Who on D.C. United’s roster hasn’t had a hamstring injury? I don’t have a complete list in front of me, but just a quick perusal of an incomplete stack of old game notes and stories from only this season and last brings up the following names: Ben Olsen, Bryan Namoff, Ange N’Silu, Santino Quaranta, Andrew Jacobson, Devon McTavish, Danny Allsopp, Juan Manuel Peña, Chris Pontius, Clyde Simms, Jordan Graye.
There’s gotta be more, right?
With that in mind, United’s head strength and conditioning coach, Randy Rocha, spoke with some of the media this afternoon – I’m not sure that he’s ever gone on the record during my tenure covering the team – after a training session which ended with sprints that at first glance looked like punishment for a team that’s 1-6. In fact, it’s just the team trying desperately to end its plague of hamstring problems.
“I was a little overcautious,” said Rocha of his planning going into the year. “We never had that day in preseason, or those days, where we broke down the athletes and they woke up the next day like, ‘Man, I am just so sore, I can’t train today.’ We never had those. We kind of eased our way and did all these aerobic-based runs but neglected the sprinting, second-gear, 100s, 120s, where they’re really opening up, and I think with everything, repetition’s the key. We weren’t getting those repetitions so when we got into game mode, these guys were having to make runs that they weren’t used to, and it caught up to us. That’s my solution to it. Hopefully, it was a freak thing, but I gotta look at it at every angle, and we got to try to fix it, not bitch and moan about it. We’re going to fix it, starting today. Today we had them running sprints at the end of training, and it was a punishment. It wasn’t something like, ‘You guys are losing, we’re going to pound you.’ It was something, ‘Let’s work on this. Let’s ease into your stride and then really open up for 50 yards, and then slow down, just trying to do it right.'”
Add Penalty Kicks to your RSS: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Penalty-kicks
Follow me on Twitter: @craigstouffer
