THE ARC OF IMPROVEMENT FOR GOALIES…AND HUMANS- by Jack Bowen

Often times at our Goalie Combines, “Expert Goalie Coaches”—goalies who have trained with us who now play in college—visit and work with goalies in the water. We did this last year with Griffen Price, now playing at Stanford, who trained with us consistently for 7 years, starting as a 6th grader.

As I often do in this case, I went back over 7 years of Griffen’s Goalie Combine test set data and graphed the trajectory of his improvement. His graph demonstrates a common trend of all goalies over the past 25 years: universal trends in our training and improvement in the goal. I share this data, below, to help goalies frame their respective personal journeys in anticipation of the ups and downs and plateaus of improvement over time.

As an added bonus, this all provides a good snapshot of the human condition, allowing us to once again learn about life through goalkeeping!

Stages of Improvement on Goalie Test Sets:
Common Trends of Expert Goalies

1. Immediate Improvement: Not surprisingly, it is very common for goalies to initially experience an immediate spike in their results. When you receive instruction and teaching regarding how to master a skill, you can immediately apply that knowledge which often manifests in an improvement. Our Corners Tests Sets (high and also low) embody nearly all of a goalie’s core techniques so any improvement in technique yields an improved time.

2. Minor Improvements: Following this “improvement spike,” improvements tend to continue but, at a smaller scale. The initial coaching allows goalies to make big changes to their fundamentals, thus making them more efficient. After this, the changes continue (forever!) but often not at the initial level, primarily because the goalie has now established a strong technique-base.

3. Minor Setbacks: This part of the “improvement trajectory” was my initial motivation for sharing this data with goalies. Every goalie, no matter how successful, experiences minor declines in their test set performance over time. Griffen had two of these on his graph. As the adage goes, “Take one step backward to take 2 steps forward.” 

For example, during the time of the year far from the ensuing season—what I call the off-off-season—we have time to break bad habits and form good ones. But breaking a bad habit requires an intentional effort to become consciously aware of what we’re doing in the goal regarding our fundamentals. We’re not doing what our brain effortlessly wants us to do (i.e. our previous bad habit) and, so, all of this rationalizing gets in the way of our performance…until…this new technique becomes a habit. Then we’re performing this new, more efficient core fundamental habitually which then, most often leads to…

4. …A Spike in Improvement: Once we’ve made that change in our technique or allowed our legs a chance to recover from previous conditioning, we’re now better and stronger than ever, which leads to a spike in our results.

5. Plateaus: This is the second motivation for my sharing past Expert Goalie data with goalies. At some point, after traversing the above trajectory, the improvements become so minute, they’re hard to detect. Griffen had a number of plateaus in his test set data: times where he’d test, and re-test, and test again yet continue to earn the same result. I have to remind goalies of 2 things at this time:

First, despite appearances, they typically are improving but at such small increments it’s hard to detect both quantitatively (through test set results) and qualitatively. But, with hard work and focus, the improvement happens…it just happens over a longer period of time, undetectable on a daily basis. Akin to the leg conditioning we do, after 1 day of intense leg conditioning your legs don't feel stronger (actually, they may even feel weaker!) but then, 3 months later you notice the spike in improvement.

Second, this plateau-phase can really be a fun time for goalies because we really get to focus on the small things. With the core fundamentals in place, now we’re looking to find ways to become 1% more explosive or add an extra inch in our reach. A lot of this relies on the mental aspect of our training and, as we’ve worked on at our Goalie Combines, on explosiveness and other similar areas where a 1% improvement actually makes a relevant difference.

6. Our Trajectory as Humans: I share this with all of you to help set expectations: To anticipate dips and plateaus and understand the trajectory of your goalkeeping technique and fundamentals over time. This is especially relevant during the Phases of our Goalie Combines which occur still months away from any big, early-Summer tournaments, reminding us that we have a chance to make really big improvements leading into the Summer season.

And I share for one other reason, captured best by the reaction of parents in the stands when I share this with the goalies: Lots of contemplative head nodding and smiling. Our trajectory as humans is much like this—if you’re focused and committed to improvement, it happens over the course of your human “career.” After that initial spike, it’s a slow process, with bumps and setbacks and long stretches of seeming nothingness along the way. And with a proper disposition, there’s a lot of joy to be experienced in the process.

-Jack Bowen
Menlo School Water Polo Coach, Author, & Head of Bowen Goalie Combines