personnel issues. Some of them are easy, some of them are quirky, and some of them are tough. One of the tough ones, in my opinion, is when a player suddenly withdraws from the team. I saw a great article called, Shutting Others Out, that talked about the reasons that this could happen. Read on for three of the reasons that a player could isolate herself from you and her teammates.

3 reasons a player may isolate herself from her teammates

1. They may want something. Some of our players will be passive aggressive by nature. They’re afraid to come directly to us, so they stew. In the personality assessment that I use, they’d be the S…resigned that no one wants to hear what they have to say anyway, so what’s the point? Action item: Reach out to them. They have things on their mind that are very important to them, but don’t know how to properly assert themselves. And when you talk to them, reassure them that they don’t have to be nervous about talking to you about anything.

2. They may have something to hide. If your players think they’ve let you or the team down, they may withdraw. They’re probably embarrassed at doing whatever it is they did…and they’re surely afraid of the consequences that may follow. This player is of the “why do today what I can put off until tomorrow” mindset. They know they’ve screwed up, they know they’re going to get in trouble for it…so they’re going to let you find out any kind of way except from them! Action item: Get behind the scenes. Someone on your team knows what’s going on. So talk to your captains or talk to her bestie on the team to find out what’s happening in her life. That way you can approach her and come up with a plan of action so that she can be herself again.

3. They may be hurting. Something happened to them. Whether it’s a bad grade, a fight with a good friend, or a sick relative…they’re sad, but they really don’t want to talk about it. These are your independent players who are used to doing everything themselves…and usually they do it pretty well. They have a tough time admitting that they’re having a problem that they can’t solve…this player will say they’re “alright” if you ask them how they are doing. Action item: Ask once and then step back. Alert your captains, have them keep an eye on her and chat with her. You’ll check in with your captains about how this player is doing, because they’ll just get annoyed if you keep asking them what’s wrong.

We’ve got to keep our eyes peeled for these things…and also know our players personality type so that we can correctly address the situation.

Fight The Good Fight: Why Battling “Girl Drama” Should Be Your Top Priority

Female athletes, Team chemistry,

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Ahhh, coaching females…it’s one of the joys of my life. And I’m not being sarcastic! Part of the reason is that I never had the opportunity to be coached by a woman. But the main reason is a deep desire to make sure that my athletes understand that women can compete, achieve, and excel together…without drama. That’s right, I said it…without drama. And not only that, I want them to recognize that they can be led by a woman and still have a team that’s drama-free and successful. I’ve written about this before in my post A Coach’s Guide To Creating Harmony On A Female Team and an experience I had at a sports convention spurred me to write this one. A speaker asked the crowd about common problems they had with their teams and someone hollered out “girl drama” and everyone (including the speaker) giggled. I believe that teams of female athletes can push each other, rely on each other, and compete with each other…without there being a lot a drama involved. If that doesn’t sound like your team…read on!

3 ways coaches can battle “girl drama” on their teams

  • Don’t believe the hype. It’s easy for coaches of female teams to shrug their shoulders, throw their hands into the air, and sarcastically say, “gotta love coaching women!” It’s easy…but it’s also unfair to your team. Our jobs as their coaches is to help them be better teammates. Allowing them to behave poorly (by ignoring girl drama) will not bring harmony to your team. And what is “girl drama” anyway? It usually involves females with a conflict they won’t speak to each other about…but that eventually involves the rest of the team when they’re forced to choose sides in the disagreement. As soon as you see things going sideways between players, you’ve got to insert yourself into the situation.
  • Equip your teams to handle conflict. Once you’ve heard about the drama, hopefully you’ve shown your team how to handle it. With my teams, everything filters through my captains. I meet with them quite often and use them as my gauge of what’s going on behind the scenes. If they mention something, I ask if they’ve tried to handle it. If it’s still a problem, I offer a suggestion. If that doesn’t work, then I’ll personally address the issue. This only works, though, because we’ve trained our athletes that they can disagree, talk to each other, and work it out on their own. Where there’s a team, there’ll be conflict…just show your players how to handle it.
  • Give your vision of the “dream team”. The biggest thing to handle “girl drama” is to tell them what your ideal team would look like. I use John Wooden’s Pyramid of Success to do this. We typically will go through it as a team, with them explaining why each of the blocks would help our team. As we go through it, they learn that loyalty, self-control, skill, confidence, and poise are some of the qualities that will make our team great. Using the Pyramid as a base, I can quickly explain that “girl drama” is exactly opposite to success. And that’s why we can’t stand for it.


If you consistently use these three tactics, I believe that your teams will experience more harmony…and therefore more success.

This week is devoted to my thoughts from the AVCA Convention, which was held in December. Why this week? Because it’s Valentine’s Week and that’s all about love. And I love coaching and I love volleyball, so this was the perfect time for it! Topics for the week: getting the most from professional development, the FCA breakfast (an early morning!), and girl drama. Stay tuned!

3 Keys To Coaching, Leading, and Living Successfully

Coaching philosophy, Leadership, Work/Life balance

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I’ve talked before about how faith has a major role in sports. The day our seasons are over, we’re already thinking ahead to the next one…and what we need in order to win it all. When we meet up with our teams in preseason, we set goals and project forward to the end of the season and the success that will hopefully be waiting for us there. In my mind, that’s called faith. Dictionary definition: a firm belief in something for which there is no proof. Sports seasons by their very nature require faith.

Which brings me to one of the highlights of my convention: the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) breakfast. They’ve sponsored this breakfast for as long as I’ve been coaching and it’s always good. It’s a nice way to start the day and it’s fun to meet people…plus, it’s a free breakfast! This year’s speaker was Stephanie Zonars, owner of Life Beyond Sport. She does team building stuff, personal coaching for folks who want to maintain balance in their lives (gasp!), and also lots of speaking engagements. She spoke about living successfully based on the book she wrote about Kay Yow…the legendary basketball coach. Here’s what she had to say:

3 ways we can live our lives purposefully and successfully

1. Be persevering. To persevere means to continue in a course of action without regard to discouragement, opposition or previous failure. I’m sure we all do this when it comes to our teams and keeping them motivated. But when we step back and look at Kay Yow’s life and her struggle with cancer…persevering takes on a new light. I can’t imagine there’s much worse news to get than the prognosis of cancer, but from all reports, she remained a motivator and a positive influence on those around her.

2. Be present. In our lives as coaches, we talk about this a lot, right? All of the previous wins and losses (from the current season or even previous seasons) don’t mean anything more than the moment we’re currently in…right now is about right now. But what about being present with our families when we finally make it home? What would happen if we turned off our Blackberries, closed our laptops, and really took time to be present with our friends, our husbands and wives, our kids?

3. Be thankful. I think that most people could do better with this one. We could be more thankful of the effort that our teams put in each day in practice…of the time they give us. We could be more thankful for our support staffs…the athletic trainers, the sports information folks, the administrative staff that takes care of data entry or accounting paperwork, the people that keep our gyms and fields in tip top shape. We should be more thankful for our family and friends who understand that we go underground during season and that they shouldn’t expect to hang out until season is over. And we should be especially thankful for spouses who have to deal with us when we’re grumpy after a crappy practice or worse yet, after our team performs poorly in competition.

Those were Stephanie’s key points from the FCA breakfast…with my spin put on things. It’d be interesting to see what our lives would look like if we were intentional about doing these things daily. I think we’d be better coaches and better human beings.

This week is devoted to my thoughts from the AVCA Convention, which was held in December. Why this week? Because it’s Valentine’s Week and that’s all about love. And I love coaching and I love volleyball, so this was the perfect time for it! Topics for the week: getting the most from professional development, the FCA breakfast (an early morning!), and girl drama. Stay tuned!

3 Ways To Get The Most Out Of Professional Development Events

Coaching community, Coaching nerds

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Today is Valentine’s Day. It’s all about love and warm feelings, right? So what better time to talk about the volleyball coach’s convention, which combined two of my loves: coaching and volleyball. Since I’m an unabashed coaching nerd, I love going to clinics, and conventions, and seminars because I know that they’ll make me better at what I do. But you can’t go in without a plan, you’ve got to get your mind right so that you can get your money’s worth out of your professional development event. Here are the…

3 ways to rock your professional development event

  • Meet people. Typically the folks at your coach’s convention, conference, or seminar are pretty fired up about your sport or else they wouldn’t be there. I wouldn’t say that I’m big on “networking”, but I do have fun talking volleyball with other volleyball coaches…and professional development events are great opportunities for that. The easiest way to meet new people is to chat up whoever is sitting next to you in your class. They’re probably wearing a name tag or whatever…that makes it even easier. And Lord knows coaches love to talk! So don’t just hang with your crew…meet some new folks, get their emails, and get in contact with them right away when you get home.
  • Go to class. Being social is fun and a great way to meet people like I was talking about above. But don’t forget why you’re there…to learn! So if you’re so tired from “being social” that you can’t wake up until noon and you’ve missed half of the classes…maybe you’re meeting too many people! I’m not necessarily one of those folks who wait to chat with the presenter after class, but I will shoot them an email when I get back home and let them know that I enjoyed their talk. Not only does that help me to make a connection, but I’m sure they appreciate getting the feedback.
  • Be open to learning. I’m pretty sure that every time I go to a professional development event and run into someone I know, at least one of them will tell me that they haven’t learned anything. Really? I find that hard to believe. You may learn how the top ten teams are training…of course, your team may not be able to perform at their level, but you learned it. You may learn a different way of saying the exact same thing that you’ve been saying for years, that’s success! In my mind, if I sit at an hour presentation and learn just one thing, it’s been successful. If I listen to someone and it triggers a “next level” thought that I can apply to my team, then it’s well worth my time. Learning requires an open attitude…just like we expect from our athletes. We don’t know it all and we sound silly when we act like we do. We can always learn.


There you go…three steps to a successful professional development event. Have fun and keep learning!

This week is devoted to my thoughts from the AVCA Convention, which was held in December. Why this week? Because it’s Valentine’s Week and that’s all about love. And I love coaching and I love volleyball, so this was the perfect time for it! Topics for the week: getting the most from convention/professional development, the FCA breakfast (an early morning!), and girl drama. Stay tuned!

10 Business Truisms That Apply To Athletics

Coaching philosophy

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We should always be trying to learn and get better. I love to read and I’m always scouring the internet for anything that will make me a better coach and I think that “20 Business Truisms That Can Change Your Life” is one of those articles. I cut it in half and applied it to athletics…check it out!

Here are 10 practical lessons that will change the way you coach

1. If you don’t know, say so. If you don’t know what you’re talking about, stop talking. Too often, we think we’ve got to have all of the answers because of that awesome adjective (Coach) in front of our name. If we have all of the answers, that’s because we’ve stopped learning…and that’s not a good thing!

2. Don’t jump ship before you hit the iceberg. Hang in their physically and mentally with your team until the bitter end. Most times we can read the writing on the wall about our teams and we can tell when the season will be a bust. That’s no reason not to hit it hard with video, or to stop being creative in practice, or to cease trying to make your players better.

3. Confidence comes from success, knowledge comes from failure. In my mind there’s no greater teacher than failure and no greater motivator than success! I’m sure most of us wouldn’t be the coaches we are today without some significant failure in our past. (See #8)

4. If you’re miserable, quit and do something else. If you’re still miserable, it’s you. We’ve all been around the folks who complain all the time…their team doesn’t have enough financial support, they’re working crazy hours, their team is underachieving, yada, yada, yada. So maybe coaching isn’t your gig. If it is, the rest of us don’t want to hear about it because we’re happy. (See #9)

5. People won’t perform for those they don’t respect. Your team doesn’t have to love you or even like you (though that’d be nice), but they do have to respect you. They should respect your knowledge of the game, your interest in their well-being, and the way you coach them. Not saying they should agree with you…respect is on a higher level.

6. If you’re not passionate about what you’re doing, you won’t be successful at it. I wrote a Pyramid of Success series a couple of months ago, based on the John Wooden tool. One of the cornerstones of that Pyramid is enthusiasm. If you’ve got it…show it. If you don’t got it…go get it. Enthusiasm and passion are huge!

7. Conflict is healthy; anger is not. Get some help for that. I wrote an article about yelling at your players a while back and gave three ways that you can get the most from your team without screaming at them. You’re going to have to manage your team and over the course of the season, that will probably involve conflict. Control yourself so that you can control the situation.

8. No matter how smart you are, wisdom only comes from experience. Boy oh boy, when I first started coaching I knew everything! And with each proceeding year, I knew less and less…funny how that worked out. Book knowledge of how things should work with your team is only valuable when combined with the street knowledge of how things actually go down. If you’re new to coaching, hook up with someone who’s been at it a while. (See #3)

9. Whine and complain all you want; nobody gives a crap. We’ll listen (grudgingly) to you, but we can’t help…so why even start in down that path? We can’t make your alums more involved, or your recruits commit earlier, or your boss give you a raise. So let’s celebrate getting to be a coach and how awesome that is! (See #4)

10. The boss isn’t always right, but she’s still the boss. What else is there to say beyond that? Our job is to coach ‘em up and make our bosses look good. Beyond that, we should give the boss the respect that we want from our teams.

I’ve always thought that the link between the athletics and business world is pretty strong and this article was a good demonstration of that.

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10 Ways To Manage With Integrity

Coaching career

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As coaches, we’ve got to see ourselves as mini-CEO’s. I’m the CEO of volleyball here at my college, we’ve also got a CEO of baseball, and a CEO of swimming…you get the idea. So when I saw this article (Maxims for PR Success) over at The Chronicle of Higher Education, I knew it’d be a benefit to us.

1. Do what you say you’re going to do. Being reliable is underrated. In my book, being a woman of my word is the highest priority. Whether it’s getting paperwork in to the administrative staff, meeting with ladies from my team, or in communications with recruits…underpromise and overdeliver.

2. Meet often with your supervisor. Maybe not “often”, but enough that they know what your vision is for your team and what your expectations are for the future. Remember, part of their job is to have answers when benefactors have money burning a hole in their pockets…be at the front of your boss’s brain when that time comes.

3. Be on time. Yes, your boss knows that you’re working on your practice plans during department meetings…but it’s another thing altogether if you’ve got a one-on-one meeting with them and you’re late. We’re all busy, we’ve all got important things on our plates…but being late implies that your stuff is more important than their stuff. Not cool, dude.

4. Tell the truth. People will hold you to your words…so choose them carefully and stick to them. This is at the heart of coaching with integrity.

5. Circulate. Coaching is a time consuming endeavor, to be sure. But there are other folks on campus who help keep it running…how about meeting some of those folks? Not just the professors (though that’s important), but the student affairs staff, other co-curricular leaders (music, art, dance), or even the staff that keeps all of our campus space neat and tidy.

6. Think on your feet. Spot problems before they happen, notice the generous donor in the stands and go chat with them, be ready when you’ve got someone’s ear who can help out your program. There’s something to be said for being prepared to react quickly.

7. Keep your ego in check. We love what we do and we think that we’re good at it…but we can’t do anything without the athletes, right? It truly takes a village for our seasons to come to fruition. From the higher ups who approve our schedules and budgets to the office staff who submit our paperwork to the appropriate folks, our programs are the products of a group effort.

8. Improve your coaching. I started this off saying that we’re all CEO’s of our sport…our “brand” as people are saying these days. Whether you plan to stay at your institution forever or you’re setting yourself up for the next big move…being the best you can be only benefits you. There are no downsides to getting better.

9. Embrace your institution, warts and all. The article says it better than I could: “It’s not that you have to love everything about your college, or ignore its flaws. It is not believable to others, much less yourself, to pretend that your institution doesn’t need to improve in some areas. But if those flaws mean that you can’t wholeheartedly support your college’s mission, you will be doing both it and yourself a favor by moving on. When you find yourself becoming cynical or see your work as just another job, it is only a matter of time before your effectiveness begins to wane.”

10. Stay current. Take advantage of professional development opportunities that are out there…whether it’s a convention, seminar, or even a free webinar. Even if your department has cut its budget, there are plenty of cheap or free ways to learn. Email or call another coach and chat about what’s new and exciting in your sport. Sit in on a business class on campus. There are many ways that you can proudly be a coaching nerd.

I’ve heard integrity described as “who we are when no one is looking”…but I also think it’s who we are when all eyes are on us.

A Navigational Map for Coaching Female Athletes-Excerpt

Books, Coaching philosophy, Female athletes,

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Not that I’m all about tooting my own horn (but toot, toot!), I’ve contributed a chapter to a great book called, They’re Not Boys-Safely Training the Adolescent Female Athlete, due out in Spring 2011. It’s written by Warren Potash and is linked on his website, Learn To Train Safely. The book is about the tangibles of nutrition and physical training of female athletes…but my chapter is about coaching female athletes.

Here’s an excerpt from my chapter, “A Navigational Map for Coaching Female Athletes”:

I don’t know the profile of the typical person who will read this book. Maybe you’re a mom or dad who wants to make sure that your daughter achieves all that she is capable of during her athletic career. Or maybe you’re a coach who has never coached female athletes before…and you’ve heard lots of horror stories about working with girls. Or you could be an athletic trainer looking for an additional tool to add to your rehab tool belt. Whatever your job in life, I’m sure you’re reading this book because there are female athletes in your life that you care about.

I can tell you, without a doubt, that coaching female athletes has been the joy of my life. I’ve spent almost 20 years in women’s athletics. I played volleyball at the University of Wisconsin and have coached at the club, middle and high school, collegiate Division I and III levels.

Female athletes are fierce competitors, hard workers, and amazing teammates…when they are coached properly.

So let’s begin with the end in mind, as Franklin Covey says, and talk about our ideal female athlete…and then how a coach can go about creating that person…

You can click on this link to my chapter in They’re Not Boys-Safely Training the Adolescent Female Athlete.