Bad Robot Drill

I do believe robots can be very helpful, but only if they are used with alot of thought and care into how you practice. Some sort of feedback is essential ie. film yourself, and you must always have targets, working just above your level (not on auto-pilot ). A term I've learnt recently and like to use: you must do 'deep practice'.

Here is a good example of what I think is a bad robot drill to be doing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UOkXl3T1Tkg

Why is this a bad drill?

Are there any benefits for the guy, at all?




Edited by Honey - 08 June 2010 at 13:21

Sorry.

I've edited the post, should work now.

For some reason, when I converted the address to a link it added a space inbetween 'http://' and 'www...'

Well I've been thinking about this alot recently and here is how I see it.

Every shot has 3 points to it: Lower body (legs), Upper body (torso and head) and then the arm (inc. elbow and wrist). IMO the guy in this clip is not benefiting at all from what he is doing. It's a very focussed drill, because there are no other variables , so he should be able to work out what he's doing wrong, but he's not. Throughout the clip the main adjustments he makes are to his arm, but IMO he has the arm part of the shot fairly spot on. He pays little attention to the position of his upper body and almost zero attention to the position of his lower body. All he is doing is nothing, he has the arm fine, yet he continues to try to adjust it.

IMO he's in no position to even try to move this clip on into a routine based drill because he's not even worked out what he should be doing yet.

Morale of the story: Without being picky about it the robot is cutting out a massive variable (the human) giving him the same shot everytime so it should be really easy for him to work out what he's doing wrong, but he's just not. He's not benefitting from it one bit. Why is he not experimenting with different feet positions. he doesn't even move his backfoot.

IMO robots are great, but this is exactly what I don't like seeing.

If I had a robot like this I would be filming myself and getting it up on here for you guys to pick on, I would be aware of my whole body (during the drill and through feedback video) and experimenting constantly finding out what works. This guy is just focussed on totally the wrong thing.

Originally posted by wiggy63 Well, if it is an exercise to drill his footwork into getting his right foot under the table, and getting out again, through repetition (muscle memory) he's doing fine and showing good recovery form.

You have a point.

I'm reading one of the books that Syed references in 'Bounce' and I don't know, you may change your mind about it. Muscle Memory is played down quite alot as being a very basic practice technique and appears to be the equivalent of 'parrot talk' (regurgitating facts with no deep understanding) in exams.

I don't have the equivalent sporting experience compared to my music...My last piano teacher didn't like muscle memory much, and would get me to play pieces at a super super slow tempo so I was using my brain and not my muscle memory. It's a very powerful practice method.

I'm not saying your wrong wiggy. I'm not saying I'm right. This alternate way of thinking just makes sense to me and I'm trying to apply it here.

Syed (and co.) talk about being on auto-pilot (not deep practice) and this appears to be what the guy in the video is doing, he's just on auto pilot; no feedback, no thought.

Yes, there is no right or wrong way to go about it, some players have made the top 10 in England by being very robotic with no flair, but hell, they have made it far higher than the 30,000 players below that level in England. Whilst their method and overall play is their stumbling block to get higher, its probably got them higher than they would have got if they had set their sights higher, and that is the same for all of us. IN my experience, the players who exel as amatures, realise their limitations and become realistic in their diversity of play, ie they do a limited amount of things very well, which stands them in exellent stead amongst their compatriots, but is ultimately their limitation.

Originally posted by Honey Originally posted by wiggy63 Yes, there is no right or wrong way to go about it, some players have made the top 10 in England by being very robotic with no flair, but hell, they have made it far higher than the 30,000 players below that level in England. Whilst their method and overall play is their stumbling block to get higher, its probably got them higher than they would have got if they had set their sights higher, and that is the same for all of us. IN my experience, the players who exel as amatures, realise their limitations and become realistic in their diversity of play, ie they do a limited amount of things very well, which stands them in exellent stead amongst their compatriots, but is ultimately their limitation. Now thats a great quote.

 I have my moments

Originally posted by Useless1 Honey: You might be interested in decision training which utilises tools like variable practice, random practice, bandwidth feedback, questioning, video feedback, hard-first instruction and modelling. It designed to help in areas such as perceptual awareness (e.g. where your opponent is). For example continuity drills have a feeder placing a ball so that numerous reps of a tactical sequence can be performed. Add in a cognitive trigger (feeder moves just before ball hit and player must 'be aware' of this change and adjust accordingly). They ask the question "What is the use of a perfect technique drilled to perfection if the wrong decision is made?"   This stuff is from a skill acquisition in sport research theory and practice. It brings together research from different perspectives (ifo processing, expert approach, dynamical systems approach) and disscusses it. There's a lot of technical crap with problems with studies in the area, but theres some stuff that may be of interest and use.   Edit: I think most techniques have their uses at different points of skill acquisition and will differ for different people. At times basic blocked practice and drilling will be appropriate, at other times it won't.

You make some great points as usual Useless one.

Where did you read about decision training. It sounds right up my street.

I agree that repitition is benificial wiggy. I don't see any problems with this drill, I need to do some of these to help me remember in game situation to be able to do it second hand. That being said, you need to have your basic fundamentals down before getting a robot or you will find yourself ingraining bad habits instead of good habits. I believe Samson Dubina, in this clip, has his fundamentals well in check.   Danny Seemiller said every time his students at his club talked him into getting out the robots their game got worse...every time. This is the trouble with robot practice and players that haven't got their fundamentals down good yet.

Yeah thanks useless one, sounds very interesting. Do you study this stuff as a hobby or are/have you been involved in it academically at all?