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Soccer has had a special place in my heart since I began playing in kindergarten. I started out in the midfield, switching between center and outside. As the years went on, I didn’t have the same rush as I once did. So in 8th grade when I had the opportunity to try goalie out, I took it. Let me tell you, it brought a whole new kind of rush. Fast forward to my sophomore year of high school. It was my second year playing lacrosse, so I was still somewhat of a beginner to the sport. My main position was defense but our goalie had shoulder surgery and was out for the season, so you bet I took the opportunity to try it out. I played goalie for soccer so why would lacrosse be that much different? They’re the same position, right? My coach was more than willing to let me try because she had the same thoughts running through her head. I was correct in my thinking: positive transfer was large between soccer and lacrosse. I took what I knew from the cognitive processes of being goalie for soccer and I applied them to lacrosse. Though the equipment and nets were different, I had to use the same type of angle knowledge, steps, and problem solving as soccer. We went undefeated that year in lacrosse, and even beat our rivals (the picture down below is from that game). At that year’s banquet I received an All-Conference award which means that I had the highest save percentage out of all goalies in our conference; positive transfer was really my friend during that year of lacrosse.

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protective equipment in gridiron football

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The Maple Grove turf field was my home throughout high school. I spent 5+ days a week yearly practicing soccer. If I didn’t have my team practice, I had goalie training. Goalie training was the most important practice that I had there, or so my obnoxious goalie coach used to tell me. I used to dread goalie practice because I would go home with bumps, bruises, and turf burns in places where they really shouldn’t be. On top of that, my coach would switch up practices so often that I got whiplash from the activities that we would do. Naïve high school me hated him for it. Now, years later, I actually appreciate him for it. Who knew that he was actually making me better? Not stupid 16 year old me, that’s for sure. The practice variability was something that I would see during a game. Of course I wouldn’t get a W catch ball, a high ball, or a close dive every time in a game; there’s variance in where the ball comes in from, how fast it goes, and where in the net its aimed. While I may have had a lot of errors during practice, something that I loathed my coach for, it made me better. The high ball to the corner that I barely got my hand on, or the break away that I didn’t come out fast enough on, those taught me to think harder and to reconstruct more on what was needed to be done. My errors during practice allowed me to be better when it actually counted.

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I have spent the last 16 years of my life learning information and skills in order to reproduce them for a grade. We were taught to memorize stories, dates, equations, etc. It was instilled in us that this information processing must be retained and stored so that we can use it in the future during tests and scenarios. The encoding took place during class or readings, while the storage took place during studying of flashcards and diagrams. The most important process of memory is retrieval because that has been the one that has given us a grade, right? We are explicitly tested on our ability to recall and recognize during multiple choice, true or false, and free response questions; I can consciously retrieve that information of dates, events, and personal experience from my memory. The only class that I have ever used implicit memory tests in Kinesiology 116 in the performance of CPR and emergency medical care; though a lot of that information is also declarative, the performance of CPR is very much procedural, too. I learned the sequence and actions so thoroughly that they became automatic.

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As was said earlier, goalie practices were a large part of my life during high school. The major part of being goalie was coordination of body movements; I had to pattern my head, body, and limb motions relative to the patterning of environmental objects and events. Eye-head coordination was used to visually process the environment around me, and I had to bimanually coordinate my arm, hand, and finger movements to securely get a hold of the ball. Additionally, I had to reach and grasp the ball coming towards me; this movement required the transport component of physically bringing my arms from the starting position to the location of the ball, the grasp component was composed of my hands enclosing the ball, and the object manipulation component came into play when I had to transport the ball to other players on my team (goal kicks, punts, etc.). All encompassing was the multi limb and gross body coordination requirements. In order to transport my body and manipulate the objects in the environment, I had to use large muscles and multiple limbs.

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Weightlifting is something that I hold near and dear to my heart. I spend hours at the gym each week, and my friends jokingly call it my second home (I wont argue with them on that). I do everything from machines to free weights to box jumps. Though I change up the workout every day, the one thing that I don’t change is my awareness. Awareness of body position and object position is a major component when lifting weights. Somesthesia is something that I have become more aware of since the beginning of this class, and it has helped me when weightlifting. I pay more attention to my limb positions and any pain that might be felt during one of my lifts. Additionally, preparatory postural reactions help me when I am doing front arm raises; my bicep femoris postural muscles allow for my body to be steady while my arms are being raised in front of me. Because proprioceptors are located in all muscles of my body, I get uninterrupted feedback which allows me to always be aware of where my body is in space compared to the environment. All of this is important in keeping my body from becoming injured; I could obtain some injury from dropping a weight or by putting my body into a dangerous position if I didn’t have the help of my proprioceptors.