Dog Days of Summer – Part II

July 30th, 2009

With all of the other sequels out there I thought I would have one of my own but I promise there won’t be as many as Rocky.

This sequel continues talking about the dog days of summer and will focus on Water, Water, Water. Water covers about 70% of the earth; about 65% of the human body is water; a plant is about 90% water. The rain replenishes the earth’s water sources, we water our plants and everyone drinks 6 – 8 cups of water a day – Right?? Well if you don’t, you should and make sure your kids are drinking water also.  That colored sugared water doesn’t count and for young and old(er) athletes it could be drastically impacting their performances on the field or courts.

As far as sports drinks go, are they as good as some people say or are they as bad as soda? The probable answer  is, it depends.  The basic rule of thumb seems to be when training for less than 1 hour, water should be sufficient; for training over an hour you might want to supplement water with a sports drink to replenish some of the electrolytes and sodium that may have been lost through sweating. It is not really the duration but the effort given by the athlete and the weather will certain have an affect as to how much the body sweats. It’s certainly easier to quantify time then it is how much a person sweats.

Don’t wait until you’re thirsty to drink. Especially, during the hot summer months you should be drinking all day (remember 6 – 8 cups per day) and drinking more if you will be training that day and don’t try to make up for it by drinking a gallon of water just before the session. I can feel the water sloshing around in my stomach just thinking about it. You should also be drinking throughout the training session. Ideally we would weight ourselves before and after training and make sure that we drink 2 cups of water per pound that was lost but that is not always possible. You know your body best, so listen to it! Remember how you felt during and after training to understand what your body needs. Every body is different and reacts differently so you need to know what your body needs.

The first  hour  after training is the most critical for refueling the body.  For an aerobic training session your meal should be higher in carbohydrates to replace the glycogen that was used  during training. For an anaerobic workout your meal should be higher in protein to feed your muscles as they rebuild. Even though a long distance run  is an aerobic activity your muscles have taken a pounding and will need some protein to help them rebuild just like carbohydrates should be consumed as well as protein after a high intensity weight lifting session since you’re burning through  gycogen as well.

 Having coached youth sports for a number of years there are certain actions by parents that I find annoying: yelling at their children from the sidelines; coming late to get their child from practice; arriving at the field right as the game is about the start - but the one thing that I find inexcusable and really ‘gets my goat’ is when they don’t make sure that their child has enough water. A 16 ounce bottle of water for a 2 hour game or training session is not sufficient. Make sure your children has more than enough water to get through an entire session.

BTW- get my goat seems to have come about in the early 1700′s when goats were used to calm down wild horses. Removing the goat would have agitated the horse so somewhere out of that ‘get my goat’ came about.

There are extreme cases when someone can actually drink too much water and a condition of hyponatremia occurs. This is basically when a person’s sodium level has become too diluted from drinking too much water.  The symptoms are nausea, dizziness, vomiting and muscle cramps.   Even though this is usually associated with long distance runners and cyclists it is certainly worth being aware of, since it can be deadly.

Let’s enjoy the summer workouts and make sure that our children get through them safely. Let’s cover up in the sun and make sure that we drink enough fluids and eat properly. That’s probably something we should be doing all year long anyway.

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Youth sports during the Dog Days of Summer

July 14th, 2009

With the dog days of summer fast approaching, if they haven’t already hit where you are, we need to ensure that we don’t let it bite us on the backside.

Dog days of summer, I’ve used this idiom many times but I never knew how it came about, so I did a little research. Dog days of summer, so called because  the brightest star in the night time sky is Sirius, which is in the constellation Canis Major, aka The Big Dog.  Ironically, this star is best seen during the winter months. But the ancients thought that we received additional heat from it during the summer since that is when it is in conjunction with the Sun, causing the hot and steamy days in the summer. 

Exposure to the sun can be beneficial or deadly. Some exposure to the sun is beneficial in aiding the body in creating Vitamin D. Vitamin D is essential in the maintenance of our organ systems. A deficiency in Vitamin D can cause diseases such as rickets or osteoporosis or a number of other chronic diseases.      

Now the Deadly! Too much exposure can cause the MOST diagnosed cancer, skin cancer. There are more diagnosed cases of skin cancer then there are of  lung, breast or prostate cancer.  This is a shame because it’s rather easy, in most cases, to avoid this: Stay out of the sun; Cover up; Use protection.

The sun is at it’s hottest between 11 am and 3 pm. It’s easy to say don’t go out during those hours but then reality sets in. We’re not all nocturnal and  sometimes we want/need to be out during those hours.  Practice, training sessions and games are determined by our coaches, when we can fit it into our lives or by the ‘league’. That being the case, if we or our children need to be out, one preventative method is to not have any skin exposed. While most people don’t want to look like a nomad in the middle of the Sahara desert there are some precautions that we can take.

Wear a hat or a visor. While a hat can provide some form of shade it can also be used to help cool us down. One potential way is to pack the inside of it with ice.  Punch a couple of holes in a bag of crushed ice then tape the bag to the inside of  a hat. The ice can cool you off and the melting ice will feel quite refreshing. 

Try to find shade. There is no reason why stretching, water breaks, team talks, etc cannot be done in the shade.  If there is no  shade then perhaps a canopy or tent can be used so that the players can get some relief from the sun.

Don’t wear dark cloths or shoes, your feet can get pretty hot too. Light color clothing will reflect the heat. Clothing should be loose fitting. Wear cotton clothing rather than material that may pull moisture from your skin. The body needs the moisture to keep cool. 

Sunscreen! Sunscreen! Sunscreen! Even the  parts of your body that you think may be covered. And reapply the sunscreen if you are out for extended periods of time.

These are some basic rules which to follow during these summer months. Don’t become a statistic. There are about 1 million cases of skin cancer diagnosed every year and I don’t think any one of them really thought that it would happen to them. As the saying goes, Better safe than sorry.

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Youth Soccer Championships

July 1st, 2009

Congratulations to all of the teams that qualified for the US Youth Soccer regional tournaments. Age groups u-13 through u-19 competed throughout the spring season to qualify for the regional championships.  The US is divided into 4 regions with the champions of each age group going on to play for the National championship. The winners of Regions II, III, and IV have been determined with Region I championships going on this weekend. 

The national championships will be played in Lancaster, Mass. at Citizens Bank Fields at Progin Park.  
The round robin games will be on  July 22-24 with the finals being play on  July 25-26.

Good luck to all of the teams and congratulations to ALL of the players and teams that qualified for these tournaments.

Follow the tournaments here .

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Hello World!! We’re Here

June 26th, 2009

www.lookingforagame.com is a FREE website that was developed to make the lives of parents/coaches/team managers  easier.  For parents, it’s an easy way to keep track of your child’s events. It’s primary focus is on sporting events but it could be used for anything. You can get a monthly calendar view of all team events that your children participate in. You no longer need to print out each youth team’s schedule then create spreadsheets or documents to keep track of their schedules. No need to update the calendar on the fridge with changes. Just print out the monthly calendar view  and put it on the fridge. Each team is color coded to easily distinguish each team’s schedule. We do it all for you. Visit us to see a sample or just click here. We also provide directions to each event. Just click on the directions link.

How many times when you were trying to remember the details of an event did have you had to go through emails or try to remember what the coach said at the last practice or maybe your child never told you about, basically because they were acting like kids and forgot or they were never listening to the coach. Now all you have to do is go to your team’s schedule at your leisure and you won’t miss anything. 

You can also send the information about your team’s event to your email or mobile device. We automatically fill in the body of the message with the event information.

And remember you can view the schedule of  multiple teams from multiple clubs or schools. It can also be used for any event (scrimmage, practice, team meetings, fundraisers,…)  not just games. It is totally customizable

For coaches and team managers it’s a very easy process to add a team or schedule. Once the address for a location has been entered for a club or school, any team thereafter will not have to key in the address. A drop down list will be  provided based on the characters entered.

You will no longer need to provide paper copies of schedules or send numerous emails or make any calls to inform parents of  updates to your team’s schedule.  Just update your team’s schedule online and everyone can view it.  We have provided an email feature where the event information is automatically filled in the body of the message or you can send a text message via Twitter.  And if you need it, we provide instructions on how to set up a Twitter account  and have your parents ‘follow’ you.

Each event will have a directions link so that everyone will go to the correct address. Having coached myself, I have received numerous phone calls asking for directions, some even  minutes before a game is to start because someone was at the wrong field.  With this site everyone can just click the directions link or get the directions from their mobile device.

Those are just some of the benefits and features of the site. I would appreciate any on comments or suggestions on the site.

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