Out of action for a while

I have not updated this blog in ages.
For those of you who come back to check on things, the babe is temporarily out of action, as my french teaching endeavours are taking so much of my time.
Plan to start again at year end, things will be quieter.
Catherine

The hallmark of a great captain is the ability to win the toss, at the right

The main job is to be the team leader of the team on the day/week of the event

Team representative: Represent the team in all official matters, including the appeals

Team leadership: No cheerleader but instill confidence in all players by maintaining positive attitude throughout the tournament.

Work with team and players to set performance target.

"If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever". So a captain must be prepared for a losing day and support team in refocus if poor initial performance. Consistent atttitude whether things are good or bad

Organisation:

Ensure best conditions for tournament (appropriate accomodation, foodstuff, getting early, plenty of rest...)

Ensure apppropriate pre-game and post-game routines.

Game plan:

General sitting strategy, based on knowledge of competitors and players, supported by coach pre and during tournament.

Keep track of performance on the day. Decides who plays when and against whom.

Makes clear decisions and equally important is clear communication of the overall plan to players.

Event report:

Keep track of team performance and report on performance of the team, including thoughts/feedback from players, lessons learnt...

A winning team is a team where all have the ability, and all know it. They support each other , pick each other up, and they never never quit.

The player, the competitors, and the game strategy

The role of the coach will be along 3 lines:

1. Players/partnership Development: Assessment - Learning- Development -Remediation
2. Tournament preparation - Knowlege of competitions - (system, style, skill level, application, apparent strength, weak points)
3. Tournament support - provide input to captain as to sitting strategy
4. Tournement performance review - input into captain report

Players development:
The first step will be to assess the current skills set. The first step of any improvment is the active knowledge that something needs improvment. The assessment will be based on

• Past performance
• Self-assessment
• Peers assessment

The assessment is partly partnership based as a player alone can never win a world title all by himself.

Technical skills - (not fully based on past performance as other factors interfer on technique)

• Technical knowledge - %, combinations, deceptive play.. techniques. Assessment based on a set of constructed hands to be played in training sessions. This may well be mainly targetted to the developing players.
• Partnership system - Completness and efficiency
• System knowledge
• Partnership defense skills

Performance skills - (this is primarily based on observation of past peformance and self- assessment)

• Competitive style
• Focus style
• Competitive strengths & weaknesses
• Demonstrated level of commitment
• partnership skills
• Full assessment of performance in last 10 major tournaments:

• Efficiency of system in a competitive arena

  System usage

  Application of technical skills

  Number/type of unforced errors - bidding

  Number/type of unforced errors - defense

  Number/type of unforced errors - play

  Missed opportunies

  Displayed areas of strength

  Behavior outside game time

  Tournament preparation

  Refocus skills

  External relevant factors

The defense rests

Ever played in a tournament where you lost the title by an imp or 2?
Well, this is not the story here but we would do well to remember that every imp count when we play a game anywhere. Here is a hand where the importance of appropriate focus would have come in handy.
The result on the board was to tie instead of us taking an couple of imps.
You LH P RH
1C(1) 1D P(2) P
P
(1) 16+
(2) less than 5hcp
I was so buy thinking about the auction and my failure to bid that I did stop to think about the defense for more than 10 seconds.
Dummy
T9xxx
xx
Qx
KJxxx

Your hand
Ax
AKx
J9xx
AQxx

HJ led.
How do you defend ? Why?

No more excuses !

Often when a player makes a mistake, he is quite prone to offer by the way of justification:

"How I was nervous" or "I was tired from last nite" or "I was psyched out" or any other excuse that seems relevant at the time. The excuse is likely to be a good one and to the point. Then the issue is put to rest and forgotten until the next time.

ButI fail to see how it makes anything better. Whether an error is due to due to lack of knowledge, faulty logic or faulty thinking or whether it is due to a lack of attention, the result is the same. What is the use of being clever if we do not capitalise on our talent.

If a player does not takes as much care improving his performance skills as he works on improving his technical knowledge, the gold will always be eluding him.

So next time you want to pull out the good old excuse card, remember: What are you going to do different to ensure it does not happen again.

No two ways about it

When you look at all the aspects that need to be right to win a major tournament, you realise that there is not 2 ways about it:

A winning team needs a coach. A winning team needs a captain.

While the roles can overlapp, they are distinct requirements.

The coach focuses on the development of the players skills and performance. Clearly bridge knowledge is important, but more important is the understanding how one goes about achieving best performance, both technical skills and performance skills. The coach knows the players, their strenght and weaknesses. The coach also knows the strength and weaknesses of the opposing players.

The captain is in charge of the team on the big day. The captain ensure that the team gets there in good time, ensure optimal conditions, decides on the sitting strategy, observse performance on the day, decides who goes in, who gets to sit out, who plays whom. The captain goes to the appeal, and mabe most important of them all, the captain has/shows a winning attitude and keeps the spirit up throughout.

In both bases, bridge knowledge is necessary. But while knowledge that is required, it does not require the same expertise as what the players themselve needs (appeals aside maybe).

Next post will then be the jobs for each of these mythical people.

Quest for the "zone"

As bridge is a game where the learning never stops, it is important to understand the various stages of learning in our quest for self-improvement.
There are 4 stages through the learning process and understanding how we move though it and how our performance will very accordingly is important if we are not to be discouraged when we get a setback.

Another aspect is to look at all the factors that we need to get right. No wonder it is a tough game :

• Comfort Zone
• Emotional Control
• Expectations , that can lead to fear of failure
• Focus – both intensity, duration and style
• Mental Preparation
• Motivation
• Perfectionism
• Self-Confidence , lack or excess of it
• Self-Esteem
• Stress Reduction
• Psychology of Recovery
• Team Dynamics
• Game Strategies
• Goal Setting
• Mental Imagery
  
  Now start making your own list.

Arousal - too much or too little

As discussed in previous posts, our arousal (excitement) level has a direct impact on our performance. Performance does increase as arousal increases up to a certain point, then it begins to decrease somewhat dramatically.
http://ababe-in-the-woods-of-bridge.blogspot.com/2009/04/dealing-with-arousal.html
If arousal levels are too low, motivation and desire may not be optimal to support a quality performance effort. On the other hand, higher than optimal arousal levels for a particular skill may cause us to become too anxious and begin to worry too much about the results rather than focus on the required task. As anxiety increase, mental flexibility becomes hindered.
Successful execution of a complex task also demands unconscious and automatic thoughts about action.

The level of arousal required depending on
• Our own personality
• The task performed.

For example, in baseball, a batter requires lower levels of arousal to perform the skills necessary to execute on hitting the pitch. They should have very low anxiety levels when they step into the batter’s box.
On the other hand, a basketball player on offense will need a higher level of arousal, as the situation requires them to be more active, yet they still must be able to run the desired offense effectively.

What about bridge
In the same fashion in bridge,I expect that the play of a hand would require a fairly a low level of arousal. Now is not the time to develop high level of aggressivity
On the other hand, today’s competitive bidding means that a higher degree of arousal will be required as the competition to ‘win’ the bidding war will be high. In defense, the mix will be more subtle and the player with incorrect level of arousal may not find the right mix of defense. You would expect a player with level of arousal too high will find too many aggressive defense while a player with a level of arousal which is too low will too many passive defenses.

In this aspect as in everything, one step at a time, practice makes perfect.

High performance teams – Does it apply to bridge partnership and teams?

The essence of focus.
Teams that feel directed toward achieving a clear and commun goal are happier and more energized, filled with a sense of purpose.
The basis of trust.
Teams tap into a natural instinct to form clans. People come together , vow to protect each other, engage in altruistic behavior with one another.
the "cheater meter."
If team members feel that the others do not appreciate the team's efforts, or that team members aren't pulling equal weight, their "cheater meters" will go off , they no longer trust one another and start losing focus on the goal
Low Focus and Low Trust (Lose/Lose)
• Fear
• Confusion
• Self-interest
• High turnover
• Failure
High Focus and Low Trust (Win/Lose)
• Focused on self, tasks
• Lots of early
accomplishments
• Longer-term disloyalty
• Turnover
High Trust and Low Focus (Lose/Win)
• Few conflicts
• "We are family"
• Lack of coordination
• Resigned to failure
High Trust and High Focus (Win/Win)
• Collaborating
• Self-directing
• Mission driven
• Loyal
• High success

So looking for the ingredient to achieve succesful teams :
• Don't gloss over performance, but talk about it.
• Hold each other accountable for each other performance.
• When someone under-performs, tells them immediately in direct, honest terms.
• Adopt a common goal or set of goals and commit to achieving them.
• Define goals simple enough to be easily grasped, specific enough to be actionable.
• Ask tough questions of one another and challenge each others assumptions. Probe an argument until all are satisfied.
• Admit your mistakes, weaknesses, concerns without fear of reprisal.