Sports
Turning a Grueling Water Polo Practice Into an Intriguing Part of My Day
Non-stop swimming combined with teamwork and ball skills equals hard work, which can be applied to other facets of life.
The amount of training and excercise in water polo may seem extreme.
The suggested 20-minute daily exercise you'd find in fitness magazines barely covers our warm up, incomparable to our daily 2 hours of heart-pounding sprints, treading, dry-land training, scrimmaging, passing and technique.
As unpleasant as it all may sound, water polo practice has become one of the best parts of my day. It’s a chance for me to unwind, take my mind off stress and just pound the heck out of the water.
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A typical workout goes something like this:
Warm up is usually a couple hundred yards of swimming, treading, and short sprints. You thought that was hard? Next comes long swimming sets. This is where they miss out on how amazing water polo can be. They’re either afraid of the cardio or never try to put in the effort.
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It's understandable when about a zillion 100s are staring at you in the face. However, it’s become second nature for my teammates to support each other. We make it a challenge by pacing each other, or by turning it into a game.
Oftentimes, the Lancers will say, "happy halfway!" Or I might say, "okay, new set, 10 more 100s!"
When I'm with friends, it’s not too hard to make a workout fun.
The last part of the workout is the best. This is when Lakes gets into game situations like passing under pressure, shooting, and running offensive and defensive drills.
During games, I direct plays and take advantage of shooting opportunities. That's my responsibility in the set position, and I usually play all 28 minutes, broken into four 7-minute quarters.
It’s essential that I improve my endurance as well as my game skills, also making the latter part of the workout important for the Lancers to learn about each other’s abilities and styles.
As tough as water polo is, practice in any sport is vital to a rewarding life and academic career. Working as a team through the good and bad times, communicating efficiently, making practice a priority, celebrating your accomplishments and learning from defeat are life skills that I can not pick up by reading a book, but are necessary to a workplace or even at home.
If I’ve learned one thing from playing water polo, it’s that with practice and a good support system, I can score any goal I shoot for — pun intended.
Be here next week for more water polo excitement!
