"There Ain't No Need to Go Outside"

This past week was not exactly full of soccer. We had practice once on Thursday and our tournament this weekend got cancelled, the only local tournament we have all year. I have never seen so much rian in my entire life (which is why I included the Jack Johnson quotes of "banana pancakes"). I went by the soccer fields at Thompson Berry, only to see what looked like minature lakes all over the complex. It would have been fun, but dangerous, to play in such conditions; consequently, no one was able to play. Weight lifting was disapointing at the start of the week. I was unable to even get my MAX from two weeks before. However, I rebounded and on Friday I was able to do five pounds more than my previous MAX. I only have two more weeks to lift at school, and I plan on making it worth it. I have decided that I'm going to join Owensboro Gym and Fitness as soon as school is over so that I don't lose all that I have gained this semester. Working, lifting, and preparing for soccer will pretty much occupy my entire summer. Right now my weeks are full of school, then work, then trying to figure out where to sqeeze evreything else in between. All of these things going on at once can make life quite stressful. Summer can't come soon enough...

Louisville

This past weekend my team went up to lousiville to compete in the annual Mockingbird tournament. We had a good showing, winning two games and tying once. However, we did not advance to the championship because of a tiebreaker that catapulted the team tied with us past us by one point. Considering we only had two subs and three players sick (me included), I would consider it to be a successful weekend. I scored 2 goals and had 4 assists in our three games. At times though, I felt myself struggling for air because of the inflamation in my lungs along with the fact that I'm still not quite cardiovascularly fit. Physically, I felt I was above par; I was able to body people off the ball with ease, and I won my share of 50/50 balls in the middle of the field. Weightlifting has really made a difference in my play, which some might find hard to believe since soccer is believed by many to be a "non-contact" sport. This summer will be crucial for me to further improve my muscular strength to the level of a collegiate athlete, as well as maintain a high level of cardiovascular fitness. It seems like as I increase my muscular strength, my cardiovascular strength is taking a hit; somehow I need to find a "happy medium" between the two. I have never been as excited, yet nervous, about anything like I am about playing soccer at Transy. I'm not exactly sure what to expect...

5 Weeks

It seems as if high school was flying by until these last couple of weeks. Ever since I began working, the days just drag by and I find myself hoping that school will end soon. We still have five weeks left, which means I have five weeks that I have to keep my grades up so I can recieve the full 500 dollars of KEYS money that we get every year we have a 4.0. As of now, I am in strong standing in every class. However, one slip up on an AP Biology or AP Language test could prove lethal. With my busy schedule, which includes soccer practice twice a week, thirty hours of work a week, and of course going to school five days a week, it is becoming harder and harder to find time to study for my classes as much as I was used to. So far it hasn't affected my grades and hopefully it won't. I have still been lifting and my MAX on bench is now around 165 pounds. I'm not quite where I would have hoped, but im still on track to get anywhere between 175 and 180 pounds, depending on how much energy I can excert every morning when I lift. Another benefit that I will be experiencing this summer is having more energy to perform my lifts. When you don't have enough energy to exort, you can't break down your muscles and form lactic acid as efficiently; therefore, your muscles are not rebuilding up to their potential. This summer I will only have to concentrate on work, lifting, and soccer. I am looking forward to summer, but I realize that high school is one of the best times of a person's life, which I will definitely miss.

Another Hurdle

I was down to just a few dollars in my pocket, I was now forced to get a job. Now I have to juggle multiple tasks: getting stronger, playing soccer, keeping my grades up, and going to work. Most people wouldn't consider my job dersierable or difficult. I would definitely agree with the first half. Stocking dairy products (milk, eggs, a million different kinds of cheese, etc.) can be straining after several hours. My first day was on Saturday and learning everything is very stressful. It is hard to do everything expected of me as fast as people who have been working at Wal-Mart for a year or longer, and it seemed as if I was being rushed to my job. However, there were about 8 new employees, and I felt as if I was doing my work more efficiently and quickly than them. By starting this new job, I have put a slight wrinkle in my goals for getting stronger and maintaining a sufficient practice schedule. Now I am only able to make 1, maybe 2, practices a week, instead of all three. As far as lifting, I am going to be tired in the mornings when I have my free weights class. This situation could put a damper on my ability to go up in weight because it will be hard to push my exhausted body, not allowing my muscles to perform to their maximum potential. But I have to remind myself that by me working, I am creating savings for when I go off to college. I won't be able to work first semester because college soccer is much more demanding. So, hopefully I will save up enough money so I don't have to work the first semester while I am going to school and playing soccer.

A week of disappointment

Well, one would think after getting demolished on Sunday afternoon, that the players on my team would be motivated to get better so this monstrosity would never occur again. This was obviously not the case because there were only nine players at our practice on Wednesday night. It is nearly impossible to have an effective practice with so few players, so the majority of practice was spend scrimmaging. Although scrimmaging is fun and a good way to improve your decision making on the field, there are more important things that need to be worked on. Hopefully the people on my team will realize this and show up to practice tonight, since we have a league game this weekend. State Cup is still about two and half months away, so we have time to improve. On the other side of things, the disappointment from this weekend revived my spirit to work out harder in the wieght room. It can only help my game if I am one of the strongest and most in shape players on the field. This week I maxed out on bench at 160 pounds, which in 15 pounds more than I did at the beginning of the semester. I am convinced to improve this MAX between 20-25 pounds for the next nine weeks, to reach my goal of around 185. Although the weekend left a sour taste in my mouth, I figured out that I was scouted by a few schools, the main being Oakland City. The head coach contacted me and offered me a $15,000 scholarship per year, which is about 70 percent of their tuition. I most likely will not go to this school because they don't have the area of study I would like, acccounting, but it is definitely an achievement and worth a visit. Hopefully if I keep working hard I will have bigger and better achievements to come...

Memphis Tourney? Kentucky Basketball!

Well, the weekend took on two totally different moods. On a positive side, Kentucky basketball signified they are on the top of the latter in the SEC. They cameback to beat Alabama in the quarter finals, blewout the 16th ranked vols, and squeaked out an overtime win against Mississippi State in the SEC Finals. Now, expectations are mammouth for the NCAA tourney, which they didn't even make last year (sorry North Carolina fans, I feel your pain). Kentucky is a 1 seed for the first time since 2004 and are now expected to meet Kansas for what people would expect to be an explosive final between the two most talented teams in college basketball. However, there was that infamous negative side of my weekend that really put a damper on Kentucky's success. Saturday, we played two inferior teams but onlny managed to pull out a tie. I'm not one to make excuses, but the fields were soaked/muddy and the half times were cut from 45 minutes to only 30 minutes. Both of these games we dominated, but we just couldn't manage to put in another goal. Sunday we were still playing for second place, if we could pull out a win against a team that had blown out both other team 7-0 and was ranked in the top 50 in the nation. I knew going in it was going to be a tough game, but never did I imagine that we would get blanked 6-0. There was no excuse for getting embarrassed this way; it was time to get back to practice and work out some kinks that obviously needed some fixing.

Polishing Rust

It's only a week away from the big tournament in Memphis, Tennesse. My soccer team has practiced the last three days in a row in an effort to polish up the rustiness from not playing outdoors since the high school season ended in early November. As any athlete knows, such a break can get you a little off your game. However, there is always going to be this long of a break when there is temperatures below 20 degrees Farenheit and snow on the ground for nearly three months. As a soccer player, there is not much we can do about this long absence besides playing a type of indoor called futsal. This is basically a type of soccer a hard floor with boundaries (not the typical off-the-wall that most people picture indoor as). The ball is slightly heavier so the game is not too fast to make it more game-like. The field is about the length of a basketball court, as well as the width. In return, it doesn't take near the cardiovascular strength that an outdoor game requires; it is also much different when you play with this heavier futsal ball than a regular outdoor ball. So, this is another barrier between the two games that does not keep the rust from forming. Hopefully the last couple of weeks have allowed us to get rid of the majority of the rust that had formed. This tournament in Memphis is mammouht in importance because of the amount of top college coaches that will be attending. Although I have pretty much made up my decision on going to Transy for soccer, there is always an outside chance that I could get a better offer from a better school if I play well.