Each and every athlete should focus on conditioning their body to prepare for the specific sport. Conditioning not only helps athletes be prepared for their sport it also plays a crucial role in injury prevention. When following a strong conditioning program, athletes will lower the risk of injuries by strengthening ligaments, tendons, and muscles while…
One of the most important skills in field hockey is dribbling. This is something your daughter can practice at home by herself with only a stick and a ball. She can practice staying low and keeping her eyes up as she control dribbles, speed dribbles and Indian dribbles. The more comfortable your daughter is dribbling…
An English woman by the name of Constance Applebee brought field hockey to the United States in 1901. Before this, field hockey was predominantly a male sport in European countries and was believed to be started by the ancient Egyptians or Greeks. In 1920 the U.S. took its first women’s field hockey team on tour…
The first day of spring is right around the corner (thank god!), and hopefully that also means the bleak days of bitter cold and snow are soon to be over. The beginning of spring elicits the commencement of many new things: blossoming flowers, cleaning out your home/office/bedroom/etc, golden tans, and lastly, spring sports! As much…
One of the most beloved comedy series of the 90s was Kid’s Say the Darndest Things. Everyone across the nation was absolutely enamored of listening to kids say, well, the darndest things you could possibly imagine. Many listened to these children because of their utter sincerity that came across as highly comedic and wonderfully genuine—kids clearly…
A couple of weeks ago we discussed the importance of playing. As mentioned before, the importance of playing is beneficial in a variety of ways: it keeps kids active, it helps to reduce the trend of childhood obesity, and it’s fun! In this week’s blog we want to zero in on one of those positives…
With basketball season wrapping up, we at Koa thought it would be a great time to discuss giving that end-of-the-season final push. Sports seasons generally range from 2 to 5 months, discounting off-season training. And while being in-season lasts for a fraction of the year, it is easy to become both physically, as well as…
Malcolm Gladwell, a popular journalist/author, brought to light one of the most interesting statistics of this century in regards to attaining “perfection” (this term is loosely used for no one can ever be totally perfect). In his book Outliers, Gladwell asserted that it takes, at minimum, 10,000 hours of practice to master a given subject. Whether that subject is…
Don’t Sweat it Now, this title might seem a little misleading—If you’re playing a sport how can you not sweat? And discounting competitive chess or perhaps darts, it’s practically impossible not to sweat when engaging in sports on a physical level however, I want to focus on the mental level of sports. It’s incredibly easy to become flustered or frustrated in…
In the past 30 years, childhood obesity rates have tripled. That’s right, tripled. That means one in every three kids in America is suffering from obesity. A lot of this is due to huge lifestyle changes that have accrued over multiple decades—changes including: accessibility/affordability of fast food, advancements in technology (practically every 5 year old knows…
