[00:00:00 - 00:02:18]
Mark Burik:
I remember our coach Fred talked about that huge misconception of timing and speed. People think that you need to rush an offense by rushing the pass. The setter is the player who rushes the offense, and the hitter can change their route however they want. The only time that's changing is on two situations. Hey, everybody, welcome. We are getting rolling. This is the second edition of the Better at Beach Volleyball podcast. And thank God we decided not to try to do it in person because of the episode. And we're already halfway across the country. Okay. So our live viewers are rolling in by the thousands. And oh, my God. Yeah, there are they're going to be here. And today, whether you're watching from Instagram, whether you guys are watching from Facebook or YouTube or LinkedIn, we're also streaming to LinkedIn and Twitter, whatever account you're on. Welcome. Happy holiday season. Today we're going to talk about a lot of defense. And specifically, we are going to talk about how to dig more hard driven balls. So there's a lot of different ways, different techniques that involve number one, like, some of them will be mental, some of them will be physical, some of them will be technique driven, and some will be situational, really. So that's what we want to get into today. We also have a few quick announcements. We had our biggest sales day ever. Brandon, I don't know if Congratulations to you and me. And that's pretty cool. And it's also good to know that our camps get to sell out quick. Now, the Christmas camps, December 26th and January 2nd camp in Florida. Those both sold out early, even though we just had a cancelation. So we had one more spot open up. And I've been texting back and forth with somebody's like, should I book? When is it going to close down? Every time we've had a spot open, it's closed within 2 hours.
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Brandon Joyner:
Yeah.
[00:02:19 - 00:02:51]
Mark Burik:
So we have a waiting list for that. If you guys are interested in getting on the waiting list, just get in touch with us. But the April 3rd camp, I think we got 17 spots booked out in the first two days, which is awesome. And there's a few months left to book that. There are going to be 40 spots, as usual. And that's going to be in St. Pete and Florida. If you guys are in New York City right now or you're near it, because we've had people drive from upstate a few years ago, I had people drive 7 hours to come to a beach volleyball clinic. There are no clinics near us,
[00:02:51 - 00:02:58]
Brandon Joyner:
so we have to get you're that good, dude. I drive 9 hours.
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Mark Burik:
People love volleyball, volleyball.
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Brandon Joyner:
They just love it. They just love it.
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Mark Burik:
So we're going to do that at Endless Summer, which is a two court indoor facility in Oceanside in Long Island. So if you guys are in the Tri state area up in the Northeast, come say hey and let's hang out for an entire day at Endless Summer. And we're going to do three sessions. And with that, if you guys head to betteratbeach.com/clinics, we have our schedule up there. If you want to bring us in for a clinic in your hometown or your facility, there are instructions on that page. And if you think we might be showing up in your hometown already, well, then that'll be on that schedule. We are still working on our Fudge clinic. We're still working on our Hawaii clinic. And yeah, we're right in a rock. So we're coming upon a full schedule of clinics and camps.
[00:03:59 - 00:04:14]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, I think I saw the day. We already have four or five weekend clinics booked up or on the schedule. So get on it quick. Get on it quick. We're going to see everybody, everybody.
[00:04:14 - 00:05:13]
Mark Burik:
Welcome to the Better at Beach Volleyball podcast with Mark Burik. That's me and Brandon Joyner. Today we are going to talk about hard driven defense and specifically ways to get more digs. There's a lot of kind of simple keys that you might think will improve it, but we're going to go a little bit more in depth in certain situations, certain strategies so that you guys can just get some better defense. And I know that it's winter time for most of us, but as we go through this, just think about it, because a lot of these if you guys play indoor, a lot of these tips and keys are going to help you out digging indoor as well. So if you're lucky enough to have an indoor facility with beach, awesome. And if you only get to play on the hardcore during the winter, well, then just start applying these and we'll see if we can get you better. Brandon, what's going on in your life?
[00:05:13 - 00:06:44]
Brandon Joyner:
Not much. Getting ready to take off on my own Christmas, but heading back to Virginia. I think I leave on Friday. Still up in the air somehow, but I'm going to get there. I'm getting home. But yeah, defense has been something that I've kind of had to focus on a little bit more, actually, since I moved out to California, because I found that before I moved out here, I was kind of considered solely a blocker and I had a pretty solid indoor career at blocking. So it kind of just transferred over to the beach. And I tried to take that on, but since I've gotten out here, I've realized that I'm not that tall and there are a lot of people that are just as tall or taller than me and jump just as high, if not higher than me. So I've had to practice some of those defensive moves as well. It's been something that I've kind of been focusing on since I've moved out here, and I'm still learning a lot. But Luckily, I get to hear you talk about a lot of stuff about digging. And it's great because I'm still learning myself. I'm just excited to keep learning and kind of share what I've kind of focused on since I've started, since it's a little bit probably newer since you've been focusing on it for a while.
[00:06:44 - 00:06:42]
Mark Burik:
Yeah. But you also played center in College and professionally overseas. So standing down that line when outside can Thunder their crossbody at you. You learn a lot about hard driven defense just by sitting in that zone. I mean, that's a dangerous place to be with outsiders coming in and hitting that crossbody down the line. So I think a lot of setters who reach the top level have to be great defenders.
[00:07:10 - 00:08:07]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, especially thinking back to my indoor career. When an outside does have the ability to turn that ball down the line, it has made me a lot more comfortable in taking car driven attacks on the sand. I was lucky enough to play almost my whole career against Kyle Granite, who was an All American opposite. He was a couple of years ahead of me, and when I was on the second team, he was the guy light me up cross court, and I was so competitive that I didn't care if I was on the second team. I still wanted to beat you guys every single time. So I figured out where to stand, how to position my body, what it meant to have a defensive platform, and kind of just put myself in a position that allowed me to get a decent amount of digs. I think I might have led the team my senior year in digs.
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Mark Burik:
Well, so there you go. You know what you're talking about?
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Brandon Joyner:
Know what I'm talking about out there on the beach,
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Mark Burik:
but it's not completely different world. So for those of you who are like playing indoor and coming out to the beach, hold onto a lot of the things you held onto an indoor don't overthink. I think when most people get out to play defense from playing indoor volleyball, they really freak out. They freak out about how much space there is, how much the person has the ability to shoot, and they lose a lot of the indoor digging ability that they should have carried over because their mind messes with them. They worry too much about all of the variables and how much they have to run, and they actually negate all those years of skill development that they had with hard driven balls. And I think today, after this lesson, we're going to talk about how those players specifically can really get that together. Some other quick announcements just in case you guys didn't know, guys, we have Better Beach shirts. We've got three new designs up and running on our Teespring account, and I don't have a specific link to that other than betteratbeach.com/shop. If you go to betteratbeach.com/shop, you can see all of our different designs. You can click on the link to our merchandise and see that. And also, we don't have these on the website, but they are for sale. If you guys want to get in touch with us, we got some sweet hats and new shipment. I think we got about 60 hats. Here's your dad hat, Brandon.
[00:09:30 - 00:09:34]
Brandon Joyner:
People love dad. Hats. They're coming back.
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Mark Burik:
Yeah, I don't. But a lot of people do. And they did sell out the fastest at the camp. So you were right.
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Brandon Joyner:
You got the visor over there. That might be my new favorite.
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Mark Burik:
Well, I got another dad hat because they did so well. And another dad hat. If you guys want any better beach hats, you are more than welcome. And then, yes, the Flicks fit advisory,
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Brandon Joyner:
which hugs your head. You love it.
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Mark Burik:
It really does. Yeah. You get impressed with how comfortable it is. So if you guys want any of this, just let us know. Shoot us a DM. We'll be able to send you some Christmas presents. All right, let's get started. Okay, so key number one for hard driven defense is get stable early. This is where we get all those indoor players who come along and they've been told like, get stable, get still, get stable, get still. And then they just completely ignore it when it comes time to play hard driven defense. Now, what you cannot do is start thinking in your head, especially early in your career, if you're still like an intermediate or intermediate advanced player, just sit in that pocket early. Too many people worry about where the attacker sees them. So they think, well, if I go to the diagonal, then they're going to know that I'm in the diagonal and then they're going to have this line open to shoot. You're giving too much credit to all of these attackers to be able to see and take an approach and take a swing and hit a spot fast enough and accurate enough that a defender couldn't get there. That is a crazy difficult thing to do at the highest level. Yeah. We train it so that we can hit like three and four foot boxes. But you have to spend years and years and years getting to that level. And not a lot of players put in the time to be that accurate and that fast. So my number one piece of advice first is you know how like, a lot of coaches will teach that serve, go into the middle, then after the set, pop into your diagonal. I'm trying to get most players completely out of that. I want them to stop doing all that. I want you to go to your position immediately, pay attention, make sure that the other person can't bump over on two or attack on two, but go to your spot right away. And by the way, like eight, nine out of ten times, you should be blocking line with a line block and a diagonal defender. That's the most efficient way to play defense when you're starting out. So get there, go early. Don't worry that that person is going to see you and sit in that nice little pocket. And when you can get stable there, you see more. The more you move, the less you see. And I know that sounds kind of strange, but your eyes start focusing on other things. If you're focused on moving and where that person might see you, you're not focused on picking up the information that they're giving you. You're more concerned with what information you're giving them, which means that you can't mentally focus on where the ball of the attack is about to go. So number one piece of advice is get in there, get stable as early as you can.
[00:12:57 - 00:14:51]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. And I think it's kind of interesting because when you're playing, I know a lot of times exactly what you just said when we're talking about you're worried about that attacker seeing you. And I would argue that if you're an intermediate player, it's almost better if the attacker sees you in that angle because then they're at a specific level where they don't have every shot that's possible in beach volleyball. So really what most people have, especially at the intermediate level or even like the low open level tournaments, is they have that hard driven cross and then they have a high line and they think about hitting one side of the court versus the other side of the court. It's not really am I going to hit a cut shot? Am I going to hit a high line? Am I hitting a jumbo? Am I hitting whatever hard hit it is? So like most of the time, if you're an intermediate style player and that attacker does see you in the cross court and you see them slowing down their approach, then eight times out of ten, they're probably just going to shoot that ball over the blocker. But if they don't slow down their approach, then there's absolutely no reason for you to move because they're probably just going to try to hit and try to beat you on that side of the court that you're currently standing on. And so especially where I grew up in Virginia, a lot of really good volleyball players, but a lot Besides the top four teams in a tournament, you're not really seeing people that have the ability to use their vision to beat you. When you're in California, it's a little different because obviously the level of play out here is just overall a little bit more consistent. I'm trying to give a little bit of love to Virginia.
[00:14:51 - 00:15:25]
Mark Burik:
We're on the East Coast. I'm from Long Island, too, and you want to give credit. But then you see no one practices when we leave that the quality has gone down and it's just like, okay, well, now we have all these junior girls, thank goodness that they're coming up, because in three, four years, they're going to absolutely whack all of the current adults. Yeah. But that jump from the level jump from the Northeast, the Midwest to California overall is massive, right?
[00:15:25 - 00:17:44]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. And then when I moved out to California, I kind of had the same idea. But I started realizing I was like, oh, these people are better. So I need to cheat a little bit if I'm going to get there. But really what it is is it's a matter of getting in that spot, allowing that attacker to kind of see where you are being okay with that and then trusting your reaction time and your speed to get to the ball. And as long as you have good footwork and you're not making a lot of negative steps, as long as that getting stable early and that setup is strong, it's going to be pretty important. It should help you out a lot. All right. Key numbers. I'll go into two hands in front. I know this is something that you've kind of battled with a little bit, and I know I have, too, because a lot of times when I love the you can't really see it now. But imagine that I have here my holsters. If I had guns, we talk a lot about firearms. I need to switch that up. But Instagram is going to start blocking us and everything. Yeah. A lot of times when we're thinking about it, we'll say imagine if you have your hands in your pockets. And a lot of times when we're playing defense, for some reason, our hands go back there. And I don't know if you guys follow Dustin Watton, but he's a guy that I think eventually we'd love to have on the show. He absolutely has an amazing Instagram channel where he talks a lot about passing and service. Even though he's a little Barrow and indoor, a lot of his defensive teachings are pretty strong. And one of the big things that he talks about is just keeping his hands away from his body. And something that I really like that Mark said before is like if you can put your hands on your knees like you're in defensive or passing position, let your hands drop and then start wiggling your fingers and bring them up until you can see your fingers out of the peripheral of your bottom eye. And I think if you can find that position and that's a really good position to start, because now you're not having to bring your arms forward and having to track and meet that ball, your arms are already forward and you can kind of just cut off the angle of where that ball is going.
[00:17:44 - 00:19:15]
Mark Burik:
What I also think and we're not going to go too much on this, but with your hands in front, once you're there and you're in that position, your body is basically prepared to dig as if you were blind, as if you're expecting. If you close your eyes and the ball bounced off of you, would it come up? That's like a good, hard driven defense position to be in. If you just set your arms in that angle so that if anything coming towards you or coming down at you would go up back into that angle. Great position to be in, but also framing the ball and understanding how deep the player is on the court, how high they can jump, how far they are away from the net and how deep you are. Right. And that'll change whether your hands are underhand or overhand and ready for the high hands. Dig. So we do teach this base position of getting your hands out nice and early. But what happens is if you put your hands down, like, let's say when you're peeling, you peeled because you thought that the attacker couldn't hit down at you. And then people get locked up, they put their hands down in front of them and they get hit by the ear and the eye of the face instead of. All right, well, you're not getting to full depth and you just by peeling, you basically announced to the whole people, to the whole court that that player couldn't hit down. So now your hands should come up, but they should still be in front. Right. So don't lock them down here. Make sure that they're out if it's hard driven and you've got plenty of depth, or even if you're peeling hands in front, but you can still have them up. So there's different hand positions for different scenarios. And I think people need to understand that locking down in that base position is not always the answer. Nine times out of ten, like it is. But if you're peeling and you're shallow in the court and that person is off the net, then you need to have your hands up before they attack.
[00:19:15 - 00:19:58]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, I think and I'm just going to ask you a question right now so you can kind of keep going with it. But is that something that you decide as you're peeling or is that something you're deciding as that attacker is hitting?
[00:19:58 - 00:21:31]
Mark Burik:
Yeah. Unfortunately for me, it's instinct now. So those calculations happen kind of fast. But what is my mind seeing that I'm calculating? Is it's understanding how far off that person is? Because the further off they are, the only fast thing that can happen is going to be flat and around my head, which is when I would bring my hands up. Right. Okay. If they're tight, some people can bounce, right? They can absolutely bounce down. And if you're playing that type of athlete, then your hands need to be in front of you and up if I know that I'm in a position where I don't have time to get full depth on defense. So let's say I appealed really late. Well, then I'm only in half court, and no matter who is hitting at me, the only thing that's going to happen fast is going to be at my face. So I'm taking into account what type of athlete I'm playing against, how deep they are and how deep I am, and you start to get a feel for. All right. Well, if you haven't really crossed half court on defense, then your hands should be up high unless somebody's 50 and they're about to go THUNDERDALE. Right. But we're talking like ADP and open level. That's when I would use that if somebody's Super, super tight. But I'm playing against a B and a player in a camp or something, I know they're probably not going to bring that much heat inside the front half of the court, so I could be a little bit looser with my hand position.
[00:21:31 - 00:21:26]
Brandon Joyner:
Got you. Yeah. And actually, I think this conversation, I didn't realize it when I was asking, but it kind of takes us into our third kind of idea, which is finding the impact window of the attacker. So, like that's one thing when we're talking about pulling or staying up and blocking, obviously that's an impact window kind of conversation. But do you want to dive a little bit deeper into the impact window when you're digging and what that kind of means?
[00:21:26 - 00:25:28]
Mark Burik:
Yeah, absolutely. So key number three for better defense is the impact window. And what do we mean by the impact window is, of course, finding that little square and actually learned this from Nicolas NA on one of his podcasts. On the Sandcast podcast, he talked about finding that window where the player is about to strike the ball. A lot of coaches and advice about defense talks about like looking at the shoulder. And we talked about that on Monday, but that never really made sense to me because this doesn't give you any hints as to where the ball is going to go. So looking at the hitting shoulder never made sense if you're looking at the entire arm. Okay, well, now you can start to notice things. But then like your visual sequence is on a forearm and an elbow instead of picking up the exact place on the ball that that person is about to hit. Now I have a visual sequence change. So I look at the speed of the attacker. I look at if the ball is going to land on their hitting arm or their non hitting arm if it's going to put them in trouble. I look to see if they're about to come under and pick up their chest because they're too early, because then they're not going to be able to hit very steep if they come in early. And then they have to lean back to hit. And once I've gotten all of that and now I just switched the focus immediately to, all right, where are they going to strike the ball? And my mind is trying to say, let's pick up the exact wrist position on which part of the ball that that person is about to touch. And that gives me better reads because that allows my hands, which are out early, that allows them to be in a position earlier. So when amazing defenders make things look so simple, right, they don't even move and that ball just pops up and you're just wondering, like what? How do they make it look so easy? All of this is anticipation. It's not reaction. It's seeing what's about to happen before it happens. And that's what makes it look easy. And a big part of that is where you're looking, and that's how you're going to pick up that hitting window is making sure that you see how that hand is contacting the ball. Then you're going to put your hands and your body in the right position. You're going to be leaning in the right position. You can't always pick it up against amazing players. And early in your career you're going to struggle with certain body positions mean, but the earlier you start trying to learn it, the faster you can pick it up in your career. And I think people need to appreciate that as well. That when you start something, you're going to get better at it sooner. But if you never start trying to pick up that information, even though it might look like gibberish first, then you're never going to get it. But try to interpret that information. It's like learning a new language. Try to speak Spanish, try to put your Netflix into Spanish and just use like us subtitles. Right. You're going to learn a lot faster in that way. Yeah, for real. And that's it. So Impact window is huge. It's made a big difference for my defense, and I think it'll make a big difference for a lot of people out there.
[00:25:28 - 00:28:22]
Brandon Joyner:
Whenever we're thinking about the impact window, I think a lot of people, they don't really know what to look for and they just think, oh, it's my responsibility to stand over here. But when you're talking about somebody's momentum of whether it's bringing them inside the court or outside the court, especially when we're thinking about lower level players, like any pretty much open, intermediate, double BB, whatever, that momentum is going to tell you a lot. And that will help you kind of get into that special location. I like that a lot. And then the next one is change your depth. And I think when I think about change your depth, Mark, I think you and I might think about this in a little bit of a different way, but I'm going to explain my idea between this and then you can kind of take yours for me changing your depth. I found myself trying to hide so much that I was never really in a great spot to make a play. And so I realized like, all right, forget about all this tricky stuff. Don't worry about trying to make them hit a shot to score a point. Put yourself in a position where I call it the danger zone. And the main reason I do that is kind of going back to my indoor days, and I was always in the danger zone. If somebody was going to get hit in the face, it was probably going to be me when I was playing defense, and an outside hitter just turned a ball down the line. But eventually you kind of get used to that. And I think something that happens a lot with players is they put themselves in a position where they can only dig with their platform or they can only dig with their hands, and they don't let it become a reactionary play. They just kind of hope that an attacker gets hit at them or hits the ball at them. So I know with me, when I'm thinking about changing the depth, the first thing that I had to do was kind of go back to where the getting stable early was, but I wanted to make sure that I'm doing that in the right location where kind of if I get hit anywhere on my body, that ball is going to land in the court. I think a lot of people will set up too far, too close to the sideline, or they'll be too deep. And if you think about that, if you get hit too high, then that ball might have been out of bounds. So I think just changing your depth and putting yourself a little bit more in that danger zone. If you're playing defense and an attacker is going up and hit a ball and your blocker is not in front of it, you should probably be a little worried, but that means you're in the right spot. If you're not worried and that attacker is getting ready to tee off on a ball, then more than likely your depth is an issue.
[00:28:22 - 00:29:59]
Mark Burik:
I like it. Part of my lesson comes from almost the opposite, but we'll meet in the middle, as usual, when players go, we can have two players on the exact same court, and we can tell them completely opposite things, right? For me, I got so used to being in that libero position when a seven footer was hitting on me. Like, at the ten foot line, they're just hitting straight down. And I said, like, okay, I have to cover that. Now. Any time a guy was spiking in Beach, I thought they had that ability to hit that far down, and I would put myself that close to the net, and I would cut off all of my own reaction time. When I got so used to again, people in middles just try to usually just bang straight down. That's what they do in indoor, and there's a lot more variety of shots, and it's way harder to hit that steep on the beach. And I would just stand in super close, and I would get blown up. I would have no reaction time. So I had to teach myself. And what I did is I drew a line at half court, and every point, every time I finished a point and the other attacker got to kill, I looked to see where I was standing, and so many times I was in front of that line. And I was like, how am I going to play defense if I'm in the front half of the court? So I had to draw that line consistently and make sure that that was my boundary line. I had to keep getting behind it to override my indoor libero side because you don't need to be that close for both people.
[00:29:59 - 00:30:42]
Brandon Joyner:
I didn't really start thinking about this until probably a couple of years ago, but if somebody has the ability to hit that ball straight down, that's just a really good hit. And I think a lot of us, we take it upon ourselves to stop every single hit. That could be an option. And I think sometimes we need to be like, you know what? Good freaking hit? And then it's our job, because then it's our job to talk to each other and be like, hey, blocker, I need you to help me on that. If he's able to hit that angle, then even if you're calling line, I need you to put your hand on that ball and take something away. So I think it's just a different conversation.
[00:30:42 - 00:32:08]
Mark Burik:
Give your blocker more liberties. But the guys who make you pay for that type of stuff, like Triborn, is the guy who makes you pay for standing too deep because his hard cross is kind of like a 70% straight down cut shot that you're like. This guy is just consistently hitting in front of me, and then you step in on it and he just hits that high, deep seam. So that attacker is changing their depth at the same time that you are. And one of the big wins that I had against Hayden and Theo in Chicago a while back was when I started playing with that depth against Theo. We were serving him all the time, and he had a couple of different swings in a couple of different scenarios. And I had to try to learn to adjust my depth for his type of set based on his tendencies. And Marciniak was giving me good intel, and I ended up getting a lot of digs, and we pulled out that match because I couldn't stay in the same spot. I had to change it. And I think people can change where they get used to standing. And then as your level, your IQ goes up, then you start changing within your game instead of just your base position. You start changing based on scenarios and the athletes you're playing against.
[00:32:08 - 00:32:32]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, I remember when that tournament happened and we were able to talk afterwards and you were really happy with just how quickly you and Peyoter were to making these adjustments in game and then not only making the adjustment, but also seeing the return on it. That's obviously always the goal. That's really cool.
[00:32:32 - 00:33:25]
Mark Burik:
And aside from defense in terms of communication, Peyoter, my partner, saw something that I didn't. I wasn't picking up on it and instead of saying, hey, you got to get that. He gave me information. He said, I think this is what's happening when this is happening. And I was staying open to it because he wasn't blaming me, he wasn't accusing me. And at the time. And now I'm trying to be like a more mature partner and be better with how I give feedback and how I receive it. But to be able to stay open to that information, he doesn't sit there and accuse you, and he actually gives you valuable information instead of, come on, dig that. Like, no kidding. Take that.
[00:33:25 - 00:33:26]
Brandon Joyner:
Thanks, dude.
[00:33:26 - 00:34:02]
Mark Burik:
Right. So he gave good, valuable information. And if we weren't talking after each play about what's happening and why, then we never get to the point where I get those ticks. So if you're out there and you're a partner and you're giving information or you're saying things that don't give information, it's almost better to shut your mouth or just give compliments so that at least the communication pathway remains open. But if you start accusing, then that pathway shuts down quick and you'll never share the valuable information when you recognize it.
[00:34:02 - 00:34:18]
Brandon Joyner:
Right. I like it. It's always nice to find that partnership that you feel that comfortable talking to somebody, and it stinks because you have to develop a little bit of a relationship first. But gosh, once you get it, it's really cool. It's so cool.
[00:34:18 - 00:35:41]
Mark Burik:
And I think the people who don't have it, that's where a coach becomes Uber valuable. Yeah. That's why relationships have therapists and some of the strongest relationships in the world. And marriages they have people they can bounce off of. Sometimes it's friends, sometimes it's a therapist. But to have that coach where I can say, coach, can you look at this and tell me if I'm wrong about Brandon's game? And then he goes, he looks at it and he's like, no, that's not what I'm seeing. Or he's like, okay, I'll tell him then you don't feel like I'm looking down on you or I think anything is wrong with you. It then comes from the coach whose job is to tell both of us, like what's wrong and right and how we can fix it. It only works in that situation without a coach. When you have a player meeting and you say, I want to play with you because I want to learn from you. I know, like, Avery, Josh has done that in a few of his partnerships where he's playing with you guys, and he's like, I love playing with Rosie, and I can't wait to learn everything I can from him. So he'll be open to that. Phil was that with Todd, that works in that situation. But when you have two people who think they're equal, neither of them can or should coach each other unless it's a very special connection.
[00:35:41 - 00:36:06]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. And I know that was something that we had to kind of go through when I first moved out here and we would have practices, and it became something where I was like, when I ask you for specific feedback, then that's when you can coach me. But other than that, let's just keep it about us. Let's not make it personal. And I think that it always helps.
[00:36:06 - 00:36:19]
Mark Burik:
It's a good conversation to have. Yeah. All right. So first key was getting stable early. Second key was hands in front. Third key was find the impact window. Fourth key, change your depth. And key number five, Brandon.
[00:36:19 - 00:36:20]
Brandon Joyner:
Key five is going to be dig high.
[00:36:20 - 00:36:21]
Mark Burik:
What I want to keep the ball low in beach volleyball.
[00:36:21 - 00:38:59]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. And there's a time and a place, but I think, especially when we think about our audience, a lot of people, once they figure out a way to get in a specific spot, they get into the right location, they've read the attackers hit, they've looked at that little window that we've talked about, and now they're getting ready to touch the ball. I think way too many people are just okay with touching the ball. They're not thinking about finishing the play. I say this a lot. It's like, oh, great touch, but you forgot to finish the play. And I think a lot of times for me, I always say aim for about 10ft off the net, middle of the court, 20ft in the air, 6ft above is a little bit hard, especially when you're thinking about digging. But if you can think about finishing the ball to this specific location, then I think it allows you to actually realize that you have the ability to control some of these digs. Obviously, there's some hits that are hit so hard at you, and it's coming so fast that you're really just trying to create an angle within your body to allow the ball to come up. But for the most part, if you have a little bit of time and you can think about making this ball go to a specific spot and you can think about height versus location first, then that's when you're going to start allowing the ball to come up in the air a little bit more. And then now you're allowing your blocker, your teammate, to get behind this ball and help you finish it. But if that plays really low, unless you are a super experienced player and you're running some kind of offense where you're passing the ball low, running a quick set away or a quick set behind. Like, I know when Christian Honor and I were playing before the Covet season, before. Yeah, there were a lot of plays where if he got a really easy dig, he would run some type of quick tempo, and it allowed us to allow us to take advantage of a lot of teams. But when we tried to do that against teams that were able to get in front of us and able to shut us down, then we had to go back to normal and just be like, hey, let's just get this ball in the air. Allow me to give you the best set that I can possibly give you. And then now we're in the driver's seat when we're attacking. But, yeah, I think the digging higher was what started it,
[00:38:59 - 00:40:55]
Mark Burik:
and I think that's a big misconception. I remember our coach, Fred talked about that huge misconception of timing and speed. People think that you need to rush an offense by rushing the pass. The setter is the player who rushes the offense, and the hitter can change their route however they want. The only time that's changing is on two situations. Okay. The other team just ran scrambled. Now they're ten yards off the court, and now you're like, hey, we have to put this all down now before they get back on the court. Then you shoot a low pass as an option, or you speed it up so you can get through bumps. It kill quicker. But you don't rush an offense by passing faster unless you're going on two. That doesn't make sense. It's up to the hitter and the setter and everything like that. So if you don't have an onto threader, you're not trying for onto passing lower with the reasoning of speeding up your offense makes zero sense. Zero sense. It only puts more pressure, especially if you're facing a decent server, like even a halfway decent server, because when you pass lower, your setter gets in trouble quick. Yeah, it's definitely increasing the responsibility and the stress on every player that's involved. And you'll see that at the pro level where people, like, in the middle of a play, they'll just Jack up a dig and they'll kind of dust their hands off and they then just get to breathe, reset themselves and say, all right, I'm in the driver's seat right now. I'm in full control. But I think that a lot of players, the faster that play starts happening, the more you stay at the speed of the play, and then you forget to think. You forget to look. Your errors increase, right?
[00:40:55 - 00:43:01]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. And it's for some reason, it's hard to get out of it once you've decided to do it. If you pass one ball low, the next time that ball comes over, if it's the same kind of look, you're probably going to rush no matter what. But trying to figure out when and where is definitely a good idea. That's another hide and side story. I faced him like me and Hudson, and then me and Dentler faced him too many times, right? Yeah. And you can even see it with Hayden, who is probably one of the most accurate attackers that I've ever played against. I remember I practiced when I first moved out here, it was being Ty Trambley against him, and I think it was Kolinsky or Doherty. I can't remember who it was, but we tied the drill and then it was like, all right, we're going to go a side out round to each player and whatever your combined score was after side out, that team won and hide and went first and we not only did Thai and Ty Tramble is probably the best defender that I've ever played with. As far as picking up shots. I think John Hyden went 21 balls without us even touching one of his attacks. And that was just so demoralizing, dude. It was terrible. Like we went from this position where like, oh my gosh, we can win this drill against a top World Tour team too. Just being like, no, he's still one of the best that's ever played this sport. But when he runs that quick offense, he doesn't have that accuracy anymore. He still scores just about as easily as he does in other situation, but he does lose a lot of his control and more becomes like, oh, the blocker is not here, I'm just going to Pat it real quick. But yeah, it's crazy if that can affect not too much because he's still freaking amazing. But yeah, it's so crazy.
[00:43:01 - 00:46:00]
Mark Burik:
Alright, so number five, we dig higher. And number six, defensive tip number six, practice digging with your hands. I hope I kept some Flack for this, but the difference in the quality of hand digging between the women my age and the men my age is too far, too far. And there's a number of reasons why that can happen, right? Guys hit harder so there's more hard driven balls, so there are more plays where they have the opportunity to use their fingers. And up until a certain level, women really aren't bringing enough heat consistently to call it a reaction play where you can use your fingers. So you have to be in the elite players on the women's side to be able to start using your hands consistently. And on the men's side, you could get a B player who can just jump and mash a ball and you'll be able to dig with your hands based on the reaction thing. So the problem with that comes now, you get stuck at that level because you've never practiced this skill and you just start losing those points and you don't include it into your practice. You don't include it into your warm up because it's not valuable to you in the game. And so then you just have this hard ceiling. So everybody out there needs to practice digging with pokies needs to practice digging with their paddles, their open hands, underhand, overhand underhand is not a lift by the way, so long as it rebounds, let's clear that out. Yes, being able to Tomahawk, okay, but that's a big problem because most people like to try to keep their fingers out of the way and you need to be able to grab that ball with your fingers to play volleyball at the next level. And people just don't practice that. They pepper. And here's what happens every time you and me. Right. Camp or clinic and we tell people to pepper. Everybody hits directly at each other's forearms and they dig with the forearms for ten minutes, and they could keep that ball alive as long as they want. Then you say, okay, everyone over hand pepper. What does that mean? Hit at each other's face. The ball dies within three reps. Right. People don't have the hand manipulation, which is shocking because these should be your most valuable tools. Your fingers and your hands have the most nerve endings in them, so they should be able to react better and faster than anything else in order to get to that next level. Practice just in your pepper. If you practice digging with your forearms, spend at least 33% of that time digging with your hands. Tomahawks, slaps, pokies. We do a lot of speed pepper at our camps and clinics, but you have to practice with your hands so that you're ready to get to the next level. What do you think?
[00:46:00 - 00:48:54]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, I don't know how anybody could even remotely argue that it's a skill that for some reason we don't work on. But if you watch the indoor game where they're allowed to serve, receive with their hands open, the best teams in the world are thing up their players so that 90% they can do this. If that's the case for indoor, which those balls are coming a lot quicker, it doesn't make sense that we haven't started transit, especially on a coaches standpoint. I'm not going to be certain there's going to be you might not be able to even hand dig. Like if you're a twelve year old, 13 year old, 14 year old girl boy, then the power that's going to be coming from that might not be able to use an opening. But as we get older, it's something that's coming to the game. And yeah, you're seeing those people who are willing to dig with their hands, it's almost becoming an easier point for them. Yes. But we don't remember doing incorporated into our trainings, getting to a live game, live match set. We forget that it's even an option. So if you start doing it after automatic, and even if you are a shorter, younger player, right, you're shorter. So that means that there will be more balls that cross your upper body when they're hit. So you don't have to have paddles, Tomahawks and slaps in order to do that. Right. So even the junior do you remember the Huntington AVP? It was the year where it also involved the international teams. Are you going to bring up the linquis sisters, the two little I don't remember their names, but the two women that qualify and they didn't block one single time. They're playing against some of the best teams in the world. And pretty much what happened is these small girls, I don't know how old they were, but they couldn't have been. Both of them couldn't have been taller than 58. And they literally were pulling playing. They only stayed [email protected], which you and I talked about a lot, to be net protectors. And then they would pull off and then they were just getting balls crushed at their face, outside their body and just being able to dig with their hands let them beat some of the best teams in the world that they had no chance of being against, but they were the only people on the court at that point that were willing to put themselves in that position.
[00:48:54 - 00:49:23]
Mark Burik:
So that is crazy. I said the same thing. I was like, who are these two homes that are out here demoralizing people? The girl who just went to the Olympics, Pavin? No, not Pavin, Melissa. She was hitting us at me. She hit one ball out and hit one ball down and hit hard and then just got lipped. And I was like, what is going on? Who are these? And then somebody said, those are linguists just because they had different names because they got married.
[00:49:23 - 00:49:24]
Brandon Joyner:
Okay.
[00:49:24 - 00:50:36]
Mark Burik:
And I was like, these girls were consistently getting top ten finishes in the AVP, like ten years ago and they were the only no blocking team and they didn't play with anybody else. They're like the McKibbens. They stuck together. Who are they? Who are the Mcibins? I think they're directors or something. So you can play high level volleyball if you have great defense. And the only way that they were able to take down literally Olympic players was because their overhand digging was fantastic and is fantastic. If you want to just see examples of people who have great overhand digging, go watch the majority of the Brazilian female teams who will step up at half court and play defense with their hands right at their face. They take away the cut shot. They're closer to the other sideline because they've stepped up. So now they've taken away all the short high lines. Now the only other option is try to hit at my face, in which case my hands are ready or try to hit that high deep line. But the women are fantastic at high hands defense.
[00:50:36 - 00:50:54]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, I've noticed that. And you can let me know if this is the case. But I've also noticed that a little bit about Billy Allen. He seems to really put himself into a good position where he just bat and balls away. And so I think he might be a good person to watch as well.
[00:50:54 - 00:51:09]
Mark Burik:
I agree. I think he's one of those guys that does. Which key is it? Our fourth key. Really well. He knows when to step up and when to play deep and dig with his forearms. I think he's amazing at that.
[00:51:09 - 00:51:41]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. All right. Last one probably most important. Calm down, calm down. I know with me I just get anxious, especially when I know I'm going to touch a ball and I just let my arms go too quickly. So I know with me, with calming down, it's letting that ball do a lot of the work for me, but I'll let you keep going with it.
[00:51:41 - 00:53:21]
Mark Burik:
For me, it was always tension. I would know that that person is about to do something hard and powerful. So my body's natural reaction is to tense with them. Right. Instead of staying loose and Reactable. That's not a word I know. But staying loose and being able to move loose instead of, like, feeling that tension, the flex in your arms that locks everything in place. When your arms are flexed, they have to unlock to move out of that position and then relock and move into a different position. So that takes more milliseconds of time, right. If you're able to stay loose, then they don't have to unlock before they move, and you're going to be faster. So I know that everybody's hitting hard and everybody, like, wants to get a dig so bad, but you've got to be a little more tailor crab about it and just kind of be out there swaying and for one reason or another, for one reason or another, and just have those loose arms able to dig. Yes. There needs to be tension in your legs. You need to be low enough. Like they can't be jelly. Same thing with the arms. They can't just be jelly, but they can't have full tension. And that face can't just be like, you can be intense without being tight. And there's a huge difference there that people need to embrace. So if you notice that during digs or after digs, you're noticing this flexes tightness in your arms, you're going to be slower. So see if you can get your arms to relax, even though you know that somebody's bringing the heat.
[00:53:21 - 00:54:10]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah. I always talk about the fact that look at body types in beach volleyball. I don't want to be the stereotypical person that says those things or don't think I'm being shallow. But a lot of beach volleyball players are long, skinny, noodley people. And if we're long and skinny and noodily, then we shouldn't be, like, trying to flex our muscles in every single point of the play. Our bodies look like this for a reason. And so just allowing yourself to be a little bit flowy and allow yourself to get behind that ball, and then you can tense up a little bit when you're making the touch. But doing it before the movement happens is just you're shooting yourself on the foot.
[00:54:10 - 00:55:40]
Mark Burik:
If we can add another like .5 to the calm down thing, it's when you lose a point, when the other team gets a kill. The offense is supposed to score more points than the defense. That's why we played drills like five three and the Battle of 1812, where you put the defense has a bigger score than the war of 1812, sir, than the offense does because the offense should be scoring more consistently. So if you get so incredibly like fired up and upset that the other team got a kill and you start blaming things, you're not going to get the next you're not going to get the next big, you're not going to get the next point. Like the top AVP and World Tour players. And yes, they're playing the best offenses in the world, but they're getting five or six digs per set. That's out of 40 something points, right? 35, 40 points. So that's one dig every seven or eight points that you're looking for, you're not going to dig every ball. So just chill, be okay that the other team got a kill, but take that as information and see if you can say why did they get that kill? What reason did they hit it? What did they see that made them hit it? Where did we serve them that made them hit that? And instead of that high anxiety situation of damage, they got another kill. I can't touch them. I can't touch them. I don't know what to do. Just start collecting information calmly.
[00:55:40 - 00:57:09]
Brandon Joyner:
Yeah, especially because in the last ten points, that's when you can use that information again. Like, oh, when I serve them short to their sideline. Last time I thought he was going to come in and hit hard cross, but he let that ball drop past his shoulder. He went line. And then you can take that information and you can kind of try to use it again later in the game to where now you can maybe win that point just by putting them into a situation that you remember them doing. I think it was Christian. Sorum he went on a podcast that I listened. I think it was Sancast, actually. And he said something about the fact that he doesn't stress out about losing points within the first 15 points or something like that. I mean, it also helps when you're playing with the best blocker in the world and the best server, because then you literally stand up, watch and block every ball. You're probably up by six points after 15 points anyway. But the fact that it doesn't stress me out, he takes in all that information and then you see those guys and when they're at the end of the match, they always look like they're in control. And it doesn't matter if they're up by five, it doesn't matter if they're down by one. They still look like they're in control, which I think that's just them taking in information.
[00:57:09 - 00:57:39]
Mark Burik:
Alright, so that's today's lesson for everybody. Number one, get stable early. Number two, get your hands in front of you. Number three, find the impact window. Number four, learn how to change your depth. Number five, dig higher. Number six, practice digging with your hands. And number seven, calm down. Good lesson today, Brandon.
[00:57:39 - 00:57:40]
Brandon Joyner:
It was nice that it was good. Thanks for having me on.
[00:57:40 - 00:57:56]
Mark Burik:
Hey, man, my pleasure. Hey, thanks for joining. Yeah, thanks for joining everybody out there. Brandon's got a hit out but I'm going to stick around for a little Q and A with our live audience. So if you're here live, let's get into that chat. Remember that I'm going to be chatting through Facebook and through YouTube. I can't respond to the chats on YouTube but I can respond verbally to when you send in the comments on that video. So if you want to hang around, ask any questions. Remember again, we have a new York clinic coming up long island this Saturday, December 18th, or two camps coming up but we have one spot left again because somebody canceled yesterday. They were sold out.
[00:57:56 - 00:58:23]
Brandon Joyner:
Might have already gotten taken. But if you're interested, send us an email [email protected] and if it is still open, we'll get you in there.
[00:58:23 - 00:58:48]
Mark Burik:
Cool. And if it's not open April 3, book that right away. That's also in Florida and if you want us to come and run any camps or clinics in your hometown, if you have a facility, a court get in touch with us. Go to bed at beach.com/clinics and we will be there. And if you want some sweet swag for Christmas, hit me up for the hats or go ahead to betteratbeach.com/shop
[00:58:48 - 00:59:06]
Brandon Joyner:
telling you guys, don't miss out on that visor you can wear it all day long. You can sleep in it. You can train in it. You can go to work in it. Office approved.
[00:59:06 - 00:59:15]
Mark Burik:
Yeah. And it doesn't abuse the follicles so for those of us who are follicularly disinclined you can protect them.
[00:59:15 - 00:59:23]
Brandon Joyner:
But it also works if you're both right.
[00:59:23 - 00:58:27]
Mark Burik:
If you want to shine it up people's. People. Alright. Alright.
[00:58:27 - 00:59:00]
Brandon Joyner:
I will see you on Monday, next Monday.
[00:59:00 - 00:59:29]
Mark Burik:
Yup. East coast we'll be talking every day, but yeah. Alright.
[00:59:29 - 00:59:33]
Brandon Joyner:
See you guys later.
[00:59:33 - 01:16:34]
Mark Burik:
Bye. All right, everybody who is hanging around for the Q and A, what I'm going to do is I'm going to scroll through the questions piece by piece. Mark Zen, thanks for coming again, Mark. Appreciate it. Tell the players to calm down. You like that information? What is the minimal information they should gather as they play? The minimal information that they should gather as play. So one of the questions that when we look at defense, right, when we are not getting upset that the other team is scoring offensive points, what we have to say is just count. So if you're a coach out there and you're trying to train your players how to play defense or how to become better defenders throughout the entire match, at some point during the match, like 10, 11, ask your players, how many cut shots has that person hit? How many hard crosses has that person hit how many high lines? Now as we move to NCAA and if they put coaches in the box for AVP, we don't necessarily need to do that as much. But if you want to train a player to be independent and think on their own and to be true like warriors and people who battle, the base stats that you need to know are how many times they hit a certain shot. That's key, number one. And then you can get into some different situations and everything. So if you are at 1011 the technical and you don't know how many hard crosses, hard lines, cut shots, or high lines a certain player has, especially if it's the person you chose to serve, you need to start tracking stats during the game. Okay, next question. Joe, I believe asked where to find this to view later. Joe is going to be on our YouTube channel. It's streaming to Facebook, so you can check out our better Beach Volleyball page. If you're not in our Facebook group. Volley chat, get better beach volleyball. It's a great place where people ask consistent questions in the community, helps them, and we do a lot of our announcements through that. So it'll be on our YouTube channel and the podcast version. Once our team gets editing, then we'll have it up on a podcast. Okay, Ian says, do you think digging and surf receipt for indoor volleyball will help you for beach? Any adjustments you make going from one to the other in regards to passing? The only difference that I would like maybe make, Ian, is personally you want to pass a little bit more outside your body line on the beach because that ball can float more and you can't use your hands there for the men's game. A lot of guys during a float surf will step up to like 13ft and they'll try to take the ball with their hands. You cannot do that in beach. So as far as digging and passing, technically no. There should be no difference for how we pass with our forearms and digging. You should always just try to dig high and towards the middle of the Port for both. There you have it. Is this Adina? Is this you who's been a colada? Do you have one on one coaching in January in California? So we have a team of better beach coaches who are in California on a regular basis in Hermosa Rodano Manhattan. So if you come just get onto that, check out the Los Angeles tab on Betterbeach.com and you'll be able to book a private there. So you think the Norway team uses Ethan Says, so you think the Norway team uses those 1st 15 points, keeping track of high lines, angles, et cetera? 100% if you can check out their podcast. Was it with the Mcvins? Yes, it was. So it wasn't a podcast, it was a YouTube channel with the Norwegian team and the McKibbens, a great YouTube channel where they Dove into their mindset on defense. So, yes, they are tracking stats. And of course, at the highest level, you basically know every team's stats before you step on the court with them. However, to give you guys information, new teams that you play, you need to first of all, hopefully recognize tendencies of the players you play against. And second of all, learn to keep track so that you can start a little black booking. All right, I have a friend who wants to get in December camp in St. Pete. If you get any openings. Kumi she's got to send us an email to support at Bitter at beach if she wants to get on the waitlist for the camps because they are full. But then we get like a random cancellation here and then we open that up and we send it first to our waitlist. So make sure she send us an email if she wants to be on the waitlist for that December and January camp. Jeremy bocio, if you're still there, how hard should we be hitting at another heads in practice? Pepper the exact same speed that you hit at their forearms. If you're practicing overhand pepper and learning to overhand dig, the other team is not going to hit less hard. They're not going to hit softer at your head than they do at your platform. So you have to be able to dig everything same speed with forearms or hands if you want to get them comfortable with it. Like if it's their first time and you're afraid that they might jam their thumbs or they're a little bit scared. Okay, then take some heat off. But you should eventually get to the point where you take the exact same speed with your hands as you do with your platform. I'm going to scroll up through these questions. Thank you, guys, for getting involved. I really appreciate it. Thanks, Matteo. 50 50 Thunderdome, your next short beach volleyball documentary. I like that. So Mike Zadio, when we were talking about getting stable early, he said, are you anti Juke? I'm not anti Juke, but I know who and what type of player I need to Juke against. So for those of you who know, a Juke is when the attacker gets his eyes onto the other side of the court, you show him one move as if you're moving to one side of the court or the other, and you can either return or you can return and then follow your Juke. There's a number of fakes that you can do back there. But the important part, Mike, is that you have to know if the other player actually looks at you, if it changes what they do based on where you are and when they look at you. But if the players on the other side of the court are not looking at you and where you stand doesn't change where they hit or they're not even accurate enough to get a kill on you. If you start from a stable position, then you have zero reason to Juke and put yourself off balance. So not anti Juke. It's just it works at a certain level. Right now. Can you get your so our T shirts and sweatshirts can be shipped internationally. So follow [email protected] Forward slash shop. But our hats, you would have to pay me for shipping and I think that would be expensive. If you want them, I am down to ship them wherever you want. But then I would have to charge you for that shipping. And I don't know how much that would be. If anybody knows a great drop shipping hat provider, a hat company that will print or embroider hats that we design and then ship them wherever they need to be shipped, that would be fantastic. I would love to get in touch with that. Phil Williams, could you all do a clinic before or after floods? We are actually planning on it. We're in contact with Emerald Coast Volleyball and we're trying to run a clinic the weekend leading up to funds. That could be a long week for a lot of people. So we might do it like the first one or two days, like Monday or Tuesday, or we might do it that weekend. So we are trying to run one. If it's at Juanas in Navarre, they have six courts and it's the biggest volleyball League around. Phil, I would love if you get in touch with me, make sure that you go to betterbeach. Comclinics and fill out that form and I'll call you and then we can talk about organizing that clinic. But if you think that we could fill it up, whether it's at Fuds or at Juana in the bar, then we would love to do it. And we are holding onto that weekend so we can do a Florida specific clinic. So see if you can I'll write it down as well. But get in touch with me, fill out that form and I'll give you a call. Okay. How important is it to record your own games? Do you do it? Recording your own games is the most important thing you can do. If you can't go back and relive each point and see it with a bird's eye view, you're not going to improve or your improvement rate is going to be half of what it should be. Think about how much time NFL and NBA teams spend in film. Right? It's important to know what's happening and where you are and how to correct yourself. So you should all start making sure you're on it. Trevor, you registered for our New York clinic and you're driving 5 hours. Dude, that's awesome. I can't wait to see you. I will buy you a beer. 40 year long drive. I can't wait to see you. You can hold me to that. And any last couple of questions. Bonnie says, what's the best way to pepper with a new partner? I'm playing with two co heads. I'm sure women on men's end just pepper, hit them high, hit them low, and make sure that they know in advance, hey, I'm going to hit you high and low because we need to practice low digging and high digging. So the best way to pepper with a new partner is just throw the ball up in the air past that and hit all the way around them. Some people get extra frustrated when they get challenged, and you don't want to put them in a frustrated state before their match. But if it's like a practice thing or you ask, hey, do you want me to challenge you during this pepper? Can I hit anywhere? Then the people who want to be challenged, you can challenge them, but just have that conversation with your partner. I know that I used to challenge players just during pepper and warm ups before they were ready to move, and they're like, no, I just want to warm up. I don't want to go firing right away. My mentality is you're on the court, it's time to fire at 100%. Their mentality was warming up, and so that would create friction in the relationship and then friction, and then they would be upset before the practice even started or before the match even started. And you can't have that. So you need to have that conversation with your partner about how you warm up the best. Do you have any tips on how to stay calm and loosen defense? Sebastian, just go back to the front. So Sebastian, go back to the beginning of this video, and we had a big thing on being able to be calm and being able to get stable early. So if you just go back to the beginning of this video, you'll be fine. Just have your hands loose. Make sure that you can actually loosen your hands and don't think big two shots. Say if he hits a high line, I'm not going to get it, but I will get every hard cross and every cut shot or vice versa. Say I'm going to dig the middle, hard cross. It's like the seam cross, right? I'm not going to pay attention to my sideline and I'll get the high lines. But dig two shots, make the court smaller, make the selection smaller. And if the other team counters that, you can adjust to that later. But say I'm going to get these two shots and I'm okay. If they get this type of kill right now, it's a good way to start playing defense. Joe, Me and Brandon are planning on running these twice a week, every Monday at 11:00 a.m. Pacific time, 02:00 P.m. East coast time, every Monday and every Wednesday. And then we'll chop them up, get recordings of them, put them on the podcast and do that. If anybody knows some great podcast Editors or just how to run a podcast in general, please let me know. We're making it up as we go along. How do we defend? We can put a ball to the area or not quickly and accurately. How do you defend against people who are quick and accurate? So people who are accurate and hit good spots, how do you defend against them? Well, if they're accurate and they're accurately hitting away from you and you're not fast enough to get there, there are a few things you can do. Number one, squat. Number two, lunge. Number three, sprint. The more you do these things, the faster you will get and the more balls you will get to. You cannot. Try to be getting more digs and being better and hit harder and spike harder. If you're not training your body to move faster and move more powerfully. So if you want to get more digs, you better start squatting heavy. You better start squatting as fast as you can, whether it's heavy or light, and you need to be starting to sprint. Other than that, if you just want to stay at the same physical level, then you have to learn how to Juke and how to throw peels like threes fours, fake peels, fake blocks. See what works and see how you can make somebody uncomfortable. But if somebody is shooting against you and getting non stop kills, you have to start peeling your blocker needs to start assisting you in covering more court. Serve with more power. Tonic. We have our tonic. Sorry, we have a fixture arm swing in 21 days course. If you check out betterapeach. Comcoaching, we will take you through a huge course that will increase your power quickly just through mechanics. All right guys, that is it for the questions. Thanks for spending the extra time with me. I hope you guys like this. Please comment on this or share it wherever you are. If you could share it to a volleyball group, you think there is good value in it, let me know. Remember that all of these topics, when we pick a topic, we choose it from volley chat, Get Better at Beach Volleyball, the Facebook group. So we look at that, we say, what are people talking about most? What questions had the most involvement? And then we put that onto our Excel sheet and we say, okay, that's when we're going to talk about that, we're going to answer those questions. So I'd love to hear your thoughts. I'd love to hear your commentary on what we're doing. If you want a free drill book, just go to [email protected]. On the home page, we give you our free Drillbook 36 Essential Drills for Beach Volleyball that will put you on our email list where we will send you our blogs, our videos on a regular basis. After the first week or so, you're going to get one email every week with a new blog and video and we'll give you these announcements if you want us to send you the announcements we'll give the announcements for when we are going live and of course you'll get first opportunity to book camps, to book clinics and everything like that. Final announcements for me. So you got your free 36 drill books, 36 essential drills for beach volleyball. We have our training camp in Florida coming up April 3. That booking is live at Bitter Beach.com camps. If you want to join our online coaching program coaching and if you want us to run a clinic in your hometown or at your facility, betteratbeach.com/clinics, you guys can head there or you can see our schedule and what cities we are headed to next. Currently we are in new York, I'm in new York and I'm running a training on Saturday, three sessions, two and a half hours each and that will be in Oceanside in long island at endless summer. If you're around, I'll see you there and if you're in the area and you haven't yet, please go ahead and share that information. It helps us in a big way and helps us keep doing what we want to do. If you need some Christmas gear, go head to better Beach.com shop and you can see our selection of shirts once you click on the apparel tab there. Thank you guys again for attending so much. It's so cool to see how many people are here and watching and staying through it so it's really cool to get to interact with you guys in a different way and I hope you guys like it. Send me feedback, send me commentary. Let me know how we can make it better for you. All right with that signing off, Tulu that's not a great sign off.
