Posts Tagged ‘motivation’
raison d'etre ?
Friday, February 5th, 2010Always look twice
Monday, July 27th, 2009
Yesterday on flight back from the Audi Medup in Cagliari I found this picture. It’s a sunset on the Hirzel one of my favorite shooting place. Right after the shooting the picture didn’t made it in to the selection of the day, would have almost deleted it, sometimes you really need to look twice before you see the real beauty.
The brain defines the limit
Sunday, April 20th, 2008
Can you imagine to do 51 km in the alps with a altitude difference of 4000m in temperatures ranging from 5 to – 15 degrees?
Maybe yes if you are well trained but the guys I could follow with my camera they do it in less than 6 ½ hours! No I’m not joking this is serious.
We tock the helicopter from Arolla up to the Col de Bertol at 300metres. The walk up to the 3650meter high summit of the Tete Blanche was everything else as a walk in the park, at least for me with my almost 30 kg backpack with cameras etc.
With the limited view it was hard to estimate the distance to the summit and the last few hundred meters where never ending, the air got thinner, my legs weaker and the my backpack with the cameras heavier.
After a while I started to count the steps, every 60 steps a I started again and again just to motivate myself to get up there.
It was a wonderful moment when my guide Norbert Zurwerra shouted: “There is the summit”.
Up on the summit we found a big military tent and you can’t imagine the surprised faces of this mountaineers when a stranger drops in with the excuse we are here to do a few pictures.
After a coffee we could relax for a few hours but at 1.30 in the morning with the wind blowing at 80 km/m at minus – 12 degrees we got out of the tent.
Until this moment I had no idea what I’m going to see in a few minutes, all happend very fast, get the camera of the bag, set up the flash do a few shots to verify the settings and here they are, running as we can down in the valley but here we are at 3650 meters.
What was even more amazing that the Tete Blanche is not the end of the trail but they still had two more summits before it goes down to Verbier.
The definition of being fit became a complete new dimension. Until this moment I was sure to be fit and comfortable with my health.
How much do they train to get this level of fitness, at least 40′000 meters in altitude difference. With 50 weekends /year you know what they are doing in their freetime.
Now I’m back home sitting in front of my notebook writing this post with some small frost damages on the right cheek and ear. This is the end of the post as I want to go jogging a bit. I’m not planning to do the Patrouille des Glaciers in 2 years as participant. As photographer would be great and hopefully again with Norbert Zurwerra as guide, and next time I want to carry the heavy photo equipment up to the Tete Blanche without counting.
Jürg
PS: I almost forgot to say, It’s important to reach the summit but It’s even more important to come down safe. As the weather was still too bad for the helicopter, we did the way back to Arolla on our ski. Going up is hard but coming down isn’t easy too.
how much can you improve teamwork
Tuesday, April 15th, 2008
Teambuilding for match race teams
Maybe you wonder why I’m writing about teambuilding for match racing teams. Probably the correct title would be: how much more can you improve teamwork.
Since we all saw the Alinghi team working as one perfect team during the America’s Cup, at least in the 2003 Cup, everybody knows that you require a high level of teamwork to perform in a boat.
Imagine now you get engaged by two top match race teams to improve their teamwork. As an example a normal good crew on a 30 foot boat takes about 15 -20 seconds to hoist the spinnaker, those guys sailing in the top 50 and 30 of the world ranking list do it in less than 12 seconds and they are not happy.
Therefore it is quite a challenge to support these 2 teams, what kind of advice would you give them, how do you advise them on areas to improve without compromising the already high level of teamwork?
The main area for improvement that I helped them to apply was communication between the team and the decision making processes. This can be applied on an overall tactical level but also in, for example, the hectic pre-start period.
The learning curve is never over and there is always room to improve, which is clear after such a training session.
We divided the training into 3 main steps:
- Assessment: Know your strengths and weaknesses
- Agreement: Of the strengths and weaknesses
- Improvement: Apply this new knowledge
At the end the spinnaker came up in less than 10 seconds which was an improvement but the major change was in the communication between the team, there was almost no shouting on board, they all knew what they had to do and how to talk to each other.
You may ask yourselves why is communication so important? Imagine you are sitting in a meeting with 20 knots of wind and big waves crashing over the table. How do you make joint decisions in no time often without clear communication channels, but be working seamlessly and instinctively as a team with the same goals and desired outcomes? That’s where teamwork comes into play.
Sailing, like many team sports, can be an excellent tool for focusing attention on teamwork. If there is a misunderstanding about roles and responsibilities you find out within seconds, not days, weeks or even possibly months later as often demonstrated in the business world.