Training for Drive Coaches

[smurfgirl]

Some suggestions:

1. Have your coach go over all of the rules. Learn early on how penalties are earned and avoid them. Make sure you're familiar with how to score points. Map out potential strategies for use in the game. Think about all possible scenarios that can arise on the field and come up with ways to deal with them.

2. A huge part of coaching is communication and interaction with the robot drivers. You want the whole team to feel comfortable working together, so they should absolutely have experience working together. Have the coach and the drivers work together extensively. It will also help the drivers to get familiar with potential strategies and avoiding penalties.

3. Don't only talk about the strategies you want to map out, also practice them in more realistic settings:
(a) If you have old robots, have a secondary drive team play defense on your 2010 robot for practice.
(b) If you have other local teams, get together to practice. Then you can simulate games and practice all of your strategies. It will help your coaches and drivers, mutually benefiting all of your teams.

4. During competitions, you are playing as part of an alliance. After practice, have your coach reflect on your team's strengths and weaknesses. Think about what role you can play in an alliance in competition. Playing with other local teams would definitely help with this.

5. Practice using data- do pre-competition scouting and use it to adapt your strategies and approach to coaching. This will prepare you for the scouting data you will use during competition.

6. See if you can find veteran coaches for your drive coaches to talk to. The fundamental aspects of coaching do not vary from game to game, and having a mentor for your coaches can be really beneficial. They may learn surprising things. Asking questions like this here is a great way to start.

Good luck and have fun! I was a student coach when I was in high school, and I gained a lot from the experience. I hope it turns out to be as valuable for your students.