Member News

May 26, 2007

Photo Credit: Lou DiGesare / Real Judo

2007 Pan Am Coaches Notes from Jason Morris

Team USA finished up strong and ended up with 10 total medals, including two gold which is our best performance since 2005 when we also had 10 medals without the Cuban team being there. There has been much improvement in this group technically & tactically which is a good sign in the young team.

There is even more good news here and that is there is a lot of room for even more improvement that the USA Judo staff from top to bottom will be continually working toward. Our veteran's are holding together very well as Val Gotay and Ryan Reser proved as they
captured gold medals and Justin Flores and Adler Volmar put in workman-like performances to finish fifth both having injuries to deal with, setting a great example for the rookies.

Two of our youngest, Jeanette Rodriguez and Francesca Durand showed a lot spunk fighting hard and taking their tough draws and losses with class which is great to see in young
athletes as they have a bright future ahead.

The athletes jobs now are to study their Pan Am opponents and take what they have learned from this weekend about themselves and try to improve on as many areas as possible to be ready for the Pan Am Games because having success once is easier than repeating it or even doing better. I personally will be doing the same thing, going over what each athlete can get better at along with further figuring out the weaknesses of our competition.

On a personal note, I would like to give a thankful mention to USA Judo and all the people behind the scenes that are doing a great job at getting the people in the field what we need to have this kind of success.