Thursday 13 February 2025

Session 1 Day 3 – In a mood of “We speak the same language in the court” – signals and mechanics

Today again we had an early wake up and the fitness session in the morning at 7.00, we have done a family picture, the first of the day! The temperature in the morning is very good to the outdoor activities; some people instead of run went to the pool.

After quick breakfast we have stated at 8.30 with Carl Jungebrand, who day before decided to come earlier just because there is so much he wanted to share that he needed extra time, of course all the group agreed in no time for early wake up from that reason 🙂 Carl was talking about the 3-men mechanic and how to behave with it on the court and what are FIBA guidelines to use it the best way.

Then was time for Steve, as today’s topic is mechanics he continued with the Clips of Costas from the day before, but now pointing the mechanics and he was exactly showing us on the example of the Euroleague and FIBA referees where to go, and what is a “close down” and how to use it. Also we have a new term in use from Steve: “happy feet” is when you are standing in one place but doing step right, step left for nothing 🙂 like dancing.

At the third lecture clips continued, so Costas took over, with the fast help of Pawel, who is the master in assisting with video clips. And we were talking about the situations. Travelling, yes or not, block/change yes or not, flop? All situations from the best referees in Europe we could recently watch in the play offs and finals and also the favorite of Costas to show, the clips of Kuba 🙂 Costas is always brining the life examples, and as basketball evolves so fast in recent years, the fresh is the best, so we see now the same clips, as Euroleague referees will see in a week at the clinic in Istanbul.

Afternoon is always some games. Today we had all together 4 games until the evening and the lecture at the court from Carl. Carl did some slides on the wall and the campers were practicing the proper running from trail to new lead position under the FIBA eye and also the proper movements on the court in the triangle.

After the game for the feedback session we had a summary from Dr Ridvan. He did some surveys in the meantime and presented the results, he also asked day before some referees to use new techniques for distress and they were telling their stories of how this worked. These results were awesome and the stories shared were super interesting, I believe everyone shall do this exercise as it is helping you to be a better referee.