By Richard Obrand
MontrealAlouettes.com
As a kicker, Damon Duval is sometimes put into high pressured situations, MontrealAlouettes.com caught found out how the veteran deals with being in tight spots.
Do you do any special exercises to learn how to deal with intense situations?
I actually use a sports psychologist to learn how to continually deal with pressure. We do exercises like sit in a museum with 50 TV’s that line the hallway showing sports highlights with the TV’s turned up to max volume and the speaker system on full-blast. The loudness teaches us how to concentrate and block out the noise and focus on identifying things that are happening around me. I also learn how to do muscle relaxation exercises where you target certain muscles and learn how to control them. For example I’ve learned how to control my heart rate.
No matter what the case I’ve learned how to control my heart and its rhythm no matter how tense the situation, I can slow down my heart rate to normal within 10 breaths. So all of the psychological training has really helped me train for pressure situations and “knock on wood” I have never missed a pressure kick in my career so far and hopefully never will.
Your longest CFL field goal was a 58 yarder, is that the longest you’ve ever made at any level of football?
No, the longest field goal I have ever made was in practice for 76 yards and that’s the longest I’ve ever attempted.
Do you do anything interesting during the off-season?
During the off-season the first thing I do is take a vacation with my wife without our children which is of course great because it’s nice to spend time alone together. The rest of the off-season I participate in the team Community programs. I take part in the School is Cool Basketball Program and the CN Adopt an Alouette school program; I really enjoy interacting with Quebec’s youth and meeting our fans. Also Calgary Stampeders’ kicker Sandro DeAndelis and I put on a kicking camp in conjunction with Centre 68 (Brian Chiu’s business) for kids and kickers of all ages to help future kickers of this league. The rest of the time is spent enjoying my family and working out. My wife gets me up every morning at 6:30 and that’s when my workouts start whether I like it or not!
What is the most memorable moment of your career?
There are three memorable moments in my career. The first is when I was in college at Auburn and I kicked the game winning 44 yard field goal against #1 ranked Florida (my school was unranked) to win the game. We won 23-20 and it was such an upset that the fans stormed the field and tore down the goal posts. That game is still considered one of the biggest wins in Auburn history to date. The second is when I kicked the winning field goal against Edmonton in my first year in Montreal; it was also the first CFL game my family was able to see. The final was Grey Cup 2005 in BC where I kicked the field goal to send the game into overtime.
