So the last practice of fall quarter is over and we've entered the time of individual training over the holidays. What motivates players to go out and push themselves in the cold training, while old friends and Mom's homecooking beckon inside? It is obvious that all the best players put in the work over breaks, and some mid level players can build the base of greatness during these times. But surely this knowledge alone cannot be enough to drive these guys out to lonely hill workout and fartlek runs?

What drives my players? I'm not sure. Thanks to Louis we've got a great workout log for the team, it's online so everyone can see what everyone else is doing. This helps to motivate through both the inspiration of seeing your teammates workouts, and through the shame of not doing as much. However, I don't think that is enough to drive someone to put their all into each sprint and every last squat jump.

I hope that most of my guys are visualizing one of two things. 1) Our main goal for the season, a National Championship (UPA, Champies, whatever) 2) Our 15-7 loss to Brown in the semis six months ago. I know that those two thoughts would drive me. To achieve number one we need to be stronger and faster so that number two won't happen again.

Personally, I know that during my '01-'02 Christmas break I was visualizing myself schooling Alex Nord. Now, at the time I had never played against him, so I didn't know how unrealistic that was. But it never hurts to dream big. ( I have since played against Alex several times and even covered him for a few cuts. Hey, I even almost got a layout d on him(stress on almost), but lets just say that he is generally not playing on the same level of reality as me.)

As a fun aside, Spell Check for blogger questioned "UPA" but accepted "Champies" so Champies it is.