Mal mit dem Mixed-Team

There are exactly 180 days left until the opening ceremonies of Worlds in Japan. Even though this sounds like a long time, I already know that it's going to fly by quickly. That's why today I went to the open tryout in Darmstadt for the German national Mixed team, headed with us to Sakai in early July. After three weeks of Christmas vacation (und einer gemütlichen Silvester-Feier mit Freunden in Hannover!) I was itching to get back on the field and start training for the season. The coaches agreed to let me participate, even after I explained how I had already accepted a spot on Inside Rakete, and so we all warmed up in the drizzling cold on the artificial turf field near the Böllenfalltor stadium.

After warmups, throwing, and 3-man thrower/marker drill, we split into groups for comparative-speed sprint tests. The first was a crossfield-suicide with cones at 0, 5, 10, 20, and 40 meters (oder so ungefähr). Second was a simple 40-40, or across the field and back. I finished near the head of my group each time, but probably shouldn't have pushed myself--my hip flexor wound up bothering me later in the day, but the pride of representing IR kept me from dogging it on the sprints.

In any case we did some more warming up after that (maybe should have done it beforehand?) and then split into two teams for a scrimmage. The twist was, each person had a specific matchup: you had to play whenever your Gegenspieler was on the field (und zwar gegen ihn!). With only a few subs for each team, this made the scrimmage pretty tough. The level of play was fairly high, though, with only a few mistakes forced by the wind and a few others born of unfamiliarity, just like any group of people new to playing with each other will have.

After a short, 30-minute lunch break we warmed up again and then had several more scrimmages: to 7, 9, 3, and 3. Each was a little different, whether zone was allowed and whether you had to match up against your specified Gegenspieler. By the end you could tell that everybody was wiped out; after a few more injuries my team was left with only one sub, and it was challenging to continue playing at a high level. Wir haben aber trotzdem viel Gas gegeben, und nach dem Abschlussspiel gaben die Coaches Bescheid, wer in dem Tryout-Prozess weitergehen dürfe. Ich darf nicht =]

Overall it was fun and challenging, and I was really happy to be playing outside again. Personal highlights for the day were when I threw a garbage hammer to an open cutter on the breakside (and then remembered that I wasn't in the Halle anymore), when I layed out to block a downfield pass that I had no chance at D'ing, and then when I layed out and toed the line to reel in a huck for the final score of the day. At least I left on a high note! Now I'm looking forward more than ever to getting in shape for the season, and hope you all are as well. Only six short months!

Ich wollte auch nochmal die Coaches danken, die das Training organisiert hatten, und wünsche das Team alle Glück beim Kämpfen in Japan!