A Tale of Two Coaches: The Trap of New and Novel

Hi Coach,

Before you dive in, two quick notes:

I hope this newsletter serves you!

Best,

Luke

Nothing is more valuable to coaches than practice time.

But too often, coaches waste it.

Last Friday, I had a phone call with a coaching colleague named Bill where we were discussing some practice planning ideas from the “4 Ways to Run Better Practices” newsletter I wrote a couple weeks ago.

In the conversation, Bill told me a story about a coach education class he attended.

At some point during the class, one of the other coaches spoke up and proudly shared that he “never did the same drill or activity twice in a season.”

I chuckled when Bill shared this and responded, “think about all the time he wasted teaching new drills and activities during the course of the season.”

I’m not saying that introducing new games or activities is bad.

In fact, I think there is a time and place for novelty in our practice planning to avoid boredom and “going through the motions.”

But the opportunity cost of continually introducing new activities in every practice should also be considered.

The best coaches I’ve been around typically take 3-5 minutes at minimum to introduce something new in practice.

Most practice activities tend to last for 10-15 minutes.

Assuming we have a 90 minute practice, we’re talking about 6 activity blocks.

If all 6 of those activities are new, we’re likely losing at least 30 minutes (assuming it’s a high-level coach who can communicate efficiently and effectively) of valuable practice time in the teaching and demonstrating of those new activities.

Now we just have 60 minutes for development.

Assuming these activities maximize space and get as many athletes as possible as active as possible for as long as possible, my guesstimate would be that total time on task for the majority of athletes would be around 45-50 of the 60 remaining minutes.

All of a sudden, players are only getting reps and improving for half of their practice time (45 of 90 minutes).

Over the course of a season, those lost minutes add up.

On the other hand, a coach that only has 8-10 core activities or games (I often refer to these as platform games) can drastically reduce time spent in teaching and demonstrating new things.

A coach with 8-10 core activities or games will certainly have to spend time teaching and demonstrating those during their first few practices, but after that is done, they can get athletes into activities within minutes and increase the time on task for all players.

All of a sudden, players can be active for 75-80 minutes of a practice session because the coach doesn’t need to spend time teaching and demonstrating new activities.

This doesn’t mean that these 8-10 activities or games are always played the exact same way.

In fact, there are often numerous ways that a coach can tweak their core activities to shift the focus and affordances players are encountering within the same activity or game.

I covered 4 simple changes you can make (space, rules, scoring, & numbers) to any activity or game in more depth in this article (it includes some examples you might find helpful).

This isn’t a lazy method of coaching. It’s a better method of coaching.

It prioritizes time on task for athletes and creates more space for coaches to observe and adjust the practice environment to help the team improve.

And if you’re still not convinced, I had AI help me with some calculations based on the estimates I shared above.

Based on the estimates above, here is the calculation for the total time on task for each coach’s players over a 20-practice season.

This coach introduces 6 new activities in every 90-minute practice.

This coach uses 8-10 "platform games/activities" and spends minimal time on instruction after the first few practices.

Over a 20-practice season, the "Core Activities" coach provides 650 more minutes of active time on task than the "Novelty" coach.

That's the equivalent of adding more than seven full practices worth of reps.

These are my estimates, so please don’t take them as scientific fact, but I think the comparison above drives home the point I’m trying to make — keep it simple.

A couple thoughts on how this could apply in your coaching or leadership context…

Thanks for reading, I hope this serves you on your journey.

To your growth,

Luke Gromer, RYG Athletics | A NIKE Sports Camps Provider

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