Soccer Coaching Tips

Speed exercises in the summer means climbing temperatures and your youngsters or teens will be playing and practicing in the heat. Consequently, children do not adapt to the heat as well as adults. It is also imperative to be know how to prevent heat illness and be aware of the warning signs. Heat stroke, heat exhaustian and heat cramps are the kinds of heat ailments. If your team is doing strength training workouts, as an adult, you need to keep in mind how dangerous heat illness can be to your charges. In reality, heat sickness can be most dangerous to children.  The mortality rate for children having heat stroke is 17 to 70%. The factors to consider are the youth’s age and the gravity of the illness.

Youngsters suffer heat sickness when their bodies can not adapt to heat and correctly lower the body temperature.  Youngsters are more vulnerable to heat related illnesses because they don’t adapt as fast or as well to heat changes as do adults and they also create additional warmth with activeness. Young people are more at risk to heat sickness since they do not adapt as fast or as efficiently to changes in heat like adults. They also produce additional heat when they are active. Youngsters also perspire at a greater body temperature plus they sweat less than adults.  For overweight children, who take medicine and have ongoing illnesses are more at risk in hot weather during workouts.

WARNINGS
Heat Cramps – painful, involuntary muscle spasms,  usually in the gastrocnemius or hamstring muscles (the muscles at the back of the calves and thighs)

Dehydration – fatigue, thirst,  lightheadedness, less-frequent urination,  confusedness, exaggerated heart rate and breathing, parched skin,  dry mouth and mucous membranes

Heat Exhaustion – clammy, blanched skin, sweating,  weakness (fatigue), throbbing head and or dizziness

Heat Stroke – Loss of consciousness, confusion or hallucinations, headache, agitation, high body temperature, absence of diaphoresis, deep or shallow breathing, weak pulse rate, seizures|

STEPS TO PREVENT
Be conscious that temperatures over 80 degrees create conditions favorable to heat malady.  Know that excessive humidity reduces a body’s ability to discard surplus heat by perspiring. Avoid illness by getting young people acclimated to the high temperatures. Workout intensity should slowly increase over the first two weeks with no strenuous work in week one. Early evening or morning is the best time for exercising as it is cooler outside. Ensure youngsters take rest periods. Hydrate kids before working out and at practice have enough fluids on hand for hydrating – preferably H2O. Minors need to drink fluids every 20 minutes while working out, whether thirsty or not. Fluids to avoid are caffeine and anything carbonated. Kids need to wear clothing that is light and well-ventilated.

Whether your youngster or your squad is doing speed exercises as a manager or parent, you need to be alert of the danger of heat-related conditions.  Respect the hot temperatures or there could be deadly consequences.

Speed and agility training has seen a paradigm shift in the past couple of years.   Some see it as the biggest breakthrough in athletic training and speed and agility training in decades.   It is all because some people went against the grain and declared a previously untrainable skill set to be trainable. The NFL Combine is a camp in which professional football teams assess NFL draft candidates – this training is the “where it’s at” there.   Sports Vision training.  It encompasses the obscure skills such as reaction speed, sport intelligence, anticipation, game tempo, court or field vision, focus and concentration, depth perception and timing. The training comes from the premise that athletes react to what they can see.   The most valuable team mates are those that are all around good. And this training helps you with this.
Athletes make mistakes if their sports vision is lacking.    It used to be that athletes could rely on “just” being very fast. If their speed and agility training achieved this, then it was ok. This is however no longer sufficient these days.  Times have changed and the atletes who don’t improve these previously untrainable characteristics will be left sitting on the bench.

When an athlete undergoes sports vision training, they process information in greater amounts.  They react to stimulus faster even when under great stress.  This field is so new that not many standards have been completely designed, but here are some of them:

* peripheral awareness – being able to recognize and react to objects out of  the corner of the eye

* visual reaction time – is time between when a change or stimulus is seen and when you react to it

* dynamic visual acuity – the number and correctness of the moving objects the athlete can keep an eye out for    * called eye tracking, this previously untrainable characteristic improves the capacity of an athlete to “keep his eye on the ball”, at faster and faster speeds
* eye focusing – this training allows your eyes to get more information by being able to focus on things faster, more information, better game reactions

* depth perception -perceiving the world in three dimensions while correctly judging the objects speed and distance

* fusion flexibility and stamina – under excessive speed and being physically taxed,  the ability of the eyes to work together
I hope this has sparked your interest as far as Sports Vision Training is concerned.  I think it is funny that the old saying: “keep your eye on the ball” has become an actual, measurable, improvable feat.

Other cool resources on speed and agility training that you need to check out are:speed,agility and protein

For more tips click here Agility Training

You should also check out this awesome exercise for speed and agility training .