- 3x15secs 5yd shuffles, 45secs rest after each
- 2x10cut, 90 secs rest after each
Afterwards, worked on throwing intermediate throws to moving targets.
150secs rest between each, 3min rest after the 300
We threw between most of the shuttles. Then after we were done, we worked on throwing a dishy and cutting deep for the huck. We did that a few times with and into the wind, but only caught about half the hucks. The rest were either overthrown (with the wind) or just bad throws. After cutting for hucks, we just worked on our deep throws. My backhands are decent but my flicks are still awful.
Had practice from 9am to 1pm both Saturday and Sunday. We did a lot of scrimmaging, and I even got some reps on the D line. We also ran drills for endzone cutting and to work on flashing our mark into the lane to stop the continuation upfield. Overall I think it was a very productive weekend. I felt strong on D and mostly strong on O. I think I only had one turnover in scrimmages, and worked well in zone O and transition D. I got my feedback from Butter and he also said that he liked what he saw. His major criticism was for me to cut deep more. I did not do the best job with that today but I will continue to focus on it during regionals.
One down note: Diana hurt herself at the start of scrimmaging on Saturday. We’re not sure what it is yet (x-ray tomorrow), but it’s likely a broken metatarsal. If that’s the case, it means about 8 weeks on crutches and no ultimate (regionals, nationals, mosh, etc). I’m still hoping that it’s just a bad sprain, but if not, it would be a huge bummer.
Gorgeous day outside. Snuck in a quick workout with Diana at the highrises:
120 seconds rest between each, 4 minutes rest after the 300.
I threw between most of the shuttles. Then Diana and I went to Left Bank and threw medium-distance for 10 min or so. I worked on keeping my flicks high and flat, and throwing flicks after a backhand fake.
Two hours of scrimmage with fairly few people. The O line had one guy sub and one girl sub. The D line started with a girl sub but ended up savage by the end. This probably contributed to how well I thought the O line played, but we played well even in the beginning. The D line spent most of the game pulling to us. Each of our goals was worth half a point, but we could double-score after each goal to earn the full point. I really enjoyed just playing a lot with few subs. It’s rare that I get a lot of reps in a row, and we really got into a good groove on O. I can see how having no subs at all would be rough, but I still enjoyed the day.
A pretty good 5-hour practice. We some skills work and scrimmaged a lot. We spent a good amount of time focusing on our redzone offense. We worked on the gravity cut, which turns out to be very hard to defend if you’re close to the endzone. The third cut (to the cone, back across for the break, then force side to the back cone) is especially tricky to cover. If you don’t sell out to get the IO, it’s pretty easy to throw something in that area. If you do, the cut to the back cone is open. Doing this drill on O and on D really let us experiment with making the cut different ways and defending it different ways, and it really proved to me how hard it is to cover (if the thrower is close enough).
After that, we went into some endzone-focused scrimmage. The O line really struggled here, and the D line played very well on D and on O. They were very smooth, only had one cut at a time to each threatening space, and broke the mark very well for goals. The O line had trouble scoring more than 2 or 3 in a row, and often the goals were quite contested. We were very frustrated towards the end of practice.
For our last drill, worked on a bit of transition O/D in the redzone. Here, the success of the lines swapped and the O line crushed it. Maybe it helped that it started to rain and the disc became very slippery, but the O line scored almost all their opportunities and got a good amount of Ds as well.
My takeaways from the practice are:
We were supposed to scrimmage at Penn Park for two hours, but they shut the lights off after about 30 minutes of playing. So we worked on our deep hucks in the dark instead. The cutting practice (the shape, the turn, not slowing down while looking back) was great. The throwing part would have been great but I was rushed to throw the next throw and not being able to see your throw was really weird.
Afterwards, I did the shuffles workout:
Threw for about a minute between each shutle.
Spent about 10 minutes working on my throws. Primarily worked on the full-extension backhand fake to the flick throw. I have trouble getting power when coming all the way back from a full step-out. Watching Melanie throw, I noticed that she doesn’t pivot the full 180 degrees on the way back. She goes about 135, with her right foot out in front of her left. That seemed to help, will try it next time. Also, gotta throw the disc more up and IO when reaching far or pivoting hard.
An hour of 3-on-3 with the South/West Philly Amp crew. We did 3 minutes on, 3 minutes off. The weather was really hot and the turf at Penn Park made it even hotter, so the pace of the game was not the highest. Still, it was good practice. My throws and cuts were somewhat lazy at times, but other times I played strong D and cut well. I did have a few bad turnovers, still not focusing on my decisions enough.
After mini, I did this week’s shuffles (8x10secondsx5yards, 30seconds rest inbetween) with Bulb and Diana. I focused on staying light on my feet in the middle and exploding out of the plants at the ends.
Two days of hiking and camping in the North Cascades. We hiked about 10 miles the first day, 13 miles the second. I was pretty sore the first day and held down the back of the line. On Tueday I felt better and mostly hung in the middle. Luckily the rain held off until right after we got back to the cars.
There weren’t many people on the hike, but we did see a group on horseback (lots of horse camps in the area) and several animals (many pika, a marmot and even a bear).
Two days of camping and ultimate in beautiful Burlington, WA. This was basically mini-Nationals, as the top 8 teams from last year were there. A lot of unexpected results on the weekend - Drag’n Thrust only won 2 games, Cosa Nostra played better than expected, we finally beat Wildcard. On the whole though, we performed below expectations and finished last (8th) despite our wins against Wildcard and Mischief.
I played fairly well, though I did have some bad turnovers in the Cosa game and in our second Wildcard game. I also only played 2 points against Cosa and in our first Wildcard game. In the games that I had time to get into, I thought my cutting was fairly strong and my D on the turn was also good.
Things I did well:
Things to improve on:
Long day of practice with AMP: 9am-1pm, then break for lunch, then 2pm-5pm. On top of that it rained for most of the day, which sapped some of my energy towards the end. I felt great until about 3 or 4, then started to feel drained. I think a lot of the O was feeling similar, and it showed in our game.
I played really well before lunch, throwing or catching most of our goals and only turning over one drop and a huck to Katie. After lunch, I was not as effective with my cutting and had some poor decisions on O and D.
One mistake I consistently make is to not anticipate where my person is going and to allow them to beat me deep. I think part of it is that I need to try setting up differently - maybe facing the open side and dictating instead of facing the person I’m covering and reacting.