Arena Awareness

Arena awareness is the art of knowing where everything is in the Arena.

Awareness starts with the self and the map - knowing where you are in relation to all the geometry (map awareness). You must also know where the disc is and where it is going (disc awareness), where your teammates are (teammate awareness), and where the opponents are (opponent awareness).

Map Awareness

Being in tune with the environment of the Arena is crucial. If you don't know where you are, the location of nearby geometry, and how to communicate where you are to teammates, you will be a bit lost.

The first thing to do is to become familiar with the names of all the places in the arena. Each block and each area of the arena have common names. You can see in the Echo Arena Block Map some of the more common and less common names for the various blocks and areas in the arena.

Map Awareness Drills

• Move around in a private arena by yourself, tapping various blocks and calling out their names as you do. Stay in a small section for a time (e.g. in the bubble, in the trap, around mid, around pacman / ghost) and bounce back and forth until you are comfortable with the names of everything. This will also help develop muscle memory for how far apart these areas are and the angle you should take to move around them easily.

Map Awareness Videos

• Arena Zones: SirDimwi explains the various zones in the arena and how they should be played when on offense or defense.

Reading the Disc

Reading the disc is one of the most important skills and somewhat under-rated. Even at high levels of play, players often mis-read where the disc is going and miss opportunities.

Reading the disc is much harder to do when moving very quickly in a stack.

Learning how to read the disc requires:

• Calculating speed and angles to see where the disc will go in the next few seconds
• Calculating your own speed to know the angle you should take to get to the disc on the straightest line possible

Reading the Disc Drills

• In a private arena, alone, use the public disc (not your personal disc) to practice shooting and rebounding. This is good practice for shooting but also for seeing the angles the disc takes when it bounces off various surfaces.
• In a private arena, with at least one other person, use the public disc. Throw the disc in various places and regrab to it. Practice staying together (don't split off to grab the disc too much). This is good practice for throwing, regrabbing in a straight line and changing directions, and reading the disc.

Teammate Awareness

Knowing where your teammates are is key in many situations:

• When you have the disc and are under pressure and need to pass
• When you are on offense and don't have the disc, so you know where to spread out for better positioning
• When you are on defense, so that you cover the right opponent (not sending multiple people after one player while leaving another one open)

When playing, develop a mental process that runs on its own that keeps track of where your teammates are. This takes time. Keep asking yourself 'Where are all of my teammates right now?' If you don't know the answer, look around to find them and re-establish your mental map of where your teammates are.

Opponent Awareness

Knowing where the opponents are is obviously useful. Keeping track of everyone and their movements is not so easy.

When playing, develop a mental process that runs on its own that keeps track of where the opponents are. This takes time. Keep asking yourself 'Where are all of the opponents right now?' If you don't know the answer, look around to find them and re-establish your mental map of where the opponents are.