Starlings Director's Meeting

Well I made it back from San Diego this evening. I had driven down on Friday evening so I could attend the Starling Director's Meeting. I really wanted to to attend this meeting since I am new to the organization and I had a lot of questions to ask.

We met all day Saturday with an itinerary that covered a wide range of topics for discussion. The highlight of the day was the presentations by John Kessel of USA Volleyball. John was an engaging speaker who spent a lot of time discussion changes to how we should be coaching. I was pleased to find out that several of the things he proposed are things I am already doing. But he made several more points that I liked and need to start working into my normal practices.

On Saturday night we went over to the Epic Volleyball club and played a little volleyball. The facility there was fantastic. It sure puts anyting we have here in town to shame. I had a blast. It was the first time I had been on the court competitively with adults for 12 years. I wasn't moving very fast, I have no vertical left and my timing was nonexistent. But I got through 4 games without damaging my knees or ankles. I scored a few aces, several kills and had two roofs. I didn't keep track of the number of shanked passes I had, but I did blame them on my blurry eyes. Which was about 90 percent true.

After volleyball we all went to El Torito for dinner. That was a total zoo, but fun none the less. I ended up sitting at one end of a very long table with four women from Indianapolis, Atlanta, Philadelphia and South Dallas. They were a hoot. We had several discussions about club management, grilled tacos, coaching, salsa, young players, mixed drinks, volleyball parents, slow watresses, inner city volleyball (I couldn't contribute much to that conversation)and just volleyball in general. These four women sure made my little one team club seem like a pitiful effort. I had to keep reminding myself that I have to start somewhere.

On Sunday we met for about 4 hours of more meetings, then an informal hour of just talking afterwards.

I left San Diego around 1 PM this afternoon. I needed to be home for practice by 6 PM. I made it just fine. But i turned out that there was a communication breakdown between the facility director and myself. So I had 8 girls standing around in a chilly parking lot outside a closed and locked building. Eventually I got a hold of the manager and found out that we could not use the facility because they still had things set up in there from some big event they had yesterday. So I gave my girls the night off and came home to try and catch up on a few things I didn't get done because I was gone all weekend.