Live Love Softball Blog

CALIFORNIA GIRLS 2011

Friday, November 25, 2011

So Ms. Schreyer has assigned me to write a blog about our trip to California! Let me tell you about our trip to the 16U Huntington Beach Tourney we were entered in. First off, plane rides suck! It’s squishy, long, and extremely boring. But I guess we had the “best of the worst” because all us academy chicks got to sit near each other. I ended up sandwiched between Coach Dave and Cassidy ward. Dub gone wild! Me and Cass were reading a gossip magazine while Coach Dave was supposedly doing work, however, we always caught he sneaking glances at our magazine. Who knew he’d be interested in Nicki Minaj and Kim Kardashian. Next thing we knew Coach D was asleep and snoring! The girls wanted to draw a mustache on his face and put makeup on him but everyone was too chicken. We figured he’d make us run laps once we got off the plane. Talk about missing a perfect opportunity or what.

Once off the plane we arrived at our hotel about an hour later. After realizing the coaches weren’t serious about the 3 hour practice we had all afternoon to shop! To bad none of us girls could find anything decent to buy. The one time we all have money we can’t find clothes. Me, Cyd, Cass and Taylor L stopped for lunch at the rainforest café. That was an adventure in itself. Literally ... There were birds, elephants, lions, tigers, and monkeys that went crazy about every five minutes. Not to mention the thunder and lightning that was happening while we were trying to mow. Taylor impressed us all by eating a monster burger in 3 minutes. No joke, we timed her. After escaping the jungle and walking around the mall probably 5 times we headed back to the hotel for a run around the lake and some pizza for dinner.

Friday morning we woke up and had to be down for breakfast at 9:30am. Let’s just say we didn’t dress for the classical music and fancy room that our breakfast was held in. After breakfast we drove to a park to have a short practice; working on grounders, outfield cuts and batting for a solid two hours. Even though we lost our games on Friday they we still super fun. All the pitchers did reallygood and the outfielders tried their best to stop the balls from rolling down the hill, oh how nice a fence would have been. On the positive side Makayla hit a huge homerun over left fielders head and we got to eat at the Olive Garden between games. Endless salad and breadsticks!

Saturday was our big day. We had 3 games to play against some of the toughest teams. Our first game was bright and early at 8:00am. After our game we went and watched Ms. Schreyer’s cousin’s team play, the So Cal Breakers. Ms. Schreyer and her have identical curly blonde hair... Coach Dave told us to watch the players that play our positions so we can learn tips from how they talk and act on the field… we were pretty much creepin’ on them but we learned a lot. 

Saturday night’s game was super intense; we played the firecrackers, probably one of the best teams in the States, no big deal. Mo (Morganne) pitched a great game and Melissa playing right field made an amazing catch! Ms. Schreyer introduced us to Chick-Fil-Et restaurant after the game and it was delicious!

We had another early morning Sunday, yaaaay..We had 2 games left to play before it was time to go back on that airplane. The first game I played shortstop and of course having never played there before it was naturally a disaster. But I’m thinking it was pretty amusing for the people in the stands. Our 2nd game went a lot smoother than our first which was a great way to finish off the fun weekend.After the game we showered and headed to an outdoor mall… of course it would decide to start raining.

Over all it was an awesome weekend and I’m proud of all the academy girls! Go Yale Lions!

SOFTBALL’S A GIRLS SPORT. WE DON’T WEAR CUPS, WE WIN THEM. BY ALEXIS JOHNSTON

Tuesday, November 08, 2011

So basically everyday in the Softball Academy is the best day ever. We have lots of fun all the time and are all amazing softball players. In my opinion, we are the coolest group of gals around at Yale. 

What fun things have the softball girls done this year thus far?

Well, I don’t know where to start. Our first trip as a team was down to the University of Washington, where everyone had a chance to practice with the Huskies!!! Always remember girls, when your on defense... ROBTC! 

Athlete reminder :

know where your “R”unners are

how many “O”uts

what kind of “B”atter she is

where to “T”hrow the ball if it comes to you

and where to “C”over

It was an amazing experience and gave us all a taste of what life on a University ball team is all about.

We also had a fun time on the Grouse Grind together.... just kidding it wasn’t that fun. It was a hard workout for your legs, your mind and your butt and I think all the girls can agree with me that they won’t be trying that again any time soon. *CONGRATS again to our two FRESHMEN top Grinders Brianna Houweling and Alexis Ross, with a time with 50 minutes! :D 

One thing you should know about the softball girls is that we know how to work very hard, but even more importantly we know how to have fun. Everyones favorite day is Zumba day!!! Zumba is a dance that combines Latin dancing and international music with a fun and effective workout. In other words, it’s a class where you can shake your butt as much as you want and get marks for it. :) 

We also had an amazing chance to all try Bikram Hot Yoga. Some of us have done it before, but for the most of us it was our first time. My Favorite pose was the pretzel where you had to twist your arms and legs as hard as you can all while balancing on one foot! The 90 minute session was extremely tiring, draining, and most of all HOT! It was nothing what I expected but I think that everyone did a pretty good job.  

Fitness and Classroom. 

As much as we work on developing our skills as softball players, we also do a lot of work off the diamond and in the classroom. In our Nutrition Unit, our latest assignment was to keep a food journal for 7 days and see what was going into our bodies, and with the help of Jes Suderman (the wonderful guest speaker/ Nutritionist that came to talk to us), we now are learning how to fuel and take care or our bodies as athletes. We also watched vitamins dissolve which was pretty interesting. Also in classroom, most of the senior ‘soft-ballers” are preparing for university and researching what universities or colleges are right for them athletically and academically.

So that’s pretty much what has been going on so far this year. We had a solid last week. Worked on infield, outfield and did some scrimmaging. Coach Dave was a litttttllle moody earlier this week when we were having a bad day on outfield cuts. We were having a hard time doing what he asked, (or even making a play I should say) and we almost witnessed a little “David freak out”. But everything ended pretty well I’d say; he just made us run 6 laps of the diamond :). 

We are all looking forward to our big trip down to ORANGE COUNTY CALI!! in only 9 dayyyyyss. Countdown is on! There’s still lots of things to do and things to work on before we go but we are running out of sunny days in Abbotsford to practice outside. 

‘The more effort you put into workouts and practices, the farther you will go with yourself, and thats the key to being successful’ as we learned from Coach Tarr from our trip down to UDUB. I think if we all have an attitude like this in academy, we should preform very well when we play down in California. (so Soooon!!!) 

More updates soon.. Thanks for reading. Remember; work hard, believe in yourself and “You shouldn’t be afraid of failure, because the only way you can truly fail is by not trying”.

Go Lions Go! :D