Warm Up?

G

Grace T.

DA
So for those of you who have been in it longer than me, what's the expectation of a proper warmup for a keeper? Reason I ask is that Jeff Tackett in his newsletter has an interesting piece on the warmup. He says it's important not just for injury avoidance and performance, but also because even though a recruiter might not watch the warmup, since a keeper is supposed to be a leader, they won't think much of keeper that doesn't demand a proper warmup.

What do you think about a keeper (or for the younger's their parent) demanding such a warmup? I think that was one of the reasons we got in the gutter with the old club (they'd only give him a proper warmup if the keeper coach was there and that was only home games....otherwise it was the old let's shoot on the keeper which Tackett especially tears into) so I'd think I'd be a bit gunshy about this. In fairness, the coaches had multiple teams and were often juggling. Does it change as they get older?

What's involved in a "proper" warmup in your opinion?
 
This is a great question. One that we've struggled with for years. Up until this year, my kid's coaches have been pretty lousy at warming up keepers. Except for when she split time and had the other keeper do the warm up, dad had been the go to warm up coach. It was fine in the younger years, but as she got better (and her pissy pre-game teenage attitude got worse) dad warm ups became a real detriment. Plus, my shot placement did really suck. She finally got a head coach who used to be a keeper and he took over and I noticed her game play improved. I asked her keeper coach about warm ups and he said it all comes down to individual comfort. He said some keepers don't feel ready to play unless they are sweating and dirty, others only want a few touches and easy saves to feel ready. He came to a game once when she was 11 and did the warm up. It was almost as hard as his regular workouts. She complained before the game to me that she was worn out, but she went on to have her best game of the year. Today she prefers a moderate warm up with catchable tosses and kicks and lots of footwork.

And yes, the rapid fire shots from the team are terrible before a game. Our keeper coach says you might as well put a monkey in goal for all it's worth. You want your keeper starting off feeling invincible, not feeling like every shot is hitting the back of the net.
 
Yeah I am the old lady out there warming up my daughter which is pretty funny considering I had to teach myself how to punt by an instructional video on the internet years ago. I have become decent at it since I have probably kicked more balls than most Keepers (Obvious joke their but I will leave it alone) (Side note: I haven't had knee problems since I have been helping train my daughter). LOL We usually get to games early so we have time to warm up before the team gets there. Even though they have a second Keeper, my daughter likes to go through the warm up with me because I try and hit everything she will potentially go through during the game. This is more about getting her mentally prepared. She has come to expect it and worries about enough time to do it. I like Mystery Train have received a bit of attitude and I simply say I am done and walk off. She is the one that wants it so we usually don't have that problem.

Having said that, in the past, one of my daughter's coaches seemed to be against it and would take over doing it. Believe me I would rather sit my butt in a chair. My daughter was so upset after the game he did that because she didn't get a complete warm up and that is when we started to show up early to the games so that we could warm up. I have gotten some strange looks and even comments from people that said she could warm up with the other Keeper. I agree that warming up with the other Keeper is great and she should be part of team warm up but she also needs to be mentally prepared and whatever she feels is necessary to get her there is what I want to do. I let her guide what she wants me to do.

Totally agree with Mystery Train: "And yes, the rapid fire shots from the team are terrible before a game. Our keeper coach says you might as well put a monkey in goal for all it's worth. You want your keeper starting off feeling invincible, not feeling like every shot is hitting the back of the net." When confidence is key for a Keeper, why would anyone think that is good for them?
 
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Keepermom2 said:
Totally agree with Mystery Train: "And yes, the rapid fire shots from the team are terrible before a game. Our keeper coach says you might as well put a monkey in goal for all it's worth. You want your keeper starting off feeling invincible, not feeling like every shot is hitting the back of the net." When confidence is key for a Keeper, why would anyone think that is good for them?
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It's bad not only for the goalkeeper but also for the rest of the team. If players hitting the net it's bad for a goalkeeper and if goalkeeper making saves, it's bad for a team.
When my kid played DA, they had this warm-up before each game, where 1 player would go outside and cross and 2 players would go for the shot around 6 with no defense. Needles to say he hated it. Most of the shots went in. Talking about point black shots and saves.
What he likes is no pressure catches, stretch and work some low and high shots.
I also noticed watching a lot of pre-game warm-up at EPL games, that if team is taking shots, they are using 2nd keeper, who will not play in the game ("monkey in goal" is a good comparison for that) , and the 1st keeper warming up with keeper coach.
 
A lot of people are using the term "drop kick" in a context where it is not clear whether they know the difference between a drop kick and a punt.
 
Eagle33 said:
It's bad not only for the goalkeeper but also for the rest of the team. If players hitting the net it's bad for a goalkeeper and if goalkeeper making saves, it's bad for a team.
When my kid played DA, they had this warm-up before each game, where 1 player would go outside and cross and 2 players would go for the shot around 6 with no defense. Needles to say he hated it. Most of the shots went in. Talking about point black shots and saves.
What he likes is no pressure catches, stretch and work some low and high shots.
I also noticed watching a lot of pre-game warm-up at EPL games, that if team is taking shots, they are using 2nd keeper, who will not play in the game ("monkey in goal" is a good comparison for that) , and the 1st keeper warming up with keeper coach.
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Have the keeper coach warm up the keeper who will play outside the goal, then tell him to go into the goal and make the shooters feel invincible.
 
Keepermom2 said:
I appropriately edited my post. Had to look up the difference but now I know.
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In the rules for gridiron football there is a significant difference, but in soccer the only time I have seen that it matters is in some indoor leagues where keeper punts are banned, but keeper dropkicks (ball hits the ground before being kicked) are allowed. For a well-trained keeper, it is hard sometimes to tell the difference when viewing in real time from the sideline.
 
My kid has been taught every keeper warm up from starting slowly rolling the ball around the feet, to the ground work to controlled dives pregame. Last year, the coach would throw him in with the field players who are running through cones and quick passes and or the coach would sit on the 18 and fire shots. Rarely, if ever did he get a proper warm-up.

I don't buy into the concept that taking shots pregame is detrimental to the psyche. I've heard it many times from the top trainers, but still don't buy it. My view is that if the keeper is so fragile that having some balls shot in the upper 90 pregame destroys his/her confidence then that kid probably shouldn't be a keeper. With these shooting drills, typically the shot takers are sending balls every 1.3 seconds and shooting so the ball kisses the sticks, which makes the utility of the drill almost useless for the keeper. The keeper knows this and should approach this type of pregame routine as purely working on timing, stretching and warming up various muscle groups.

On his JV HS team, I watched the field players in 2 lines pass/shot on both keepers with the express goal of hitting the corners. Since I was on the field with camera in hand, I strolled over to the Assistant and said "You know, that drill is doing absolutely nothing for your keepers." His response was "I know, our keepers are not our problem, shooting on frame and scoring goals is our problem." Well, at least he had a plan. When he got moved to varsity at the end of the season, he had a real keeper coach that would send the boys through a proper warm-up.
 
espola said:
In the rules for gridiron football there is a significant difference, but in soccer the only time I have seen that it matters is in some indoor leagues where keeper punts are banned, but keeper dropkicks (ball hits the ground before being kicked) are allowed. For a well-trained keeper, it is hard sometimes to tell the difference when viewing in real time from the sideline.
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The ultimate goal from the trainer is ultimately to have the keeper get to the sidewinder....so most will discourage the drop kick once the keeper knows how to punt since the drop kick might lead to bad habits when it comes time to learn the sidewinder. If the keeper knows all 3 they all have their place...punt for distance, drop kick for shorter accuracy, sidewinder for a rapid counter, but the long throw seems to have replaced the drop kick in European soccer being more accurate and quick than a drop kick.

Eagle33 said:
I also noticed watching a lot of pre-game warm-up at EPL games, that if team is taking shots, they are using 2nd keeper, who will not play in the game ("monkey in goal" is a good comparison for that) , and the 1st keeper warming up with keeper coach.
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Yeah, but what do you do if there isn't a keeper coach for warmups? Tackett says the keeper should speak up. The jist I'm getting here is that the parent is doing it (which didn't really work for us last year).
 
Grace T. said:
The ultimate goal from the trainer is ultimately to have the keeper get to the sidewinder....so most will discourage the drop kick once the keeper knows how to punt since the drop kick might lead to bad habits when it comes time to learn the sidewinder. If the keeper knows all 3 they all have their place...punt for distance, drop kick for shorter accuracy, sidewinder for a rapid counter, but the long throw seems to have replaced the drop kick in European soccer being more accurate and quick than a drop kick.



Yeah, but what do you do if there isn't a keeper coach for warmups? Tackett says the keeper should speak up. The jist I'm getting here is that the parent is doing it (which didn't really work for us last year).
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Most of the teams don't have keeper coach at the game. Good way is to establish the warm-up routine either with a 2nd goalkeeper or with 1 of the players. Having parent doing it is NO-NO in my book, unless parent is a qualified keeper trainer.
 
Eagle33 said:
Most of the teams don't have keeper coach at the game. Good way is to establish the warm-up routine either with a 2nd goalkeeper or with 1 of the players. Having parent doing it is NO-NO in my book, unless parent is a qualified keeper trainer.
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I am (though I don't make any pretense about being any good) but still wouldn't want to do it (he fights me, I get him nervous, and it interferes with him building a relationship with his coach if he's looking to me for guidance). I also think it's dangerous because like KeeperMom points out it could lead to a "bit of attitude" (but maybe that's what we have to do as keeper parents...might we have to do some things which aren't acceptable if other team parents did them?....but then again, that was part of the factor of the old coach turning on us for rockin the boat) What was even worse was when they had another parent do it (bad enough if a coach tells my kid something which is incorrect but I don't want a parent that doesn't know keeping it doing it before the game).

I like the idea of a warmup with one of the players if no second keeper, but at the younger ages it would still require some effort on the part of the coach to supervise.
 
Grace T. said:
I am (though I don't make any pretense about being any good) but still wouldn't want to do it (he fights me, I get him nervous, and it interferes with him building a relationship with his coach if he's looking to me for guidance). I also think it's dangerous because like KeeperMom points out it could lead to a "bit of attitude" (but maybe that's what we have to do as keeper parents...might we have to do some things which aren't acceptable if other team parents did them?....but then again, that was part of the factor of the old coach turning on us for rockin the boat) What was even worse was when they had another parent do it (bad enough if a coach tells my kid something which is incorrect but I don't want a parent that doesn't know keeping it doing it before the game).

I like the idea of a warmup with one of the players if no second keeper, but at the younger ages it would still require some effort on the part of the coach to supervise.
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Establishing a routine can be done at any age. Coach should just tell keeper what needs to be done step-by-step before each game.
 
A coach always warms up my daughter, usually her keeper coach, otherwise one of the other coaches. Everyone talks about having the 2nd keeper warm her up, ha, not many teams have a 2nd keeper, and many teams don't even have a quality 1st keeper on the girls side, with even some teams that don't even have a keeper and look to their lower levels and bring someone up. I've seen this with big clubs and with small clubs. Probably why you always see people on this board looking for keepers.

Have to agree about the confidence level issue. If goals by your teammates destroys your confidence, then you are in the wrong line of work. Sometime during these pregame shooting drills the girls get lazy with their passes or shots. That is when the keeper can shine and keep her players on their toes and working their best. Now for her this always come after she has already warmed up. She warms up 15 with the team, 20 with keeper coach, then 15 back with the team while they shoot.
 
socalkdg said:
If goals by your teammates destroys your confidence, then you are in the wrong line of work.
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MWN said:
My view is that if the keeper is so fragile that having some balls shot in the upper 90 pregame destroys his/her confidence then that kid probably shouldn't be a keeper.
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I hear you both to a degree. But it's a personality thing. My daughter likes to work herself into a zone and she's pretty high maintenance about it.

Part of that zone for her is finding a level of hyper-focus which means stopping everything that comes at you. It's not that having her team shoot on her "destroys" confidence, it's that if done from too close in, or if the shots are coming too quickly one after another, it A) pisses her off, and B) takes her out of the mentality that she wants heading into kickoff. If she gets there in her warm-up and then has to turn it off while letting her teammates shoot, she just doesn't like it. Her current coach does a good job of not letting them get free shots from 8 yards out, and keeping the pacing so that she has time to recover and focus on the next shot. He tells her to step out of the goal and take a break if he sees she's working too hard. And to Eagle's point, I have seen her take the fire out of some of the more timid teammates back in the day (youngers levels) by denying them every shot before a game.

I'd relate it to a horse getting ready to go to post. Some can sit in the gate and wait for days. Some can only stand to be in there for a few moments and will bang around in there and get antsy if they have to hold back too long, and the rider has to back them out and get settled in again. My kid is the latter. Being high-strung like that before a game also meant that if I wasn't giving her the perfect toss or kick during warm-up, she would get really snippy with me and then I had a hard time not putting my Dad hat back on and giving her a real chewing out, which never helped her get ready. Just to underscore why parent warm-ups are a bad idea.
 
LOL about having a qualified Keeper trainer warming up kids. My daughter is 11 and has never seen a Keeper trainer at a game and last year the coach rarely showed up prior to the game starting because of scheduling etc. I learned 2 years ago that I better step up my game as a Keeper parent or my daughter would fall behind because A. Trainers have different philosophies so I had to keep my daughter down 1 path to get her out of confusion which was messing with her game B. Some trainers work on shot stopping and others work on technique (my daughter had one early on that was focused on technique and I learned a lot from him) and I have only had 1 that works on strategy in the goal and C. My daughter has never received a warm up that gets her mentally ready for the game other than with me (That is her opinion. She isn't serious about a lot but she is very serious about me warming her up and she rides my butt in the morning of a game to get her there early for warm up. Some times I am really tired and don't want to do it but she talks me into it). To presume a parent doesn't know enough to properly warm up their Keeper is sort of funny to me considering I have been to a multitude of Keeper trainings and focus in on the technique being trained and why it is being trained so when my daughter asks me to practice with her, I can ensure she is using proper technique. I am pretty certain you can ask a whole lot of Keeper parents what the proper technique was for various catches/dives etc. and they can tell you. There is no one that watches my daughter in a game like I do nor knows my daughter and her psychological makeup like I do. Since she just started playing up 2 years, I noticed she wasn't used to the long shots and bounces that result so I started kicking those kind of balls at her before games to get her mentally prepared for them. She usually tells me what she wants to work on in addition to a prescribed warm up. If she didn't want me to warm her up, I wouldn't do it. The Keeper position is such a mental position that whatever she thinks is necessary to get her ready, I am willing to do. I am so looking forward to the day my daughter has a Keeper trainer warm her up. I think we would both appreciate that.
 
Keepermom2 said:
L I learned 2 years ago that I better step up my game as a Keeper parent or my daughter would fall behind because A. Trainers have different philosophies so I had to keep my daughter down 1 path to get her out of confusion which was messing with her game B. Some trainers work on shot stopping and others work on technique (my daughter had one early on that was focused on technique and I learned a lot from him) and I have only had 1 that works on strategy in the goal and
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It's funny you say that because even though I don't coach my son anymore, to the extent I'm still involved in his training it's as synthesizer-in-chief....to help him make sense of the mess of conflicting information he gets from different coaches, trainers (private and club), and camps...which is why even though I'm not coaching anymore, I'm keeping up with my education. And as you seem to hint at, I think keeper parents can often know more than even coaches about keeping after no more than a couple years, even if they started with zero soccer knowledge. I think most of us agree that it would be great if the club had a keeper trainer or assistant coach to do the warmup....I don't think I've heard anyone disagree with that.....I think the argument is when that luxury isn't available what should you do? The pros for having the parent do it (if they are knowledgeable) is that they know the kid best and may know more about keeping than even the coach. The cons are they may interfere with the kid developing a relationship with the coach, they may fight with the kid (if the kid is prone to that), others may take exception to the parent being involved, and that it might not look professional in a recruiting situation for college.
 
Keepermom2 said:
LOL about having a qualified Keeper trainer warming up kids. My daughter is 11 and has never seen a Keeper trainer at a game and last year the coach rarely showed up prior to the game starting because of scheduling etc. I learned 2 years ago that I better step up my game as a Keeper parent or my daughter would fall behind because A. Trainers have different philosophies so I had to keep my daughter down 1 path to get her out of confusion which was messing with her game B. Some trainers work on shot stopping and others work on technique (my daughter had one early on that was focused on technique and I learned a lot from him) and I have only had 1 that works on strategy in the goal and C. My daughter has never received a warm up that gets her mentally ready for the game other than with me (That is her opinion. She isn't serious about a lot but she is very serious about me warming her up and she rides my butt in the morning of a game to get her there early for warm up. Some times I am really tired and don't want to do it but she talks me into it). To presume a parent doesn't know enough to properly warm up their Keeper is sort of funny to me considering I have been to a multitude of Keeper trainings and focus in on the technique being trained and why it is being trained so when my daughter asks me to practice with her, I can ensure she is using proper technique. I am pretty certain you can ask a whole lot of Keeper parents what the proper technique was for various catches/dives etc. and they can tell you. There is no one that watches my daughter in a game like I do nor knows my daughter and her psychological makeup like I do. Since she just started playing up 2 years, I noticed she wasn't used to the long shots and bounces that result so I started kicking those kind of balls at her before games to get her mentally prepared for them. She usually tells me what she wants to work on in addition to a prescribed warm up. If she didn't want me to warm her up, I wouldn't do it. The Keeper position is such a mental position that whatever she thinks is necessary to get her ready, I am willing to do. I am so looking forward to the day my daughter has a Keeper trainer warm her up. I think we would both appreciate that.
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This was exactly my experience up until about age 14. My daughter preferred me to warm her up, and I enjoyed the process of bonding and helping her get in the zone. But things changed and 90% of it was the teenage/parent dynamic. Pre-teen, I was the all-knowing, all-seeing DadMan, the one who could answer any question, solve any problem, scale tall buildings in a single bound. When she turned 14, I suddenly became a complete idiot. And a general embarrassment to humanity as well. Suggestions and pointers that used to receive eager attention were now either completely ignored or returned with, "I ALREADY KNOW THAT," replete with exasperated eye-roll. It didn't help that she began needing a more intensive warm up with more difficult shots, which I could provide only about 50% of the time. Bless you and your kid if you both cross the Rubicon of puberty and maintain that positive energy during warm ups into the older age groups. I'm not saying it's impossible, it just didn't go that way for me. I'm happy to report that although I'm still mildly embarrassing and annoying, I'm not quite as dumb as I was when she was 14. There's hope for me yet.

Anyway, you're spot on about qualified keeper trainers warming up kids. It just isn't realistic. The only time it happened for us was at our club's tournament and her club keeper trainer just happened to be at our field before our game. Thus, even though I think parent warm-ups are a poor solution, it is often the ONLY solution.
 
Grace T. said:
It's funny you say that because even though I don't coach my son anymore, to the extent I'm still involved in his training it's as synthesizer-in-chief....to help him make sense of the mess of conflicting information he gets from different coaches, trainers (private and club), and camps...which is why even though I'm not coaching anymore, I'm keeping up with my education. And as you seem to hint at, I think keeper parents can often know more than even coaches about keeping after no more than a couple years, even if they started with zero soccer knowledge. I think most of us agree that it would be great if the club had a keeper trainer or assistant coach to do the warmup....I don't think I've heard anyone disagree with that.....I think the argument is when that luxury isn't available what should you do? The pros for having the parent do it (if they are knowledgeable) is that they know the kid best and may know more about keeping than even the coach. The cons are they may interfere with the kid developing a relationship with the coach, they may fight with the kid (if the kid is prone to that), others may take exception to the parent being involved, and that it might not look professional in a recruiting situation for college.
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EXACTLY!!! I always think of myself as the sifter! I sift through and analyze everything being taught so my daughter doesn't get confused! Once she learns something wrong it is hell to break her!

I am pretty sure her last club thought of me warming her up as unprofessional (she is 11 years old) and my thought was...somebody needs to do it! 3 minutes of focused coach time if at all was not enough. That is why we show up before practice start time of games now. I wasn't resentful or anything I just wanted to solve the problem. Now she trains with me before training with her new team and the other Keeper. I immediately leave the field when her team begins to train. She is happy with this set up so I am happy.

FYI...One person commented that the person that warms your child up should be a "qualified keeper trainer" and having a parent do it is a "No No"...that was the premise of my comments.
 
Mystery Train said:
This was exactly my experience up until about age 14. My daughter preferred me to warm her up, and I enjoyed the process of bonding and helping her get in the zone. But things changed and 90% of it was the teenage/parent dynamic. Pre-teen, I was the all-knowing, all-seeing DadMan, the one who could answer any question, solve any problem, scale tall buildings in a single bound. When she turned 14, I suddenly became a complete idiot. And a general embarrassment to humanity as well. Suggestions and pointers that used to receive eager attention were now either completely ignored or returned with, "I ALREADY KNOW THAT," replete with exasperated eye-roll. It didn't help that she began needing a more intensive warm up with more difficult shots, which I could provide only about 50% of the time. Bless you and your kid if you both cross the Rubicon of puberty and maintain that positive energy during warm ups into the older age groups. I'm not saying it's impossible, it just didn't go that way for me. I'm happy to report that although I'm still mildly embarrassing and annoying, I'm not quite as dumb as I was when she was 14. There's hope for me yet.

Anyway, you're spot on about qualified keeper trainers warming up kids. It just isn't realistic. The only time it happened for us was at our club's tournament and her club keeper trainer just happened to be at our field before our game. Thus, even though I think parent warm-ups are a poor solution, it is often the ONLY solution.
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I laughed out loud for a bit at your post! While my daughter likes me to warm her up now, I have to show her 3 referenced sources for every thing (not just soccer) I try and teach her...even math and I am a CPA. It has been this way since she was 3 years old. I have to prove my case as to why the information on the internet is wrong. Loved your post!!!

FYI...I had to look up the definition of "Rubicon". Now your comment is even funnier!
 
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