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Drive Coach Strategies/Ideas
This will be my second year as drive coach for our team. After reviewing old matches from champs last year, and just a general conversations with other drive coaches in FIRST, I realized how different many people take the role.
Last year I would go to the different teams on our alliance before matches and whiteboard our strategy based on capabilities of our opposing alliance's bots, keep a general track of our score through the match, and advise (okay, more like yell) at our alliance members during a change of strategy or if they aren't adhering to our plan. What do other drive coaches you know of do? I'd love to learn more efficient ways of handling the role. |
Re: Drive Coach Strategies/Ideas
My biggest advice to keep your plans fluid. Have contingencies for if different things go right or wrong. Be able to change your team and alliance strategies during the match quickly.
And also be nice behind the glass. A lot of students don't drive as well when some coach from another team gets way too competitive and screams at them (trust me I've been both the driver and other coach having to deal with coaches like this). |
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Keep your cool. I have always viewed the coach as a resource to ground the drive team. If a match doesn't go your way be gracious and let your team see that you've put it behind you, even if you haven't. |
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I didn't communicate this well in the original post, but I was also wondering if anyone had different things they bring with them. I.e. to keep score, for notes, etc. |
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Fluid coaching. Work with your drive team when they practice; make call outs and ask them what information they want to hear during a match. Some drivers like time call outs, some just prefer score call outs.
Keep an eye on everything that isn't your team's robot - let your driver worry about driving, your job is to keep them informed about everything that isn't your robot's direct path. Quote:
One of the best coaches I've seen was the drive coach from 3612, the Gearhogs. He was, by far, the most calm coach, and had this loud but soothing voice and would always stay positive and point out positives at the end of every mach to his alliance partners. |
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One thing I have learnt from Mr. Bollinger the coach from team 2337, the Enginerds is to show respect to other partners especially the alliance captain during play offs. |
Re: Drive Coach Strategies/Ideas
From my experience on a drive team (as I, too, am still learning the ropes of coaching)...
As a driver, I always appreciated being given space from other teams' coaches, both in terms of match strategy and communication on the field. That means that things often work best when each team is performing tasks they are comfortable with. If you come in trying to bend the alliance's strategy to your will and make your partners do what you want, it can get very uncomfortable for the their drivers and coaches, who are put in an unfamiliar position against their will. If you think the alliance really needs to work some way, just make sure you get buy-in. It also means that during a match, I didn't want other teams' coaches talking to me. It's an unfamiliar voice and it's not fun to hear conflicting instructions from your own coach and someone else. Try to keep all the communication among the coaches, and let your fellow coaches interact with their own students. |
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And to piggyback on a well-deserved shout out from Tungrus, Clint Bollinger from Team 2337 is always one of the best to work with. |
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Plus after a couple of regionals, you could start making your very own Driver Manual for current and future students to learn from. |
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