Podcast listening and beach volleyball - the most important tool for becoming better?

Becoming better at beach volleyball is a goal many of us have, and the better and sharper tools we have for making that journey more efficient, the easier it will be to reach that goal.
Regardless of if your problem is in passing, setting, attacking, defense, blocking, serving, the mental game, career strategy or anything else that is relevant, I believe podcast listening can be a crucial tool for gaining those skills.
In short, my claim is that podcasts can give you crucial in depth understanding of nuances of the game that you actually won't reach in other ways, all while costing you no money, practically speaking no time, and even making your life more enjoyable in the process.
Sounds too good to be true? I'm sure it might, but I believe this video will change your mind and give you efficient pathways towards mastery that you might never have thought of before.
If you feel that you don't have time to watch this video, you can listen to it "on the go" instead. Find it at www.learnbeachvolleyballfast.... or at podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast... or by finding episode 17 on the Learn Beach Volleyball Fast Podcast in your favorite podcast app!
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Links to the 2 other parts of this podcast listening series:
Physical tools you should know (Part 2/3):
• Physical tips on getti...
Making podcast listening work better in your life (Part 3/3): www.learnbeachvolleyballfast.... or • #18 - Making podcast l... or by finding episode 18 of the Learn Beach Volleyball Fast Podcast in your favorite podcast app!
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At 7:30 in this episode/video, I talk about how much payoff listening to for example 100 minutes of in depth, very nuanced discussions about certain aspects of the game has.
I hope the point gets across in this episode already with what I said in the video, but I was debating whether or not to add more arguments for why investing this time is worthwhile for you. Here is the script for a part of this episode that I ended up not adding, but it's here for you to read if you need/want more arguments:
"The thing is, 100 minutes of listening to theory might seem like a waste of time, but let’s say you decide to not do that and continue believing you should always square up when setting.. And one third of your sets end up being bad because you focus on squaring up instead of focusing on things that actually matter in the situations where you shouldn’t square up.
What’s going to happen?
Well, you will be frustrated because you can’t set well. So you’ll probably go and practice setting and squaring up even more. Let’s say you on average end up practicing setting and squaring up for 15 minutes per week because of your frustrations… One year has 52 weeks, which becomes 780 minutes.. Let’s say you do that for 3 years, that’s over 2300 minutes that you will end up practicing the things that actually won’t make you better! Now that 100 minute theory lesson that would save you from all this wasted practice doesn’t sound too bad right?!
The real cost of believing in false ideas about beach volleyball technique and information is one of many podcast episodes I will create in the future also, but for now, I hope this gives you some food for thought.
(And by the way, let me know in the comment below if you want me to make this in depth episode about squaring up or not when setting sooner rather than later!)"
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[@FrancescoCelauro7]

I agree! I love podcast and long form yt videos. It's basically how I learned most of what I know in the strength and conditioning, I'm going to also listen to beach volleyball pods now. Do you have any recommendations (other than yours of course ahahah)? I know Sandcast and Get Better at beach are good

[@LearnBeachVolleyballFast]

Haha yes, long form content just gives a possibility to go several layers deep in concepts that short form rarely if ever makes possible..! And this, according to me, is the gamechanger. About good podcasts, good question! Lets put it this way, if there had been a volleyball podcast that gave me everything I wanted, I'd never had felt the need to start my own.. But on top of the ones you mentioned, I have learned stuff from Volleynerds podcast, and Volleytalks podcast as well.. Coach your brains out has some episodes that have been stimulating.. But for me, often listening to volleyball podcasts is a mix of listening for new ideas, but also a practice in spotting weak logic behind arguments haha.. I dunno, there's just so much beach volleyball advice out there that doesn't match up (or even directly contradicts) with what actually happens when pros play and what ultimately helped me personally play better beach volleyball haha.. I don't know, sometimes I feel slightly like a grumpy old man, but then on the other hand it also makes me question my own theories over and over and helps me refine them more and more..! What would you like to hear from a beach volleyball podcast?

[@Delbertfrost2000]

You're back! Missed your videos. Just curious, will you be back to uploading regularly? Also I am curious. Many of your videos I watched on beach volleyball are from 3 years ago, and you seemed pretty good then. Have you found you are able to consistently progress fast, even after reaching a high level, or have you reached a plateau nowadays?

[@LearnBeachVolleyballFast]

Thanks! 😀 Yess I'm trying as hard as I can to get back into uploading videos, while balancing out life in general. I am 100% committed to this project and have always been, just the combination of stuff that happened to me because of covid restrictions (lost money, lost income, wasn't allowed to do things that I needed to run this project well, and then later living through inflation with whatever money was left) unfortunately sent me into a deep hole that has been challenging to climb out of, I've been forced to do all sorts of other stuff than making videos to not go bankrupt unfortunately.. Which has left the last 3 years very "thin" on videos compared to how it was before. I believe I see the light in the end of the tunnel now though, so yes, as long as nothing more major happens then the project should be back up and running more or less from now on! Second question is a very interesting one! So yes, it is very true that the higher the level, the flatter the improvement curve becomes, basically the same amount of hours as before doesn't give as big of a difference on how much you score on the court. But that is the same for everyone, I still think there is a massive difference on how fast you climb this now less steep learning curve. So here's the thing, almost 5 years ago I decided it was time to start studying how the now famous Swedish jumpsetter David Åhman hits a volleyball. We are from the same place so I had seen him grow up and it always astonished me (and a lot of other people) how he could put so much pace on the ball, so fast, in so many directions, and from such a high contact point. It was unlike anything I had ever seen other high level players do, and some technical details of his hitting technique were unique. So almost 5 years ago I told my friends "give me 2 months, and I'll figure out how he is doing it." I trusted my already then quite sophisticated volleybrain to figure it out by looking at videos and emulating and thinking and experimenting. Would I have known how long those 2 months ended up being I would probably never have gone for it, and decided to do what everyone else does instead - more or less optimize their current attacking technique and strategy around it, be in peace with that they will never hit as hard/high/fast/angled as the best hitters in the world, and still play really high level beach volleyball. But for me, those 2 months that I commited got me hooked I guess. I made a lot of progress but didn't find the ultimate answer. So I added another month.. And another. After a few months I found myself in a situation where for one the "sunk cost fallacy" (look that up if you don't know what it is) was too big for me to stop, and secondly I was continuing on the journey not only for the sake of my playing career. I realized that the process itself of basically playing around with hundreds of variables in spiking technique, slowly but surely gave me just a deeper and deeper understanding of spiking biomechanics. I ended up finding spiking techniques that I had previously also not been able to do, but recognized from other players/professionals on accident. I realized that I was probably becoming one of the people on earth that has spent the biggest amount of time into not only thinking about spiking technique, but also trying different techniques out, and that that should be a huge advantage for my future as a beach volleyball coach. If I'd one day figure out "Davids secrets" for his hitting technique and would be able to consistently teach people to hit that way, I'd for sure become the number one attacking mechanics coach in the world... So I continued the work. Yesterday was the first time I played a high level game with all the chaos that it includes, and was able to use what I perceive as the same technique as David several times consciously. I need to do some exact math one day but the process of getting here that I thought would take 2 months, took roughly 4 years and 9 months. In other words, 57 months or a 28.5 fold underestimation of how much time it would take for me to finish the job.. 😅 I am unfortunately a bit of an optimist at times when it comes to estimating how long things will take, a 6 hour job for me easily becomes 7 hours (17% increase in time), but this 2850% miscalculation is just of historic proportions even for me.. 😂 Imagine telling someone you'll get to their place in 1 hour, and 28.5 hours later you show up.. 🕝 👀 Haha so what's the summary of all of this? Well.. I am quite damn sure that would I have spent the last 4 years 9 months focusing on optimizing my old attacking technique (without completely rebuilding it) and attacking strategy and working on all the other things I need to work on in my game, I'd probably be a better player today than I currently am. At the same time, my body feels like it is in shape to play really high level ball for at least 10 more years, and now that I can finally start using this attacking technique and get to build my strategies around this technique instead, and can finally start working on all the other aspects of the game I want to get better at. I do believe there is a high chance that in a 1-3 years I'll reach a level that I wouldn't have been able to reach with my old technique, and if that ends up being true I should still have at least roughly 7-9 years of playing left in me at a level that I wouldn't have reached if I had chosen the other path. On top of that, I now feel pretty damn confident I'll become one of the most sought after hitting technique coaches one day pretty soon, and I know these almost 5 years have been an experience of a lifetime that I will never forget.. The amount of times people have been amused by seeing me once again alone at the courts hitting self tossed balls, the amount of times my girlfriend has laughed at me for realizing I'm up trying out different armswings in the middle of the night because I woke up from a dream about a new technique, the amount of gigabytes of video I have of my training sessions on my harddrives, the swing count on my shoulder (I need to try to roughly calculate one day but I think there is a realistic chance I've done an armswing with my right arm over 50,000 times during these years), the amount of stuff I have learned on this journey is all sort of beyond comprehension for me.. Anyways. Your question got me a bit carried away! I hope it was good reading in some way anyway. The short answer is: The hours that you put into training give you less and less points per game the higher the level, but I believe there is still a big difference on how efficient one persons practice hours are, and I believe mine have been pretty efficient given the circumstances. I did, however, choose a path for moving forward that for sure hurt my skill level in the short term, but hopefully on a 1-3 year horizon from now on will pay off as a player, and definitely as a coach and guy behind this project. Figuring out that hitting technique is by far the most difficult task I have done in my life, and I sort of wouldn't wish that work I went through onto even my worst enemy.. It might feel a bit weird and maybe even unfair when in the future I think people will be able to buy the course of the technique (or my coaching) and learn in 1-6 months what took me 4 years and 9 months of obsessive desperation with a 1.5 year shoulder injury included in the package to learn.. But that's part of why I'm creating this project, to change beach volleyball coaching and instruction for good for the better. Glad you found your way back even after all these years! 🙂

[@Delbertfrost2000]

@@LearnBeachVolleyballFast Hi, Wow, that's some tense stuff! Sorry to hear you are tight financially I hope you can find a way out of it. Hopefully with the level of commitment, out of the box thinking and fast development you brought to beach volleyball, you will also be able to settle your finances one day. To hear you played a high level game is great though! I assume in Sweden? As for the time you put into perfecting your attacking... if you say you just played a high level game now (meaning you're really good then), even if you didn't optimize your time the most effectively, we can say that the time you put into studying the spiking mechanics is good as you said you could be one of the best coaches of it. So if you're a high level player now anyways, I don't think in the long run its so bad you "wasted/sunk" time creating your new spiking attack as 1) we never plan perfectly and in retrospect there is always a way we could've used our time more effectively and 2) you just said, you may become one of the best coaches of it. So in the end you are still a good player, and your self assessment suggests you have some really valuable coaching material now, it doesn't sound so bad. My question then is for your personal goal, are you oriented more towards becoming a good coach, or do you also have aspirations to play at high levels and how high do you think is it possible for you?

[@LearnBeachVolleyballFast]

@@Delbertfrost2000 Hahah yes, when it comes to the financial situation I've been trying my best to "ninja" my way out of it, but one thing I have realized is that governments are so damn powerful that if they happen to make a mistake and you end up being unlucky and caught in the wrong situation, the impact can be so big that it literally takes you years to repair the damage caused. Hopefully later this year I'll get to a point where the situation is a bit balanced out again and I can feel some peace like before covid, rather than the constant financial pressure that has been over 3 years now. If nothing else, these years have upgraded me as a person in many ways which hopefully will pay off in the future. And yes, regarding the decision of what path I ended up taking with developing my game, I'm all in all happy with the decision - I think it will lead me more efficiently towards my future goals, and I'm excited to create the content that I'll now be able to create after that journey. So for my personal goals, coaching vs playing: Both are important for me, but the reason I am playing beach volleyball is and has always been for finding happiness in life (I find beach volleyball to be one of the most fun activities in life that enriches my life a lot) in a productive way (keeps me in shape, social etc.) I came to beach volleyball after a snowboarding career that was more successful than I ever thought I'd be as an athlete, so in a sense there's no part of my ego that needs to "prove" to anyone anymore that I can do high level sports which I remember was one of my childhood dreams. Also, the life of a modern day beach volleyball professional in a sense doesn't entice me much at all, even if I'd one day reach that level. For me it seems more or less like it's just constant travel with little stability and living under financial pressure, except maybe for the top top level players. I actually have little insight into the finances of teams ranked lets say 10-50 in the world so I should look that up before I say too much, but I believe I lived a similar lifestyle when snowboarding. It was really really fun for a few years, but after a while you realize you can't keep living on less than minimum wage, sleeping on couches, floors, planes and cars, under the pressure of staying injury free because as soon as you get injured you can't perform anymore. So career-wise, coaching is much more important for me. It feels like a much more realistic but also happiness filled way to pay the bills. And I think I can give a much bigger positive impact on the community and sport through coaching than through being "just a player." But yeah.. Trying to predict how good of a player I'll become has its challenges, I think in 2018 this channel had 300 subscribers, in 2019 it had 1000 subscribers and in 2020 right before the pandemic it had 3000 subscribers, so subscribers had roughly tripled every year, and I was predicting that would probably continue and I'd be at 9000 by the end of 2020. Then shit hit the fan and here I am 3 years later with 6000 haha. I don't know how realistic the 3x growth would have been year after year, but if it would have been I guess I'd be somewhere closer to 100thousand at this point.. I don't know. Anyway so as a player, as long as my body stays healthy I guess my hope is that once I fix a few more things in my game I'd be at a position where even international players could think I'm fun and challenging to play against. So hard to say.. My initial challenge that I set for myself when I started playing was to get to a level where players who played on the Swedish tour would be "equal" to me (meaning I'd get invited to play regularly and do not lose all the time when playing), and I guess I'm just about there now. I, however have no plans to stop improving and I still see a lot of flaws in my game with pretty clear roadmaps on how to improve these things, so we will see where I end up! One thing though is that to reach the really really top levels, I think partnership has a lot to say. Finding a partner that fits you, and syncing up your game with them. I have realized that since I'd rather live a life of being a coach and have a somewhat stable home etc, it doesn't fit so well with most other people who play high level beach volleyball who are more interested in travelling to all the tournaments. So that could become a challenge.. Who knows, we'll see. I'm not completely opposed to travelling for competitions a few months out of the year either if it felt fun and I could make it happen financially. Remains to be seen, first things first is to get to a point where I feel like even playing a local tournament is something I'm willing to do with all the preparation it takes, at this point I still feel like I should work as much as humanly possible so I'm staying with just self organized games until things get better. Haha another long answer, but that's what it is. Life has a lot of nuances and I know I often make decisions that people don't understand, unless they understand the nuances behind the decisions..!