attack footwork

Question
My daughter has played volleyball for the past five years in school and club. She has always been a standout on all of the teams she has played on as a hitter. However, last season her varsity coach pointed out that her approach footwork is backwards. She is right handed but starts her approach as if she were a left handed hitter. Her coach tried to help her change this as did her club coach this season. Now she is attending her high school camp run by the head coach of CSU and he tells my daughter that she needs to fix her footwork if she wants to play at the next level. She has already received a letter of interest from a DIV I college at the end of her Freshman year. I am wondering if she might be ambidextrous because she can hit the ball fairly hard and place it with her left hand when she gets a bad set. Also, when she was younger and played soccer she would always kick the ball with her left foot even though she is right handed. Should she leave well enough alone or really make all efforts to change her footwork to the proper approach? What is the best way to help her fix her footwork? Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Answer
Good afternoon!

Thank you for visiting allexperts.com.  

First off, I find it criminal that her first 4, 6 or 8 coaches didn't fix her spike approach.  At this point, I'm not even convinced which ones are right!  A half dozen missed it, then 2 saw it?  

Even if she's ambi, then will have a hand that she can spike better with.  I imagine it's the same hand that she serves with, and I imagine that's what she's been doing.  Unless she's a Michael Jordan type athlete, then she should stick to the hand she's been hitting with.....I can't fathom her changing hands while college are contacting her.....but I guess stranger things have happened.  

But which is easier:  fixing a 5 year footwork issue, or hitting with a different hand after 5 years?  Jeeeeeeeze, nasty decision!

I'd like to ask you a question. I may be hard to answer, but I don't know how I can answer your question w/o knowing it.

* What are the final 3 steps of your daughter's "new" spike approach?  The FINAL three.  Are they right/left/right, or left/right/left?  (You may have to ask her.) If you can tell me this, then we can go on.  I want to know which set of coaches were actually right:  The first ones or the recent ones.  (The answer will be on the Olympics this summer!  I'm 99.9% sure that 99.9% of the hitters in the Olympics use the correct footwork!)  

Another STAR volleyball camp ends tomorrow.  Magical camp!  It's been awesome.  To see the camp picture, please visit me at www.coachhouser.com