The weather is still crap, snowing again today and ranging between 4 and 5 degrees centigrade, so not at all nice and nowhere near warm enough to go outside and train. Everywhere is wet and saturated with water and with the Easterly wind it's just miserable. With the season looming fast there's a requirement to get out there and shed some pounds and get fit for the first match, especially for Joe what with having been sitting around for the last 12 months. So with 2 weeks off and the weather predicted to be cold and miserable for the full two weeks a contingency plan has been devised...
Exercise Boot Camp.
The plan is everyday we're going to be trying to get out and do something, hopefully for the most part it'll be useful in more than one way to cricket development. The main part of it though is based around a video I've come across on Youtube that I like that has a quick 5-6 minute work-out that'll get both of us fit and ready and maybe we'll lose a little weight. This is the video here or click on the video above. We made a start on it yesterday and it went okay as a first attempt and initially Joe needed a lot of cajolling to get through it and there was a lot of stopping and starting. But today we've done it again and we both did it and there was a very marked improvement - especially for Joe and I think now he's slightly enthused by the idea. *Note, we're not doing the full 30 seconds for each exercise we're only doing 15-20 seconds and we're looking to increase the time as we get fitter.
On day one 29th (Friday) we also went to the 'Muno' (Community Centre) and hired out one of the badminton bays and all played Badminton for an hour Ben, Joe, Michelle and Me and that was good as well as it incorprates eye, ball and bat coordination skills which can only be beneficial. I made sure that when I played Joe I was lobbing the ball up and into the corners alternately, getting him to run around lots. Needless to say he slept well Friday night!
Part of the same plan involves looking to reduce his carb intake, Michelle said at the start of the holiday that she felt we needed to do something (I've been saying this for months now) so, at last she's on board and hopefully he'll get served dinners fit for a boy who is the smallest member of the family as opposed to portions the same size as the rest of us?
There's a second video of the same nature that focuses on upper body strength and I'm hoping that after a week I might be able to incorporate that into my own exercise program, but at the moment I'm a big fan of this idea and I feel really motivated to do it, primarily because it is so fast to get done and out of the way.
Week before last I was on form and this weekend I've been crap. Last week on Thursday I walked into a metal post and nearly knocked myself out and I'm sporting a classic 'Dennis The Menace' black eye. I've felt crap for the last week or so and generally lethargic. Then it dawned on me that maybe it was my Biorythmns. These are some kind of Voodoo cycle hippy crap thing that I've read about before, but I kind of noticed that there did seem to be some evidence to support the theory. So I'm blaming my bad physical form on my biorythmns.
So I've now taken it further and looked on line and there's a website - www.bio-chart.com you fill in a couple of fields and it gives you a reading. With regards my physical reading I'm.....
35% physical on a downward slide, so that concours and my general well being is described as .... your general well being is moderate but declining and getting worse.
It goes on to advise - Give yourself a rest and try not to be so physical. That's enough for me - that explains why I can't bowl and I'm now going to have some early nights and wake up for the cricket highlights on BBC2. Hopefully come the weekend I'll be back on form.
It seems someone has passed on the blog address to Sports Science and they now know everything. So welcome to our Sports Science readers now you know the extent of how seriously we're taking this - so bring it on! Anyway that aside let's get on with business as usual. I did contemplate creating a new blog so any new info especially if it was training specific wouldn't be seen by Sports Science but I'm confident that we've got such a massive headstart on them that it doesn't matter if they see what we're up to. Besides I think the things that we've got to look at and get better at are things that they've already got set up anyway - general fitness, speed, stamina etc. So starting off - weather permitting there's been a good response to the possibility of a group of us getting on the gras this saturday - Thomas, Me, Simon & Badger have all signed up to the idea (All bowlers - which is excellent). But Simon may bring along Naughty & Trevor and Alex is even contemplating coming all the way out from London providing he sorts his old boiler out. If this happens this will be brilliant as that will be almost all of the bowling team. I think it's important that as many of us get out on to a field and play because of the fitness factor and the throwing opportunities. We all need to be chasing after the ball at speed and throwing the ball back now in order that we iron issues such as - can you throw the ball back from the outfield without pulling arm muscles? As I'm sure a lot of you have probably not thrown something as big and as weighty as a cricket ball over long distances since you were 14 years old or younger. I know from the fact that this is something I'm good at from my days of throwing rocks and stones accurately over long distances trying to hit outflow/sewage pipe marker posts in the Thames as a youth and trying to hit swallows and swifts in flight with stones. Then trying to do similar stuff much later in life when bored on a beach and pulling my shoulder, neck or arm muscles - it's going to happen unless you've got that muscle development already there. So better to highlight it as a weakness now in practice rather than find out in the field during our first competitive match. Hence the reason I'd encourage everyone to use the opportunities to practice out on the grass. Additionally we need to go through some rudimentary cricket fielding practices such as backing up the wicket keeper and anyone at the bowling end to avoid over-throws when trying to stump their men out by throwing the ball. Follow up fielding when trying to stop the balls from hitting the boundary - 2nd man picks up the stopped ball and gets it back to the crease. 2 stage return of the ball from the outfield to restrict the chance of injury in non urgent situations as the Aussies do. Plus general fielding practice - accurracy of throwing at stumps; pick up and throw at stumps; catching high balls; Slip fielding etc. Look at the websites previously mentioned http://www.ninemsn.com.au/ follow the link to 'The Cricket Show' and the video footage of training exercises and also the BBC website - Paul Collingwood and Gearaint wosshisfaces training videos. Another good option is our very own mate - David Hinchcliffe at harrowdrive.com as fitness training is his specialist area. One of the things he advocates is cricket related exercises and the fact that what we do is short fast energetic work with fast turning and excelleration and therefore any fitness training should be built up around developing these areas of your fitness/stamina and muscle. I noticed that their in-house comedian - Ronnie had a cricket ball today. He's supposedly a bowler (I think Etheridge said he was a medium pace bowler or did he say comdian pace bowler)? and was throwing the ball around in the team room as I do. I know recently cos of my finger I've dropped the ball a few times recently and everyone sniggers and they all sledge me as I go past, but 'Ronnie funnybloke' had the ball for 5 minutes and dropped it five times! I think we may win the game on wides because there's about three of them that bowl - Ronnie, Gavin and Dean perhaps? So unless they get themselves out there and practicing we're going to be facing a lot of wide balls? What does that mean strategically - do we go for the wide balls and risk edging it? Will they have slips fielders good enough to collect the balls or should we train specifically to make sure the wides run off to Deep 3rd man and Deep fine leg? If they're only using 3 bowlers there's going to be stamina issues as well which will suit us and again this backs up the argument for a change in our batting order - If we put Richard in first with Rod who both seem to be strategically clever and adaptable batsmen (Or Ash if he turns up and proves his worth) we can take the sting out of the new ball and wear down the opening bowlers (maybe all their bowlers) before we release the Rottweilers (Mark and Thomas) to smash the ball all over the park? What do you reckon? Here's another idea - one of their blokes lives near me do you reckon we should invite him over for a knock about? (in the spirit of the Gentlemen's game as Simon would put it). For me it's still all out war and in wars the opposing teams can get together - entente cordial etc - but it's still war!
