Working from The Pro Player Timeline: Weekly, this individual day post focuses on what a professional player overseas should be outlining each specific day of the week like.
SEE ALSO:
Navigating Sports Abroad blog post.
Play Abroad 101 for the most accurate preparation in print.
The Pro Player Timeline: Daily
& The Pro Player Timeline: Overview.
Obviously, every player's schedule will vary based on practices, matches, and other planned activities; however, it's important for athletes to go into each week with an organized view of how the days within the week will play themselves out.
FRIDAY - Preparation Day
Pack your game gear bag and prepare pre-game meals.
Your sleep and nutrition should be balanced everyday, but Friday is the most important.
Save your "going-out" days for post-match or the day after the match.
Know Your Focus...
You have been zoning in all week on what's important right now and hopefully the words you have chosen have been influencing you in a positive and empowering way. After five days, your focus should be easily coming to your mind and adapted into your perspective for this week. Use this certainty to garner momentum and confidence heading into your match.Prepare...
Your game bag, whether for a home or away match, and make sure to include food, changes of clothes, shower items, and any necessary back-up items like athletic tape, pre-wrap, shoelaces, and so on. Your club, depending on its level of professionalism, should have access to most "back-up items," but it's always best to just have a mini-kit for yourself in your huge gym bag anyway. Also take the time to prepare your pre-game meal, especially if you will be on the road. It's a great idea to invest in some heavy duty Tupperware that can hold one or two servings of a hot meal safely in your bag.Think About...
How you can be your best as a player and teammate, any extra items your gym bag may need, any other questions about the match you may have for your coach or team captain, and your main three goals to achieve during the match. These goals could be performance-oriented, based on individual or team statistics, or also mindset-oriented, based on maintaining a specific kind of attitude the entire game.Something You (7 ideas)...
Create a table centerpiece you love (flowers, leaves, trinket, vase, bottle, photo frame, whatever), buy a new outfit for yourself, video yourself all day long and make a "day in the life" video for your YouTube/blog/fan page, take a nap, take a spa day (take a bath, get a massage, facial, manicure, pedicure, etc.), draw in a sketchbook or color in a coloring book, create two new music playlists - one for relaxing and one for game pump-up.Finish...
Packing your game bag and preparing your game day meals. Reply to any conversations that need to be finished to clear your mind for the weekend. Finish your practice week with your best performance, driving your desire forward into a stellar match performance.
As your day-to-day schedule become more routine, you can add more social media presence (i.e., sharing other pro player's match times/highlights, linking to your blog, etc.). The most important baselines for every day are getting enough of the right kind of sleep and eating properly. These actions take intentional planning and purpose. Too many times we have heard stories of athletes finishing practice after 9:00 PM and not having any food left to eat - and all the grocery stores and decent restaurants are closed!
Prepare so well in advance that you have nothing left to do but read a book!
For the rest of the days of the week, see The Pro Player Timeline: Weekly.
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