The screens beside our courts replay every rep. Here is why.
A player sees her own arm swing a few seconds after she made it, while the coach is still talking. What delayed video review does for a 12-year-old, and why we built it into the gym.
What the screens do
Beside each court there is a screen that replays what the camera saw a few seconds ago. A player passes a ball, looks up, and sees her own platform, her own feet and her own shoulders from the side, while the coach is still standing next to her. The replay runs on a short delay, so nobody has to stop, rewind or hold a phone.
Why it matters for a twelve-year-old
Most of what a coach says to a young player is a description of something she cannot see. "Your elbow dropped." "You were early." She nods and has no picture of it. The screen gives her the picture. The correction lands in one rep instead of twenty, and it lands as her own observation rather than an adult's opinion.
It also takes the pressure out of feedback. She is not being told she is wrong; she is watching a replay, the way she watches any replay. That is the external focus we teach for tryouts, applied to practice.
How we use it
- In skill blocks, the coach cues one thing, the player does the rep, both look at the screen.
- In the strength room, Volleyball Pattern Training® reps are checked the same way: the squat she passes from, seen from the side.
- Coaches can mic up, so a whole court hears the same cue at once.
The screens are part of why the facility was built rather than rented. You cannot bolt this into a borrowed school gym for two hours a night.
More from the gym
- Coaches, slow down. A tryout story.A coach who had never met her asked a player to move five feet and change her platform in the middle of a tryout. What happened next is why we tell players to say thank you and play their game.
- Volleyball Pattern Training®, explained for parents.Why the squat she lifts with is the squat she passes from, what the eight VPT episodes cover, and why every club practice starts with thirty minutes in the strength room.
- What her first club practice looks like, and why.The first five minutes on the court, in one take. What a new player does in her first practice at the facility, what the coaches are watching for, and the one thing parents can do to help.