Summer Is Nearly Here!

Sorry I haven't written for a while. Not much has been happening to tell you the truth. I have continued my workouts. I haven't been able to lift though. I picked up some extra hours at work so I miss my lifting times with Rico. But I have continued to run and do my sprints. Yesterday I actually did Zumba, the salsa dance workout which is pretty popular. It's pretty fun. I sweat a lot and am tired afterwards. I have the dvds but I used to take the class here at Bradley last spring with my team. It was a lot of fun. If you get a chance to try it out and you enjoy dancing I highly recommend it. :)

Anyway, this is my last week at Bradley! I graduate Saturday... I can hardly believe it! And it's funny because for the past 4 years I was excited about school being done, but now that the end is quickly approaching I am beginning to realize what I will miss. I will miss my friends that I have shared so many memories with over the past four years. We will spread out all across the country. One in Colorado, one in Indiana, one in Arizona... all over. A couple of us made a pact that we will have a reunion every year and go visit one person no matter where they are. The people that we visit will change each year. I hope we follow through with this because I am not ready for these friendships to end. It won't be the same living back at home for good now until I move out. I am so used to living with my teammates and best friends. It's something I took for granted these past four years and now with our lease coming to an end and the packing beginning, I begin to realize how sad I will be when I can't just walk across the hall into Lyndi's or Kait's room. I will miss being able to walk across the street to the soccer house which was my second home on campus.

With summer quickly approaching, I am beginning to plan out what tournaments I will partake in. I know there is a 4's tournament the 22nd and a doubles tourney the 29th in Michigan. The tourney on the 29th is a pro-level beach tournament. I am pretty pumped for it. As soon as I get home this weekend I am going to begin training so that I have a chance at winning. There is an EVP June 13th and then other multiple grass tournaments that I have been notified about. I am really excited! With being at home this summer, instead of school, I will more likely be able to play in them all. :)

As far as training goes, I don't really have a schedule. I know the 3 main things I would like to work on are blocking, serve receive, and reading the hitter. I haven't really played in a tournament yet where the competition blocks and where we need to block. I most likely will be the player that blocks on my team. I need to work on setting up the block and then turning and finding the ball. Serve receive needs to become more consistent. I rarely played all the way around in college. I was part of our serve receive pattern but I wasn't a main passer. I would get the shorter balls. I am inconsistent and need to make sure I can at least pass the ball up somewhere where my partner can get a decent bump set/set out of it. Lots of repetition and advice will help me with this. Reading the block will come with time. I plan on taking advice on this as well from other players who are more knowledgeable and experienced than me. Granted I will probably be blocking a majority of the time but I still need to know how to play defense and read the hitter. I am excited to get on the court with my partner and put in some serious time training and playing together. I hope we establish a great connection and click. Only time will tell though. And once time lets me know, I'll let you know. :)