>Times Picayune - New Orleans,LA,USA
><http://www.nola.com/news/t-p/index.ssf?/base/news-5/107804047685390.xml>

Volleyball center opens near Goodbee

Indoor facility boasts four full-size courts

Sunday February 29, 2004

Funny how some of the most impressive things seem to pop up in the most
unassuming places.

One of those gems, the Supreme Courts Athletic Training Centre, recently
cropped up on Louisiana 1085 in a remote section of St. Tammany Parish south
of Goodbee.

The facility, which formerly was the Scholastic Book Fair warehouse, was
purchased by the Volleyball Institute of America's Jimmy Miranda and a
business partner and remade into a 25,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art
volleyball training gymnasium.

The gym, which has been in use since late last month, boasts eight training
courts that can quickly be transformed into four full-size courts for games.
More than a dozen baskets of red, white and blue volleyballs line the walls.
A video camera snaps real-time images of players and sends them to a giant
video screen that hangs on the gym wall where coaches can analyze a player's
every move.

On a recent visit to the gym, the Bonnie Raitt song "(Let's Give 'Em)
Something to Talk About" played over the PA system.

And how.

Miranda said Supreme Courts, which is a separate entity from the Volleyball
Institute, was necessary in part because of the league's growing numbers.
VIA has 140 players from 7 to 18 years old and utilizes gym space across the
parish. While that number is manageable, when the league hosts tournaments
(like it did two weekends ago), more than 100 teams from around the state
compete and can make gym space scarce.

"(Supreme Courts was built) because of the combination of numbers and
control to give them the product they want," Miranda said.

What Miranda calls "virtual training" using the video screen, cameras and
computers is especially impressive. If a player hits a great spike during
practice, for instance, they can look to the screen and see the form they
used and hopefully repeat it. Meanwhile, in an adjacent computer room,
coaches can burn discs of the training sessions for players to analyze at
home.

"Players look at their own clips and can e-mail them to themselves to look
at what they do," Miranda said. "It expedites the training process."

Additional VIA Power League tournaments are scheduled at Supreme Courts,
with the gold and silver divisions playing today. Renovation of the gym's
office space is ongoing.

Miranda also said Supreme Courts plans to branch out to include Futsal
(indoor soccer) among other programs in the future.

For more information on Supreme Courts and VIA, call 893-7555 or 871-9613.

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