Orange Beach Preseason Diary by Katie Holtzapfel: Day Two
8/14/2003 12:00:00 AM | Soccer
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The second day of camp is over, and all of us are definitely hurting a little bit more than yesterday. We’ve all decided that you can never train enough during the summer to prepare for preseason. No matter how much you train, you always end up sore by at least the second day. Regardless, we played really well today, well enough to meet Coach’s approval tonight during the evening session.
We started this morning’s session again with Jesper and one of his fitness tests, and then we headed straight into two solid hours of training with Coach. After practice, we all head to the cold whirlpool. I don’t know if you would necessarily call it a whirlpool, though. The trainers fill up huge garbage cans with ice and water, and all of us, every last one of us, get in the cold tubs for at least a few minutes. Only a select group (Elizabeth Jannik officially named the group the Tub Club) sit down in a huge ice tub, and, speaking from experience, it’s miserable. But, as miserable as it might be, it really does make a difference the next day.
We all headed back to the condos after the first session and basically we try to eat every last thing in the kitchen. There are six seniors in our condo, and we definitely don’t hold back when lunch time rolls around. The six seniors are Elizabeth Jannik, Melissa Montgomery, or Monty for short, Rebecca Baker, Lauren Imwalle, Dawn Nash, and me, Katie Holtzapfel. We’re missing Caroline Bolz, but our underclassmen are surely thankful to have her veteran wisdom and incredible fashion sense in their condo. Caroline is in the same boat as Rebecca Baker this preseason. Caroline just can’t seem to catch a break and has been through two surgeries this past summer. We’re hoping she will join us sometime soon, but it all depends on how well her recovery. Anyway, we all sit on the balcony and eat lunch together and talk about strategies to pass the next fitness test. Trust me, by our senior year we all know the tricks of the trade to running Jesper’s fitness tests, although Lauren Imwalle might take the crown for the best strategies. After lunch, Baker and Imwalle tried to hook up the Nintendo GameCube, but the rest of us regulated them really fast. We brought the GameCube from home because Baker and Imwalle just may not have reported to preseason if we hadn’t brought it with us.
We scrimmaged during the entire evening session, and since we played so well, Coach gave us a break and let us head to dinner earlier than usual. Like always, dinner was amazing. So many people work so hard for us here at Orange Beach, and we are truly in debt to them. I mentioned Preston Poozer, Danny Martin, and Don Brewer yesterday, but so many more people are involved. I also want to mention Jeff Ryan, Patrick Reid, Adam Owens, J.A. Neese, Dusty Russell, Keith Warden, Jeff Moon, Pete Blalock and Blalock Seafood, Angie Lee, and Ben Peters. We really feel at home here at Orange Beach, and since Baker lives right down the road in Foley, she is at home. On our way to and from the field, we always see the marquee in front of the city building that welcomes us, the Alabama Crimson Tide Soccer Team, to Orange Beach. We truly feel welcome here, and as usual, we’re having a great preseason here so far.
Roll Tide!
Katie
