Soccer Evaluations

On Saturday we took Brenna out to the soccer fields for Upward Soccer evaluations. It was cold and windy so we bundled everyone up and went to stand in line for uniform measurements. Then they sent us out across the parking lot to the soccer fields where they had four stations set up to evaluate the players. At the first stop, she was asked to do a soccer throw-in. (Over the head throw with both feet on the ground) We determined that she throws like a girl and moved on to the next station. There she had to do a shuttle run...up and back to the line twice. Now we know she throws like a girl and prances when she runs. It was so hard not to laugh as she ran down to the line. We did our best to channel our laughter into cheering and encouragement. Station three was a dribbling exercise, in and out of the cones. She did pretty well at first, but about half way around, she began to kick the ball too hard and lose control of it. She ended up chasing it around quite a bit before kicking it over the finish line. At the last station she was supposed to kick the ball as far as she could. Maybe she was just cold, but I've seen her kick a ball a lot further than she did then. We didn't care much, though, because by then we just wanted to finish and get back to the car. The wind was biting cold! We looked over the marks each evaluator had given her and decided they must mean the following:
Kick -17 inches
Run - 5 minutes
Throw In- 5 feet
Dribbling - 25 kicks
Soccer is going to be an interesting adventure this spring. I'm sure I'll have lots to post and share. For starters, I signed up to walk the Monument Avenue 10k and then discovered that it's the same day as her first game. Go figure.