Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Warm-up for Soccer Training and Games

To improve your soccer coaching skills, youve got to make sure your players give their bodies the chance to perform at their best. That means sensible warm-ups and cool-down, before and after a match or a soccer training session of any kind.

Soccer is a demanding physical game. So providing encouragement and instruction and making sure your players do adequate physical preparation is one of the most important responsibilities in soccer coaching.

The warm up is a process to increase awareness, improve co-ordination, improve elasticity and contractibility of muscles, and increase the efficiency of the respiratory and cardiovascular systems.

Soccer training and blood flow to muscles

In a body at rest, the blood flow to the muscles is comparatively low, and the majority of the small blood vessels (capillaries) supplying them are closed. When soccer training or playing begins, the blood flow in the exercising muscles increases markedly, as the capillaries open.

At rest, 15-20% of the blood flow supplies muscles, while after 10-12 minutes of all-round exercise, the percentage of blood flow supplying the muscles rises to 70-75%. A muscle can only achieve maximum performance when all its blood vessels are functional.Physical work increases the energy output and temperature of the muscle, this in turn leads to improved co-ordination with less likelihood of injury.

A warm-up therefore prepares the body by:

raising muscle temperature towards an optimum level for performance

enabling metabolic processes in cells to proceed at higher rates

and allowing nerve messages to travel faster

Why warm-up is important in soccer coaching

Reasons for conducting a thorough warm-up prior to soccer training and games include the following:

To increase blood flow to muscular tissue

To increase muscle temperature

To reduce muscle tightness

To elevate body temperature

To stimulate reflex activity related to balance and co-ordination

To achieve full joint mobility in the specific joints involved in the activity

To achieve full soft tissue extensibility muscles, tendons, ligaments

To enhance the functioning of the neuromuscular system

To prepare the cardiovascular and respiratory systems

To prepare the player psychologically for the coming activity

To familiarize themselves with the environmental conditions

Warm-ups should be intense enough to increase the body temperature, the effects of which will ultimately wear off depending upon its intensity and specificity. The procedure should begin with movements of the large muscle groups, as these are the main areas to which blood is redistributed. These include the following areas:

Back lower leg: gastrocnemius and soleus

Front lower leg: peroneals (shin)

Front thigh: quadriceps

Back thigh: hamstrings

Inner thigh: adductors

Back: erector spinae

Trunk: abdominal muscles

Shoulders and chest: deltoids and pectorials

Specialized soccer exercises

After the general warm-up players can begin more specialized exercises including mobilization of the joints and dynamic movements of muscles, particularly of the lower extremity. The final stage of a warm-up concentrates on technique, and/or practicing a specific movement.

Whether warm-ups are performed with or without a ball depends entirely upon the philosophy adopted by the coach. This part of the soccer training session does provide an opportunity to work on specific technical skills in conjunction with mobility work and may also provide a greater mental and neurological stimulus for the players. In soccer coaching generally a lack or improper use of a warm-up and a cool-down is a risk factor for lower extremity overuse muscular injuries, especially during running.

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Swim With the Current

Youve probably heard me say over and over that 80% of your return on your portfolio comes from the market and the sector. But what the heck does that really mean?

In June 1998, Investors Business Daily summarized two studies on the causes of stock- price movement in two books: The New Science of Investing, by Dr. Robert Hagen and The Latent Statistical Structure of Securities Price Changes, by Benjamin King.

Those studies found that 31% of a company's stock-price action was tied to the market as a whole. Industry group action explained 37%, while broad sector action accounted for 12% of the price movement.

Both studies concluded that only 20% of the price action in a stock was determined by company fundamentals!

Unfortunately, most people were taught backwards. Most think gains and losses are only determined by picking the stock with the right fundamentals! Fundamentals are things like P/E ratio, good management, growth rates, new products, market share, etc. I'd venture a guess and say that most people spend 80% of their time (and sometimes 100% of their time!) trying to find the stock with the best set of fundamentals.

Yikes!

So what happens when a company "with great fundamentals" happens to be in a sector thats on defense? Or what if the whole market is on defense? The company could see their stock price get slammed (yes, even with great fundamentals!).

Say you bought at a stock a few months ago at $40. Today it is $20. The company may still be growing like crazy, but the market or the sector dragged it down. If the story didnt change, then didn't the fundamentals just get even better? It has to be a better value at this price, right? If you invest by using only the fundamentals, you lose.

Again, most of the returns you're going to get will depend on whether the market (and the sector the stock belongs to) is on offense or defense.

Look, everyone knows that if you're swimming with the current, it's an easier ride. There are times when the market is on offense (and you're moving with the current). Hey, it IS possible to make money when the current is against you. But the odds are stacked against you! So, try to swim with the current...swimming against the current is NOT recommended!

Offense? Defense? Huh?
When were on offense, we run offensive plays from our playbook. Meaning, well look to put money into the market to build our wealth. Were not going to buy everything in sight; we want to focus ONLY on the sectors that are also on offense.

When were on defense, well run plays designed to protect our assets. Defense doesnt mean run out and sell everything! Whats the goal when the defense comes on the field in a football game?

To prevent the other team (the market) from scoring against you!

When the market is on defense, well only call plays from our defensive playbook. Running a defensive strategy helps prevent us from making really stupid mistakes in our account and taking big losses. Defense can mean taking steps like buying protective puts against your holdings. Or possibly shave back a large investment in a stock or mutual fund.

Avoiding big losses alone will improve the performance for most people in the market.

How do we know whether to be on offense or defense? We use a tool that is an excellent indicator of the level of risk in the market. Fifty years ago, a technical analyst named A.W. Cohen came up with this tool he dubbed the bullish percent index. Cohen was looking for a way to tell when to be cautious near market tops and also aggressively optimistic near market bottoms.

If you think about it, isnt that what we all want? Something thatll tell us when the risk in the market is high...and when the risk in the market (or a sector) is low! And its been around for fifty years, ignored by many in the market!

The bullish percent index is the percentage of all the stocks in a universe that are currently on buy signals. Now, that universe may be all the stocks in the semiconductor or the financial sector. Or even all the stocks listed on the New York Stock Exchange.

Knowing when the risk is high in a particular area will go a long way toward improving your investment results!

When to take action
Weve discussed the bullish percent is all the stocks in your group that are currently on buy signals. We feel its the single best risk level indicator we have found. But how do you know when to take action?

If 90 out of 100 stocks in a given sector are currently on buy signals, the bullish percent index is said to be at 90% for that group. If only 30 of 100 are on buy signals, the bullish percent is 30%.

Now, if 90% of all stocks in a sector are already on buy signals, that means only 10% of the names in that group are NOT on buy signals.

Wed want to be cautious with that kind of high reading!

Hey, no one likes being the last guy to show up at a party, but thats what happens to a lot of individual investors. They get in near the top and get creamed when the sector or market takes a dive.

Now, what were measuring here is supply and demand. When there is demand, prices rise. When a sector reaches 90%, theres not much more that can move a group higher.

But thats NOT the time to sell.

See, stocks can hang around lofty levels for a LONG time. Its only when we see more and more companies in a sector (or market) start to give sell signals, we know that supply is overtaking demand. When that happens, lower prices are on the way.

Now, say last week we noticed that a sector had a bullish percent reading of 30% and this week its now at 38%. This is a group wed want to pay attention to! Not only are the readings going up, they are going up from low levels!

This is precisely the stuff we zoom in on when telling you where to put money to work!

Predictions

If we need to get out of something, wed sure like to know it NOW, not later!

Hindsight IS 20/20. But it wont help you avoid losses in your account. Weve given up predicting what the market will do because we use tools that tell us accurately what IS happening right now in the marketplace. The point and figure charts we use and the bullish percent index are tools that tell us whats happening today. These charts tell us what is in demand and what is in supply.

There are too many folks trying to complicate the investing process. Keep it simple. Just remember that anything with too much supply will see their prices fall. Anything in demand will see their prices rise. And we have a method of measuring exactly which stocks and mutual funds are in demand and which are in supply.

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