Or some lame played out saying that could either be a dumb bumper sticker or a t shirt – who cares which because they’re equally barfy.

You’ve seen this kind of stuff:

lacrosse is life, the rest is just details |or| Eat, Sleep, Lacrosse |or| I heart Lax

or

Some beer ad and/or logo turned into a lacrosse stick somehow.  Where is the originality?

You know that you know what I’m talking about.  If not, just visit cafe press.  “lacrosse, what men do during boys baseball season.”  Seriously?  Who comes up with this stuff?  Even worse, who the heck buys it?

IMUHO, (In my un-humble opinion), Adrenaline apparel out of San Diego is the opposite of that.  They make sick apparel with yummy flavor.

South Swell Sports is a retail shop that sells Adrenaline clothing, including adrenaline lacrosse socks.  These socks have become ubiquitous, appearing on kids from coast to coast.  Brine even had a player wearing them on their homepage.  You’ll understand why once you play in them.  They’re fly, and they’re also the most comfortable lacrosse socks you’ve ever worn.

Good job adrenaline.  Keep it crispy.

Wesleyan upsets Conn College in New Haven, so the Jumbos host the next 2 rounds.  The harder you work, the luckier you get.

Welcome to Browntown!

He wanted us to all be lacrosse junkies, meaning students of the game whose thirst for growth was unquenchable.

One synonym I’ve heard for lacrosse junkie is “lax rat”

I don’t like lax rat.  Not sure why.  It just sounds nasty.  I’d just rather be a junkie than a rat.

Holla back with some of your favorite terms for the person who eats, sleeps and breathes lacrosse.   Leave a comment

“2 guys walk into a bar…”

Actually, it was a breakfast bar in whole foods in new york city, and it was delicious. It was the morning after an aggressive Halloween party.

The two guys were myself and Jon Zissi, who spent the entire previous night in full scuba gear.  The subsequent rash, said the doctor, was from wearing an old wetsuit (i swear this is what it was from).  But I digress.

Jono and I (yes I wrote Jono, it’s not a typo, he puts an extraneous “O” at the end of his first name.  Don’t worry, we give him plenty of shit for it) is the current offensive coordinator for the Tufts Lacrosse team, my former teammate at Tufts and my former house mate in San Diego.  We coached a varsity lacrosse team together out in San Diego.

This particular morning, we were talking about the 30 Days to Scoring Success lacrosse training dvd I produced with Pat Myers, assistant coach at UNC, and about how all coaches are always looking for good lacrosse drills.

So, I decided to make some of the drills from the dvd available for free.

I’m using a new website to do this called LacrosseMentor.com.  There you can find the wall ball lacrosse drills section of the dvd for free.  And if you register for the newsletter, you get more video clips from 30 Days to Scoring Success.  These are arranged in a series of mini lessons that I believe you’ll find useful should you choose not to buy the entire dvd.

Check out the free videos at lacrossementor.com, or buy the full lacrosse training video at www.ScoreMoreGoals.com.

When powerful ideas come to my head and I think they’ll help others, i want to share them.  When I discover great products that others have introduced me too, I want to tell all my friends and family about them.

So I launched www.LacrosseMentor.com to be a collection of everything I think is Awesome.

You’re likely to find music recommendations, nutrition ideas I get from my Uncle George (a licensed acupunturist and nutritionist in Massachussets), travel stories, links to dvds of workouts that kick my ass and make my spirit soar, and any random rants or ruminations that spring to mind that day.

Read what you’re interested in, leave what you’re not, but I think it’s worth checking out if you’re into lacrosse, sports, fitness, being healthy and generally feeling good about life.

Much love,

Jimmy Mandler

San Diego, CA
Solana Beach, CA
Fountain Valley, CA
Laguna Woods (Orange County), CA
Austin, TX 

Southswell Website

Lacrosse Plus

Encinitas, CA 

Lacrosse Unlimited

Long Island
Syracuse
Rochester
Connecticut
New Jersey
Massachusetts 

http://www.lacrosseunlimited.com/

Olympic Den

Long Island in Ronkonkoma and Franklin Square

website

Quickstix Lacrosse

Suffern, NY

Quickstix website

MadLax

McClain, VA
Alexandria, VA
Olney, MD 
Ashburn, VA 

Mad Lax website

QC Lax

Bridgeville, Pennsylvania

QC website

Tribal West Lacrosse

Sandy, Utah

Tribal West website

What the heck does that have to do with your lacrosse game?  Let’s explore the principle and see. 

This 80/20 distribution applies to countless relationships in the universe.  Recognizing the “vital few and trivial many” can change your life.  

For example, a business can skyrocket its profits when it realizes which 20% of the customers make 80% of the purchases.  Once these “vital few” are identified, the marketing, support, etc can be focused on them to maximize sales.  

Consider that only 20% of the material you study will make up 80% of the exam.  Imagine how well you would score if you focused most of your study time on this vital 20%.  

20% of the calories you consume will build 80% of your muscle mass.  On the flip side, 80% of the fat cells you store will come from just 20% of the foods you eat.  Champion body builders intake the vital few nutrients and cut out the trivial many.  

Now let’s apply the 80/20 distribution to lacrosse. 

• 80% of the goals are scored by only 20% of the players in the league

• Only 20% of the defensemen make 80% of the plays 

• Only 20% of the players on a team possess the ball 80% of the time

• 80% of scholarships go to only 20% of the players 

• Only 20% of the players get 80% of the playing time

How do you become one of the vital few on your team, in your league, your county, your state, the country, the world, the solar system?  

Start by practicing smarter.  Realize that 20% of the time you spend practicing will produce 80% of your results.  

Are you seeing the power of this concept now?  

If you had very little time to practice on your own, say only 15 extra minutes a day, you can still become better than 80% of the players if you know how to spend your time.  

You already know about the one activity which will produce 80% of your results because your coach has preached its benefits over and over.  This incredibly efficient activity is WALL BALL.  

No matter what position you play, wall ball is the fastest way to success.     

Ryan Powell, on the three Powells website, says that “stick skills are by far the most important facet of the game of lacrosse,” and guarantees that working on the wall will make you a better player.  

Paul Carcaterra says wall ball was, “The single most effective training technique that was implemented in my game.” 

NCAA coach Pat Myers asserts, “wall ball is the single most important thing you can do as a player, regardless of your position on the field.”  

When Pat Myers trains his division 1 lacrosse players, every workout begins with 7 specific wall ball exercises.  The first 30 minutes of Myers’ lacrosse training DVD is dedicated to showing a detailed demonstration of each exercise because the techniques are crucial to the success of any player, from beginner to advanced, goalie to attackman. 

Among the top players and coaches in the game, the consensus is clear:  If you want to get good FAST, hit the wall.  

Now Go Play!

You can learn more about Pat Myers and his 30 Days to Scoring Success training program at www.ScoreMoreGoals.com.

Style and Grace: Gary Gait

“Who Loves Short Shorts? We Love Short Shorts”

Anyone remember that ad campaign? I can’t recall the product, but the jingle is stuck in my head now. And so is the video itself – some real nice lady stems parading around the TV screen.

Then there was that mint song by the 69 Boys: “Look at them girls with the daisy dukes on. Come on baby, kick them daisies.” Don’t remember that one? Well I guess you weren’t lucky enough to be a teenager in the mid nineties. I think I’ll go download the ringtone when I’m done with this post.

To be fair, few images are finer than those conjured in the above 2 examples. But where are the televisions spots and lyrical masterpieces extolling the guys who aren’t afraid to flaunt some man thigh?

I write not to throw my sexuality in question, but to lament the disappearance of athletic “shorts.”

Today’s shorts are not that at all.

Aesthetics aside, a split dodge or between the legs dribble in basketball must have been much more efficient back in the day.

I bring this up because my middle school team complained this past season that their shorts were too small. Ahhhh, this brought back great memories of my Freshman year at Tufts (1998) when our uniforms were relics from the early 80s and our nut hugging brown trunks were fodder for the worst away game heckling I’ve ever experienced. But I digress. Back to my middle school team. I tried to convince my players that they were studs in these great uniforms and the girls would be watching them, not the opponents. It was no use.

Call me nostalgic, but you tell me which of these looks cooler, more stylish, more intimidating:

NO CONTEST, RIGHT?

Would you take a charge from Walt? PuhLease – Those quads would knock you unconscious.

And those socks. Where did those go?

With about 2:45 left in quarter 3 Zach Howell executed a perfect question mark dodge and beat Bud Petit with a high shot.

In the 30 Days to Scoring Success lacrosse dvd, Pat Myers walks you through the dodge.  It is Myers’ favorite because, as he explains, it is a dodge you can always go to to get room for a shot if you have it in your arsenal.

If you have this Duke Virginia game on DVR, watch the dodge a few times.  You will notice that in Howell’s execution as he rolls back he does not switch hands immediately.  Instead, he uses his body to shield his stick as his feet get him and his hands separation, then transfers the stick and fires.  This important point is something Myers emphasizes in the instructional DVD.

ESPNU is great isn’t it?

The seed for this DVD germinated in 2003 at the US Lacrosse Convention in Philadelphia. There I was fortunate to attend a seminar by Pat Myers, who was then an offensive coach at Cornell University. Myers shared with the coaches in attendance the individual workout program he uses to train his division 1 players.

After Myers’ presentation, many of the coaches including myself were in line to speak with Myers, and we all had the same question: Do you have this on DVD? We wanted to study Pat’s drills and training sessions and also share them directly with our own players. Unfortunately for us, we had to go off our written notes and memory because Myers did not have the program on DVD.

Well, now he does. Last summer the stars aligned and we were able to get Pat Myers out to San Diego where we filmed his Blueprint for Offensive Skill Development. After many months of hard work by our director, directors of photography, editors and graphic designers, 30 Days to Scoring Success is now available at www.ScoreMoreGoals.com.

It is brought to you by Lacrosse Junkie Productions, a company dedicated to making premium coaching available to every lacrosse player.

Among the Division 1 coaches who know Pat Myers, he is considered a bright, up and coming star of the coaching world.

Frank Fedorjaka, head coach at NCAA Division 1 Bucknell University, says:
“Pat is one of the best developmental coaches in the game today. He comes from a family of coaches and he thrives on the ‘little things’.”

Jeff Tambroni, head coach at Cornell University says:
“His attention to detail and knowledge in our offensive skill developmental program was instrumental in our teams success.”

We are confident you will get great results from this workout program. In fact, we guarantee it.

Better than money back guarantee:

If for any reason you are not satisfied with DVD, you can return it for a full refund. If you perform even 50% of the workout on Pat Myers’ video, and you do not score more goals in your next lacrosse season, return it for a 110% refund.

Keep Laxin’

Jimmy Mandler
President, Lacrosse Junkie Productions