If I’m brutally honest about myself I’d have to admit I’ve spent years talking a good game on how I’m going to get much fitter, I’m going to improve the technical side of my game, solo practice more and eventually be one of the better players in my Squash Club. I have made improvements over the years, I am fitter, I’ve won my first team matches and I was regularly practising on court alone or with a partner. However, I’ve lacked motivation from time to time and I’ve now gone on to realise I’ve kept myself training at a “comfort level”, doing what I know and probably just about maintaining my current fitness at the time.
Enter SquashSkills Training Club…
Thankfully I managed to get myself onto one of the pilot Training Clubs back in September and across the 6 weeks, I had never done so many court sprints in my life! I found myself in a WhatsApp group full of like-minded people of all genders, age, race, based all over the World. We were pushed out of our comfort zone and given weekly drills to complete. That’s what really motivated me to re-join when the program started again. I had never trained so hard but smart in my life and was able to bounce off the coaches and fellow Squash players. I had gone from reaching 7.2 on the Bleep Test at Week 1 to 8.9 at the end of Week 6, the hard work was paying off!
The sessions back in September were court-based but with current lockdown and social distancing guidelines, SquashSkills have been able to tailor a 6-week plan to be completed at home indoors, in your garden or in your local field. The sessions can be completed by anyone of any fitness, done at your own pace and made as tough as you want them to be. Each week we’ve been working on our endurance, speed/agility, strength and something that gets forgotten a lot, mobility. Each workout is related specifically to playing Squash and I can’t wait to get back on court to see how my fitness has progressed.
As a competitive person myself I enjoy being part of the WhatsApp group and logging my results onto the STC spreadsheet to keep an eye on how everyone is doing around me. The times you lack motivation and fancy a rest day there will probably be someone in the group posting a post-workout out sweaty selfie and challenge you to get on with it. Having Gary & Jesse in the group interacting with everyone has been great; Gary checks up on everyone, answers all fitness-related questions and is always around for handy tips. Jesse has hosted Zoom calls going over technical analysis and also introduced us all to his new visualisation training to help you with the mental side of the game.
It’s Week 6 now into my third STC experience and I’ve signed up to go again on the 22nd June. I’m excited to see how the STC evolves as Clubs start opening up again and I feel that although I’ve learnt so much from Gary & Jesse, there’s a lot more to learn and understand. I couldn’t recommend the STC highly enough as it’s kept me mentally strong throughout lockdown, given me goals to work to and made me realise how much I can actually achieve.
Scott Richardson
SquashSkills Training Club participant
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