Visualization

Table Of Contents

Visualization Skills for all aspects of the game.

Presentation at the Best In The West Volleyball Coaches Clinic Seattle February 1997

By Vic Lindal

The first phase is for the coach to determine what and how his or her team will look and feel like at the end of the season.

Do a picture of the systems that you will be running at the end of the year. To do this you can look at video of last years championships to determine what you will need in order to be successful or you can arrange a match with the best teams early in your year. The key is to know exactly what you want your team to look like. What will you do for defence, what will you do for service reception, what blocking formations will you use. Take time to mind map this to be sure that you have covered everything.

When you have completed this "End Point Visualization", then ask yourself the question. What action can I take now to get us to that picture?

You pace it back to now. That is, you picture what the team will look like and be doing the week of the championships, then the week before the championships then the month before and so on back to today.

What you are getting will be a series of mini pictures all the way back to day one. For example when you picture the championships you may see a practice at the host site or near the host site. The action is to call and book a practice court. Maybe you will be arriving a day early and want to play the local team in a practice game, call and arrange. In the week prior to the event you may decide that you need a game against teams you can beat (I happen to believe teams we can beat is important), then call and schedule.

Next you plan all practices with the end in mind. Show in the first all the ultimate systems that you will use in the finals. This will be complete with all plays, all subs etc. Some coaches like to build their systems incrementally. This might be OK, but it does not fit with the EPV system. You can practice by showing all the factors in the system and then breaking the system into its parts. Some of our team play drills cover this.

At every practice you outline the EPV (win nationals or ??). Then you outline all the drills in the practice and indicate how they fit with the target (use this word now instead of goal) of our EPV. This is very important so that all players can see the reason for all actions in practice. This helps with the visualization, (individually and collectively).

All players must be taught how to do the EPV system and must be asked to to it every night. The system every night has two major parts.

1. You do a picture of playing in the nationals. (see EPV system)

2. Run a clear movie of the key target areas that you want to achieve in the next practice. This is critical that we get the players coming to practice with clear pictures of what they want to achieve at practice. With our teams we have asked for three target areas and we ask that they be specific. You may or may not ask for the player to tell you ahead of time. For example a player may have as a target to focus on a particular action of the spike, or a particular aspect of blocking or a new serve or more emphasize on an old serve.

Now when the players do the evening movies just prior to sleep, we ask them to do it in reverse order or using the EPV system. For example on the serve the first picture is exactly where you want the ball to land. (this could be a spot or a person). The key is to have the exact details. If it is a spot, then you want to see the exact spot on the floor. You may look for intersecting lines. We have found that when players pinpoint the location then they are more likely to hit the target. Recently asked a player where he aimed when he played darts. His answer, "Always at the triple twenty." I then asked him to do the same thing in Volleyball. The next picture is paced back, so it could be the ball crossing the net. On this picture, you again have to be very clear. Height above net and exact spot over the net. Next picture could be striking the hand. Usually that is enough. The key is to do it in a snap shot fashion, from the EPV, to the start.

Now make sure that the EPV system is used in all practices.

We have the 5 steps for Quantum achievement. (separate article)

I will give #'s three to five:

Prior to every action in the game or practice, you must take these steps.

#3. Do an EPV of the likely action that you expect to take. For example in blocking, you see yourself blocking player "X". Be sure to see the exact end. For example the ball on the floor in certain spot.

#4. If you are successful, then you run the movie again and anchor the feeling of a great play.

# 5. If you were not successful then run a movie of being successful. Also you want to reset your system so you do the following:

The above is an example to use in a game. You must do exactly the same in practice.

The key is to do the EPV system of every action.

Examples:

Service Reception

Defence:

Exactly the same.

The key to defence is to see the ball already in the perfectly passed position.

Setting:

Spiking.

From the bench.

EPV's are a way of life and need to be done for all aspects of life. Volleyball gives you a great chance to practice this most powerful life skill.

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