Kopion 2016

Tonight we had over 150 kids show up for the Speed and Agility training. Thanks guys for a great job.

Senior Captain Scott Soldan
"Hey guys, I hope everyone is having a profitable summer and killing their workouts. In two weeks from today (Monday) I hope to see all of you at Captain’s practice for the week.  As most of you know from my past emails, I usually have lots to stay. So strap in and stay with me. I’ll try not to make this too long.
I have thought about a lot of different things that I wanted to make my post about for this week and it was hard to settle on one, but seeing that I just got done watching American Sniper I will talk about something from that movie because you all know I love it. Watch this clip from (1:55) to the end and you will see the part I want to talk about. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpi6T8MDTtk
At the end of this clip the drill instructor ask Chris Kyle how he is feeling. This might seem like a simple question that would warrant a response like, “I feel fine drill sergeant” or “I’m a little cold, sir”, but sitting chest deep in freezing cold water after months of exhausting and extensive training, Chris Kyle answers by saying, “Dangerous… I’m feeling dangerous.” This is one of my favorite quotes from this movie, because it shows the mental transformation that he went through during his training. He came into training as a cowboy and in that moment with those 4 words, you can clearly see him as a warrior. I love this idea of feeling dangerous. To me it just oozes confidence. It says, “It doesn’t matter you’re your strategy or game plan is, I will find a way to beat you.” It is my desire for everyone on this team to be able to look at each other and confidently say that you feel dangerous when you step on the soccer field. When was the last time you felt dangerous on the field? Have you ever felt dangerous while you are on the field? Too many times last year we were spectators on the field. We sat back and let people have their way with us. Gentlemen, this cannot happen anymore. So how do we get to a point where we feel dangerous as a team….as one unit. There are two things that stick out to me.
The first is that in order to feel dangerous we have to be confident. Confident in our skills, knowing that we have pushed ourselves to the limit to ensure we are successful when the time comes for us to perform. This means that we train hard EVERYDAY. We refine our skills. We PLAY SIMPLE. We master 2 touch. We know our style of play inside and out. We know what to do and where to be no matter where the ball is on the field. We listen. We communicate. We are fit. These are all skills that every person needs to be confident in, in order for our team to feel dangerous.
The other aspect of feeling dangerous is finding your heart. Coach K is arguably the most successful college basketball coach in history. In his book, “Leading with the Heart”, he says, “Leaders have to search for the heart of the team, because the person who has it can bring out the best in everybody else. The person who has it inspires the entire team.” When I think about who has heart on our team, I think about guys like Reid. I love having this guy on my team because I know he makes everyone around him better! He is exactly what Coach K is talking about in his book. We need to find more guys who have a heart like Reid. I know that Reid will blow somebody up in a game because he does that day in and day out in practice. We should view every training session as a time to test ourselves and test each other. How tough are you? How tough is the guy you are going against? Will you lay your teammate out on a tackle in practice because you know he is tough enough to handle it or are you worried he might get mad at you? Are you will to run a guy into the ground in practice to show him that his starting spot is not safe? Or are you content being a nice guy that “knows his role”?
I want our team to be able to feel dangerous as we step out on the field together every game. If we do that, then we can play and compete with anybody but it starts by first of all being supremely confident in your skills because of the training that you have gone through. It becomes a reality when you find a common heart within our team, and we do that by following the example of Reid and others who already possess it. That is when we become a truly dangerous team and one that nobody likes to play against. "