Monday, November 27, 2006

November in the Rain - Practice 25/11/06

A day for die hard enthusiasts only - Julian, Alex, Paul, Manjiv, Vic, Kate
Amid the rain wind and mud we managed some pitching and batting and throwing, and Tim from the Devil Strays showed up as well.

The batting practice was particularly useful thanks to Paul. I can now concentrate on hitting as I step forward - when the weight has transferred from back to front foot.

4 comments:

Paul said...

I am in agony.... I couldn't work out why as I hardly did any running... then Manjiv pointed out it was probably pitching. I guess you pitching folk use different muscles to the standing around in the field folk :-)

One thing I discovered was the orange bat has a lot of "pop" if hit right. I was trying to knock some up for catches on 3rd, SS and 2nd and despite using any effort I kept clearing the whole infield.
Of course later on when I was trying to batter the ball out of the park it hardly reached the Pitcher :-(

So one exerise i would suggest revisiting is a batter with a small semi-circle throwing to ball and tapping the ball back. Getting the eye-ball co-ordination to hit the bats sweetspot.

As Julian mentioned getting the foot work right when batting can add a lot. When the ball is in the air the batter's weight should be on the back foot. As you hit the ball your weight should transfer to the front foot.

And any sort of fielding in the mud is pointless... maybe next time we should all stay in bed :-)

Kate said...

I agree with the returning to bed at the sight of that much mud sentiment!

Yep, pitching is murder on the muscles - I only pitched for about 10 minutes on Saturday and as usual my right arm and left leg are stiff as a board the following day.

I'm rather disappointed by the fact that you have to look very very hard to see the bruise on my cheek - I somehow managed to hit the ball right onto my cheekbone instead of into the diamond - ouch - but hey, at least I made contact, so that's an improvement for me! :)

Vic said...

It was not dedication that got me out Saturday. The weather in Ealing lulled me into a false sense of security. It was quite pleasant when I left home.I have to say that I didn't really enjoy my first wet practice.

I learnt a useful lesson though:
Mud and running do not mix. Mud and batting do not mix. Mud and pitching does not mix.
Mud and fielding do not mix.
It basically makes playing softball quite difficult - more so than usual.
conclusion - mud is bad

Not sure if I can blame mud for my inability to hit the ball though. I think I had a hole in the bat. Sorry to those waiting out in the field. I think I need some more 'pepper' practice.

Manj said...

Lots of useful information and observations on this post so far...I can't top that so will continue my trend of talking drivel and nonsense instead :-)

I personally loved the rain..my new found philosophy is that if you're going to get a little bit wet, why not go the whole yard and get absolutely drenched? So I did....and then did it again on Sunday when I decided the rainstorm wasn't going to stop me going out for a long run.. Well team, I think I'm well and truly over my fear of getting rain on my face.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to get those mud stains off my white sweatshirt..hmmm