[vc_row][vc_column][vc_single_image image=”412″ img_size=”medium”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Women’s beach volleyball is the fastest growing sport in NCAA history! It’s awesome to see the sport we love so much growing so fast! In 2017-2022 over 200 more colleges of all divisions are set to add beach volleyball programs. In some states you’ll even see high schools from all over the country implementing beach volleyball as a sport! Callan is one of the first local girls CHAOS BEACH VOLLEYBALL knew that had the opportunity to go play beach volleyball in college. She is not only one of Ohio’s top female players, she is an inspiration to the thousands of young volleyball girls in the Ohio Valley Region that might want to play collegiate beach volleyball while getting a college education! We were so excited that Callan agreed to take time out of her busy schedule to write this article for us! We thought it would be cool to get a peek into what daily life is like for a collegiate beach volleyball athlete, enjoy!
Hey! My name is Callan and I am from Dublin, Ohio. I currently attend LSU and play on the beach volleyball team. I began playing indoor volleyball in the 4th grade and immediately fell in love. I couldn’t see myself not playing volleyball in college so I originally attended Otterbein University where I played indoor volleyball for a year. I was not satisfied with being so close to home and had been playing beach since my freshmen year of high school, so I knew I wanted to make the transition to collegiate beach. Now I am in my third and final year of college beach, so I can give you some insight on what a typical weekday looks like for me.
5:25 AM
- Wake up
6:00-7:00 AM
- Monday: Lifting
- Tuesday: Lifting/Conditioning
- Wednesday: Off (Obviously sleeping in unless I’m going to yogalates)
- Thursday: Lifting
- Friday: Lifting/Conditioning
8:30 AM – 1:30 PM
These are the usual times that we have classes as athletes in order to fit in with our practice schedule. On Tuesdays and Thursdays classes begin as early as 7:30 but we usually try to avoid those because you feel extremely rushed coming straight from weights. Freshmen and sophomores will usually begin at 8:30 but as you get older the time slots for the classes you need to take get later. My earliest class this semester is a 10:30 class so it’s wonderful.
If there are any breaks in your classes you typically will go to see our athletic trainers. We have 2 mandatory days of shoulder and hip maintenance every week and you will also go see them for rehab or any recovery you want to do.
2:00-5:00PM
Practice at Mangos. Mango’s is our amazing off campus facility so we have to allow enough time to drive over. On Tuesdays and Thursdays we typically condition in the sand in addition to practice. Our practices usually consist of drills that are focused on one specific skill but also incorporate some form of conditioning. As season gets closer we tend to scrimmage more towards the end of practice as well. We also go out to practice every other Saturday from 8:00-10:00.
After practice activities become very specific to each student athlete’s needs.
- Freshmen will have an objective based study hall in our academic center. Also freshmen will have to get 8 hours of study hall each week for their first semester. Once you achieve above a 3.0 your study hall hours will be decreased. Freshmen may also have a strategy tutor who will help with organization.
- Some people have night classes or night labs and will go straight from practice to class. I currently have 2 night classes on Monday and Tuesday that go from 6:00-9:00.
- You may also have a tutoring appointment in our academic center. This can be any day of the week except for Saturday. It will be an hour long one on one season with a tutor for whichever subject you want help in. As crazy as the collegiate beach volleyball schedule seems I find it easier to be on task and get my work done when busy. I have to be extremely organized and know all my deadlines and dates of my tests so I don’t fall behind. If you fall behind it is extremely hard to get caught back up with this schedule unless you are willing to give up sleep, which I am not because I love my sleep. Being able to play beach volleyball in college is a true blessing. The team atmosphere you continue to get while playing on a court with only one other person is incredible. But at the same time it is definitely a tough mental transition. When playing in a typical beach volleyball tournament the atmosphere is very relaxed and you pick who you want to play with. In college it is way more intense and you don’t get to pick your partner, so this is something that people tend to struggle with at first. Also, in the off season the early wake up calls can get old and you may just want to go through the motions while working out or practicing. As I get closer and closer to graduating I realize that each rep counts and even though it sucks getting up that early, it is worth it in the end and you never want to take a moment for granted. This experience definitely taught me a lot about myself and helped shape me into the person I am today and I wouldn’t trade it for a thing. After I graduate I plan to move back to Ohio and begin working. I am not exactly sure what I will be doing or if I will return to grad school or not. I plan to continue to play in the local tournaments like CHAOS BEACH VOLLEYBALL and maybe try to qualify for some professional tournaments, but we’ll just see where I end up.
See you on the sand!!!
The 2017 CHAOS BEACH VOLLEYBALL schedule will be announced very soon. Thanks for your patience!
Article written/owned by Callan Molle for CHAOS BEACH VOLLEYBALL 2017[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]