As Day 2 comes to a close (for me) it’s a good time to post a summary of the activities that started yesterday. Checkin to camp was between 2 and 5 pm. The girls dropped their equipment off at the rink and then proceeded to the St. Cloud dormitories to check in. At the dorms there were a lot of assistants there to greet the girls and usher them through the checkin procedure which consisted of checking your name off, handing in your medical and waivers, getting your room key and then taking things up to the rooms. It was a hot day (in the high 80′s) and given the rooms do not have air-conditioning, they were hot. USAH kindly provided fans for each room but many girls brought additional fans and even portable room air conditioners with them. I’m betting they will be popular.
After checkin, team meetings and dinner, the girls went down to the arena for a first day ice session. These sessions were shared ice and were basic warmup drills and small games. These practices started at 8 and the last session started after 10pm.
Before discussing the first full day of activities, and for those who may not be familiar with these camps, a typical day consists of two ice sessions (morning and afternoon), off-ice/strength training, team meetings, and meals. This camp will follow that same basic format. The only difference to that basic format today was team photos. The activities started on the ice as early as 7am for some teams and went to nearly 2pm as each team had a full ice practice. During the morning practice the mission seemed to be “burn the legs” as there was lots of skating and skating and passing drills. The afternoon session started at 2:15 (the early teams) and was a 1hr 30min shared ice session with another team. During this session they broke up into Forwards and Defense and did position specific drills for the first third of practice. The second third was focused on breakouts, and the last third was either small games or full ice scrimmage. After the session I saw a lot of ice packs on the athletes as the tough 3 sessions in 24 hrs started to wear on the muscles.
It’s a bit early yet but my impression already is that this year’s camp is much better (from a training point of view) that last year’s already. This was confirmed by more than a few of the attendee’s I talked with. We shall see as the week progresses.
Note: I didn’t take as many photos today as I thought I would, but did take some that I will post later. Frankly, taking photos of games are of more interest so that’s when I’ll take the most. If any readers would like me to take any of there athlete, just write and while I won’t promise, I will try to get a few snaps in. Additionally, the photos posted in the gallery can be downloaded at full original resolution and used for your personal use. They are all free.
