What We Learned From Coach Tai
As a self-confessed avid, blue-blooded fan of the Ateneo Ladies’ Volleyball Team, I have been to most of the team’s UAAP and Shakey’s V-League games for the past three years. Given the opportunity, I will probably go to Bacolod and watch them play in the Uni Games! What is it that keeps me clearing my schedule to be at the arena or the coliseum? Why isn’t it enough for me to sit in the comfort of my home or lie in my soft bed like my fellow sixty something, co-faculty members do on weekends? What is the allure in braving the crowds and doing everything to get myself and my friends, tickets to the volleyball games, when there are a million other things to do like checking my students’ long tests or their case analyses?
Recently, I found out that much more than enjoying myself with friends watching at the risk of getting a heart attack or my blood pressure rising to dangerous levels, so much can be learned watching an afternoon game of the Ateneo Ladies Volleyball Team. Sitting in sections that may be crummy depending on whatever tickets are made available and even the changing perspectives brought about by changing seating assignments make for an afternoon of fun and excitement!
For most games throughout the elimination rounds, one is surrounded by true fans. As the elimination round comes to a close and the top four teams emerge to compete in the semis and finals round the number of fans grow and so do the cheers and the jeers that characterizes each game. One shakes more hands and says more hellos as the season nears its end. “Beso-besos” and affectionate greetings grow even fonder depending on the excitement of coming close to a first place finish for the team. The tickets become more expensive and scarce. Some friends like it because of their scalper connections, most don’t and moan a sigh of disdain as they fill their day trying their best to secure tickets for the rest of the games in the season. Hearing that in three weeks time, the next conference will begin does not bring comfort, because the guarantee of it being as thrilling and as exciting as the current league won’t be obvious until a few games are played.
This season, we have come to learn what a Buddhist coach from Thailand brought to the team as well as to the University in particular. Tonight, watching the team prepare for the final round of games with the most formidable team in the entire season, the girls gave it their 110% - plus their hearts to boot! Admiration and respect abound when the coach shouts corrective actions as well as when he elicits laughter based on his antics while preparing for routine plays he has prepared for the team.
Here there are no miracles, only hard work! Just five months ago, this Thai coach named “Tai” wanted training three times a day, every day of the week. Well, not at the Ateneo, where he had to settle for training twice a day and give way when exams or tests required student athletes to be in their classrooms or at the library tackling their academic requirements. I do not know of many people, regardless of age, who can do four rounds of four hundred meters each in a track oval but within seven minutes maximum. This is breakfast for a typical day of a team member in Tai’s army of “heart strong” soldiers.
The team members then go to class from 8AM to 5PM, grab lunch and even take a quick nap, because they know that by 8AM to 5PM, they will again be going through the gruelling pace of training for particular plays as well as mind conditioning. This daily grind is punctuated with brief meditations and breathing exercises. Enter Coach Tai’s “Heart Strong” philosophy. We have heard a lot about the Ateneo “Puso” the past several years.
Coach Tai’s version is somewhat similar and yet has a distinct twist to it. “A sound mind in a sound body” as the saying goes, the team’s battle cry, “Heart Strong” evolves around enjoying the hard work in order to achieve fulfillment. It is all about the happy heart. The audiences try to understand why Tai keeps repeating, “Be happy, eh. Be happy!” He knows very well that the mind drives the body, most especially in critical tasks. Thus, he triggers each individual team member to work with the other team members and achieve their mission in a joyful environment. It is a place where pressure plays second fiddle to being together and achieving the vision together.
Why am I writing all this, I suddenly realize that it is no different from the training and formation of my class’ case competition teams during the last seven years. Let’s have fun. That is what we are here for! I have been a student of Coach Norman Black’s strategy development and formulation in the past. What continues to amaze me with Coach Tai’s methodology is its simplicity and at the same time how deep the lessons are driven down to the hearts of his players. They say winning is not everything. Certainly in Tai’s book of plays, happiness is everything!
We would like to thank the patrons of the ladies’ volleyball team, most specially Mr. Tony Liao, who has gone to great lengths to bring Ansurom Bundit to the Ateneo. Sir Tony, you have not only succeeded in bringing the school to its final four finish in the last seven years. You have taught us the lessons that patience, besides being a virtue, is the sword with which battles are won and in this case enjoyed. This is the game changing perspective to live a long life, by enjoying it. Not by taking it easy or erasing the pain. But rather the unbridled fulfillment that comes after giving the game your very best! Kudos to you Tai. Animo Ateneo!
** The writer, Johnny Filart, is a diehard fan of the Ateneo Women’s Volleyball Team and is a lecturer at the Leadership and Strategy Department of the School of Management (JGSOM).
