By Jessica Wind (Contributor) – Email
Print Edition: August 21, 2012
After finishing seventh in Western Canada, the varsity women’s soccer team is looking to do whatever it takes to make it to postseason play. They came away from a preseason road trip with a near perfect record. Catch their games at Exhibition Field in Chilliwack; first home game is at 5 p.m. on September 7. We caught up with head coach Robert Giesbrecht and asked him about the upcoming season.
How has your training been going over the summer? Any special stories to relate?
Team is showing lots of promise. We have a lot of new faces so we did a weekend of team building up at Camp Squeah in Hope, BC; it was an incredible experience for our team.
Can you tell us about your training regimen?
The girls are working extremely hard, we test the girls’ fitness with a yo-yo recovery test (editor’s note: this is like a beep test, with timed intervals in which the athlete must get from one cone to the next. The difference with the yo-yo recovery test is that there is an additional, shorter beep where the athlete must “recover”, going to a cone beyond the sprint area and turning around to return to the start point before the next beep sounds). Danielle Schmidt holds our team record of 47. We train about four times a week, each session is about two hours and includes working on strength and power as well as all the soccer training.
Have you made any new acquisitions over the summer? How will they effect the composition of your team?
Our incoming recruiting class is excellent; I feel that we have definitely improved our depth and overall athleticism. They have all done well and we could see a number of them playing significant roles for our team this season.
What are your expectations for this season?
Expectations are that we return to the postseason and that we enter the postseason prepared to do whatever it takes to defeat whoever stands in our way.
Any comments on the referee from the semi-final women’s Canada versus USA match?
It was sad to see the Canadian team work so hard and have the game taken from them; however, it’s a good learning opportunity for all soccer players. Trying to control things that are outside of your control, like officiating, is a futile effort. Achieving the bronze medal is an amazing accomplishment for the Canadian team and we all should be very proud of them.
