Posted by The title is one of life’s little no-brainers, but I have a specific timing question in mind.
When we get to the highest level, most spikers have range. That is they can spike in all directions. Whether they actually do spike in all directions is one of those questions that we answer with scouting. In practice we can predict with some reasonable degree of accuracy where a spiker most likes to spike.
But there always outliers. For example, the cross court spiker who sometimes spikers line. Why does he spike line at exactly that moment? The most obvious answer is because it is open. So the question presents itself, when does he decide to spike line?
And to be a little more specific, I don’t mean when he decides to spike 20cm left or right, but when he decides to spike line or cross.
The follow up to this post is here.
At Home On The Court 
“When I see blocker’s starting position” is what I have chosen, because I guess that’s what’s true for most spikers. However, I think as a matter of fact it depends on the quickness of the eye cascade (“Blicksprung” in German, i.e. how fast the spikers eye is able to refocus after changing the spot where watching, in this case: ball – block- ball) and there are huge differences from individual to individual there. I take it to be absolutely impossible to watch all of the mentioned parameters in a single action and though it would be awesome if a spiker could watch blocker’s hands a split second before the attack, I take that to be impossible as well. Maybe Giba was able to watch the block after the set, but I’m not sure on that.
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