Volleyball Drills to try

Coming up with drills to do in practices is sometimes hard because they have to involve all positions, be productive, and be fun at the same time. Some of my favorite drills are Pra-ja, Columbia, George, Baseball, WIN, and Split Court. All of these drills are fun, productive, and everyone gets a lot of touches.

Pra-ja is a game I learned at HP this year. It is definitely my favorite drill because it involves a lot of quick thinking and communication between you and your partner. Pra-ja is a 2 on 2 game with 2 balls being played at the same time. You and your partner are allowed 3 touches on each ball like normal but you can let the ball bounce in between each contact. In order to get each ball in play one partner from each side will serve one ball to the player on the other side who is not serving. After each ball is in play you play normally but you can let the ball bounce once in between each contact. If one team wins both points they stay and the other team waves through, but if both teams win one point they are both off and two new teams come on. I like this drill because it tests how well you can communicate with your teammate and it trains you to look across the net to tell your partner where he/she should attack the ball to. A hint for this drill is to never tip short. Tipping in the drill is an easy pass for the other team because the short tip will bounce up directly to a player on the other side.

Columbia is another awesome drill. Columbia is run with 4-6 players on each side of the net. The scoring and rules of a normal game apply, the only thing that is different is that every player rotates when your team attacks the ball over the net. I like this drill because you get to experience playing every position. George is similar to Columbia with 4-6 players and regular rules/scoring applies, but if you make a mistake you are out and the next person in line on your team replaces you. I like this drill because it puts pressure on you to not make a mistake. Volleyball is a game of mistakes, every point is caused by a mistake. So everyone is going to make mistakes at some point in a game but it is the team who makes the least mistakes that will come out on top. When you are playing the game George it really makes you focus on the position you are playing because if you want to stay on the court you can’t make a mistake.

These are just some of my favorite drills I have played. I hope this helps if you are looking for fun drills for a practice :) 

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Day 2 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Today our first match wasn't until 3 in the afternoon, so surprisingly we got to sleep in. For breakfast I went to a place called George Webb with a couple of my teammates. After that we watched Divergent and just hung out until we had to check out of the hotel and head to the convention center. Our first game was against Skyline, but it was postponed for a little bit because they were reffing a different game so we started playing Nukem, a game where you can catch the volleyball and take 1 step then throw it to the other side and try to score. When we started playing it other CIA teams asked if they could play and pretty soon there were around 30 girls (some of 12 Black, 16 Black, my team and 18 Black) playing. It was pretty awesome because a ton of people came to watch and asked where we were from and thought it was awesome that our club was so close to each other.

When skyline was done reffing our match started and we beat them in the first set easily. It was a little weird because 18 Black was reffing us and if we beat Skyline we were going to have to play them next. We ended up losing the second set and having to play a third. I don't know why but we are really good at third sets so I wasn't worried. We beat them easily in the third and now it was time for the real test, playing 18 Black the team that we practice with every practice and the team that we look up to. It was a little weird knowing that we would be playing them but I was excited for the challenge. In the first set we did not play well at all, I don't really know what it was but we just couldn't stop them from getting runs. So during the second set we knew we had to step it up and we definitely did. We were ahead until the last couple points, it was 24-23 and we were losing and they won on a bad call. That second set was one of the best games we have ever played so I was proud of my team.

After losing in the semi's to 18 Black we played another 18's team called Capital. They were a tough team but we should have beat them. I think we were still upset about losing to 18's and we just weren't really focused on winning that last game. We lost in 2 sets, both of the scores being close and ended up getting 4th out of 16 teams overall.

I think this weekend showed us what we have to continue working on and what we are doing well, but most importantly it showed us that we can compete with the open division teams and we are going to have to fight for every point in upcoming tournaments.

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Day 1 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Tournament time is finally here and that means playing my favorite sport with my favorite people almost every weekend. This weekend was no exception and we competed in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in the open 17 and 18's division. We faced some pretty tough competition but overall it was a great weekend.

On Friday at 4 I left with my parents and headed to Milwaukee. 5 hours later we arrived at our hotel, which was connected to the convention center where we would be playing the next 2 days. The hotel was really nice and once we got there I unpacked and then hung out with some of teammates that were there. Some girls on my team had basketball games Friday night, so they didn't get to the hotel until 2 in the morning!

On Saturday we played at 9 so we had to be at the convention center at 7:30 to watch the teams that we would be playing compete. I was pumped to play. Our first match was against Wisconsin Juniors and we beat them in 2 sets. After that we played right away and beat New Wave in the third set. During the game against New Wave the Wisconsin head volleyball coach was standing at the end of our court. I was a little nervous, but I knew I just had to play like I always do and I wold be fine. Winning the third set of that match was awesome. We played West Power Bend in our last match of the day and beat them in 2 sets.

After we were done playing we headed back to the hotel and took ice baths, showered and changed to go watch 16 Black play. Once they won their match we headed back and then went out for dinner as a team. when we got back to the hotel we hung out until it was time for "CIA's Got Talent", It was a team bonding activity that consisted of mini competitions that each team competed in together. The first competition was who could make a paper airplane that flew the furthest, which 18 Black won. there were probably 10 competitions overall and after the last one my team was tied with the 18's. So the tie breaker was an individual dance off. We lost and we were pretty bad but it turns out we were going to get a chance at revenge against them the next day, on the court.

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