Seeing the Game With Different Eyes

As an athletic development coach I watch a game or a competition quite differently. I am not a spectator or a fan, nor am I a sport coach who is concerned with tactics and strategy. Frankly my concern is the conditioning implications of tactics and strategy. I cannot afford to be a fan because that would detract from objectivity. I feel that watching a game of a team that I am working with as a conditioning coach makes me an active participant. I watch games or competitions to gather information and feedback to improve the athletes that I am working with. That is not to say that outcome is not important, because it is, that is the essence of competition and the ultimate measure in most peoples eyes. To insure consistent injury free performance it is essential to get beyond the outcome and see what I like to call the game within the game, the patterns and movements that occur that really make things happen. Those patterns and movements have direct conditioning implications that can be improved through a properly constructed program based on game analysis and observation.

The sport coach watches the game to evaluate strategy, tactics and technique. The spectator watches as a fan. Both are outcome oriented. The conditioning coach watches to see the patterns, the moments, strength/power demands and the effect of fatigue. The conditioning coach is process oriented. We look for things we have been working on in training and see how they apply. The game or competition represents an opportunity to reinforce the positive aspects of training as well as to look for things to work on.