My son is playing soccer on a U8 team, which means the kids are six or seven at the start of the year. It's a fun league, which means "we don't keep score." Of course, the kids keep score, and it's highly disheartening for my kids, because we're the team that always loses. (Actually, there's another team in our situation, and games with that team are actually interesting. We even won one.)
I know it really bugs my kids that we lose all the time. I fear some of them are getting turned off soccer. I bet we're not the only league with badly uneven teams. I think part of the solution is to keep score, and for the league organizers to use the information to balance out the teams over the years. Here's how.
Record every game score for the season. Ideally, also record which players actually showed up at each game. That would be pretty easy for the coach or manager to do. When it comes time to make the teams next year, give all the kids who have history in the league one point for each goal their team scored. Put the kids in order by points and assign the kids to teams on a round robin basis. If a coach or parent asks that two kids play on the same team, then the player moved to make room has to have the same number or more points than the requested player (to eliminate incentives to stacking).
Of course this isn't going to be perfect. You don't know about new players who come along. It won't work for the first year the kids play. But it doesn't have to be perfect. Part of sports is to learn to win and lose graciously. But kids have to be doing both. It doesn't do any good to teach some kids that the deck is stacked against them and they'll never win.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Why Lencho Reyes?
If you wonder why my Google name is lenchoreyes, here it is:
First, in my ongoing quest to miss every great development, I totally blew off my brother when he offered an invitation to a beta of this "gmail" thing. So I missed my chance to be larry.reid@gmail.com.
When I finally got around to signing up for all things Google, all variants of my name were taken. So I used one of my Spanish pseudonyms.
"Lencho" is short for "Lorenzo", which is the Spanish equivalent of "Lawrence". So "Lencho" would be "Larry".
"Reyes" is a real Spanish surname that literally means "Kings". When I was first traveling in Central America, the way to make long distance calls home was to go to a telephone company office, write up a little paper form, then sit in a stuffy waiting room for an hour or so until an operator connected your call and called your name. I missed a few calls because someone massacred the pronunciation of my name (for some reason, "Reid" is hard to read for Central Americans which is funny, because "reid" is actually a word in the Spanish spoken in Spain).
At the same time, I figured out that when I said my surname to people, and tried to make it "Spanish" so they could spell it, their brains would translate what they were hearing to "Reyes", because that's the closest surname they could think of to match the sounds I was making. So I just started writing my name as "Lorenzo Reyes" on the phone company form, and I never missed another long distance call.
First, in my ongoing quest to miss every great development, I totally blew off my brother when he offered an invitation to a beta of this "gmail" thing. So I missed my chance to be larry.reid@gmail.com.
When I finally got around to signing up for all things Google, all variants of my name were taken. So I used one of my Spanish pseudonyms.
"Lencho" is short for "Lorenzo", which is the Spanish equivalent of "Lawrence". So "Lencho" would be "Larry".
"Reyes" is a real Spanish surname that literally means "Kings". When I was first traveling in Central America, the way to make long distance calls home was to go to a telephone company office, write up a little paper form, then sit in a stuffy waiting room for an hour or so until an operator connected your call and called your name. I missed a few calls because someone massacred the pronunciation of my name (for some reason, "Reid" is hard to read for Central Americans which is funny, because "reid" is actually a word in the Spanish spoken in Spain).
At the same time, I figured out that when I said my surname to people, and tried to make it "Spanish" so they could spell it, their brains would translate what they were hearing to "Reyes", because that's the closest surname they could think of to match the sounds I was making. So I just started writing my name as "Lorenzo Reyes" on the phone company form, and I never missed another long distance call.
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Turkey on the BBQ
I did an 11 lb. turkey with stuffing on the BBQ for Christmas (so I wasn't an adult when Canada went metric -- why do we still buy our meat in pounds?). I took the temperature of the stuffing at three hours and it was ready (165 F -- again, still cooking in Imperial units). It was nice and moist so I don't think it had been ready for long.
The BBQ is great for a couple of reasons: The rotisserie keeps the juices in the turkey, not in the dripping pan. Also, gas heat is moister than the electric heat that many of us have in the oven in the kitchen.
11 lbs. is the maximum-sized turkey I could do in my BBQ, which is a fairly standard domestic gas BBQ. That's okay, as it's still way too big for our family.
The BBQ is great for a couple of reasons: The rotisserie keeps the juices in the turkey, not in the dripping pan. Also, gas heat is moister than the electric heat that many of us have in the oven in the kitchen.
11 lbs. is the maximum-sized turkey I could do in my BBQ, which is a fairly standard domestic gas BBQ. That's okay, as it's still way too big for our family.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Friday, September 11, 2009
Canadians in La Vuelta
Ryder Hesjedal, one of four Canadians riding in the Vuelta a España this year, won today's stage and finished second on Tuesday. Since I started following the grand tours on the Internet (1994?), this is the first time I recall Canadians winning a stage.
The Tour of Spain is the third of the three big three-week cycling races, along with the Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France.
The Tour of Spain is the third of the three big three-week cycling races, along with the Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Mt Seymour Again
Friday I did Mount Seymour again. 59 minutes from the old kiosk where the road starts the serious climb, to the far end of the parking lot. My iPhone said I was at exactly 1,000 m at the top, and coming off the Ironworkers Bridge I was basically at sea level. At the kiosk, I was at 118 m.
I had a mental collapse coming around the last hairpin turn when I couldn't see the parking lot. I just became completely unable to push myself anymore and I allowed myself to slow down to 10 kph (from 12 or so). Once I crested the small rise, the parking lot was right there and almost flat. Something to remember if I do this again: Be prepared for the fact that you can't see the parking lot from the curve.
Another thing to remember: After the second hairpin, the slope gets a bit easier and there's a couple of minutes where I could up the pace to about 16 or 17 kph.
I hadn't done a good job of marking my time the last time I did this. I remembered 55 minutes as my time, but it could be that I was slower then. Watching my speed this time I think I was going as fast or faster than last time. Most of the time I'm doing around 12 kph.
I had a mental collapse coming around the last hairpin turn when I couldn't see the parking lot. I just became completely unable to push myself anymore and I allowed myself to slow down to 10 kph (from 12 or so). Once I crested the small rise, the parking lot was right there and almost flat. Something to remember if I do this again: Be prepared for the fact that you can't see the parking lot from the curve.
Another thing to remember: After the second hairpin, the slope gets a bit easier and there's a couple of minutes where I could up the pace to about 16 or 17 kph.
I hadn't done a good job of marking my time the last time I did this. I remembered 55 minutes as my time, but it could be that I was slower then. Watching my speed this time I think I was going as fast or faster than last time. Most of the time I'm doing around 12 kph.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Camping at Goldstream Provincial Park
Marc and I went camping at Goldstream Provincial Park (Google Maps has bad imagery in this area) on Vancouver Island. It's a comment on the population of the Vancouver area that you can't get a campsite in most parks on the mainland on the weekend unless you book two months in advance. But I got a weekend booking two weeks in advance for a campground 20 minutes from Victoria. And what I spent on ferry I almost saved on gas (a bit of an exaggeration, but not much).
To top it off, there were all sorts of interesting things to see within walking distance of the campground: Abandoned mine shafts, a railway bridge over a deep canyon, and a very high waterfall. Marc was the trooper he always is, walking or running six hours on Saturday to all the different sights. We saw and heard owls in the campground on Saturday night, and a garter snake on the trail on Sunday.
The only bummer was the total campfire ban. It's for good reason, it's been dry for months here, but it's strange to go camping and not have a campfire. Trying to make smores over a Coleman stove just doesn't do it.
Here's the slideshow:
To top it off, there were all sorts of interesting things to see within walking distance of the campground: Abandoned mine shafts, a railway bridge over a deep canyon, and a very high waterfall. Marc was the trooper he always is, walking or running six hours on Saturday to all the different sights. We saw and heard owls in the campground on Saturday night, and a garter snake on the trail on Sunday.
The only bummer was the total campfire ban. It's for good reason, it's been dry for months here, but it's strange to go camping and not have a campfire. Trying to make smores over a Coleman stove just doesn't do it.
Here's the slideshow:
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