HKAIH USA Camp

During the summer, my team embarked on a hockey camp to Stamford, Connecticut in the US. It was a challenging, tiring, but rewarding ten days. It was days of intense hockey training, one that greatly benefited myself and my fellow teammates. We were exposed to the North American hockey culture, after travelling with HKAIH to Russia and Czech Republic in past years. It was definitely a summer to remember.

Stamford is New England’s third largest city with a population of 122,000. Just 30 miles out of New York City, it was very convenient and was a fairly peaceful city. Our hotel was around fifteen minutes from the rink by bus.I travelled to the US by myself prior to the camp, so I met up with my jet-lagged teammates at the hotel. I was assigned to a room with Jonathan Han, our goalie and Adrian, who we were assigned to take care of as he was much younger than us. Training began the following day and we were greeted by our coach, Mike Backman at the rink. He is a former Rangers player who used to play with coach Barry Beck. Mike was always very patient and understanding with us, so all of us respected him and his fellow coaches. We could see that he was using all his effort to coach us, he was showing us the sport he so loves, and we respected him for that. Although we were from Asia and he wasn’t familiar with us, he was dedicated to making us better hockey players. We trained at Stamford Twin Rinks, opening in 1996, it is the biggest ice rink in the area. It is an individual building with two NHL size ice rinks. It was home to the Connecticut Kings, a youth hockey team playing at AAA level.

We had three hours of on-ice time everyday, with an hour of dryland in between. the camp was more focused on tactic drills like 3-0’s and 2-1’s, with the occasional power skating session. We also had fun games like battling in the corner, capture the flag and ball hockey; which helped me improve my speed and agility. Afternoon sessions were usually two full hours, which was really exhausting for us as we were only used to one-hour trainings in Hong Kong. We were lucky to be able to play twice with Mike’s local team, who was much better than us. We lost both games, but learnt invaluable lessons of teamwork and determination. It was definitely tiring to have so much training in one day, but it was rewarding making it worthy.

Besides training we also had a afternoon trip to the Yankees stadium to watch some baseball. I’m anything but a baseball fan, but I found it to be a fun sport to watch, though lacking the speed and excitement of hockey. We also had a day trip to New York City. We roamed the streets of Manhattan and visited the 9/11 memorial. But the most memorable event of the day was our visit to Madison Square Garden, the home of the New York Rangers. This was where coach Barry and coach Mike used to play. In the centre of New York City, it was a gigantic stadium. We visited the seating areas and also got the chance to see the Rangers changing room. We concluded the day by watching an absolutely hilarious show by the Blue Man Group.

During the trip, we had the opportunity to meet famous NHL players. One day, we had just finished our morning on-ice session and was waiting to do dryland. Suddenly, Jonathan Quick walked into the rink and greeted us! We were speechless as he walked away. Fortunately, we got to meet him again and our goalie, Jonathan Han got the opportunity to go on ice with him. We also watched NHL players train, we saw Matt Moulson from the Buffalo Sabres and Cam Atkinson from the Columbus Blue Jackets.

The ten days flashed by as soon I found out it was time to go. We were all very thankful for all we have learnt in the camp and thanked all the coaches that has helped us through the camp. My skills vastly improved after the camp as I learnt to think ahead and pass the puck to the right place at the right time. My skating was also better as I could skate quicker forwards and backwards. I got to know many of my fellow teammates better, and a stronger bond means more teamwork on the ice, something we were lacking in. But one of the most important things we gained from the camp was exposure to North American hockey culture. Like coach Barry said at the end of the camp, North American hockey is a combination of Russia’s power skating and Czech’s fine skill, both of which we have been exposed to through the previous summer camps. Therefore, through the combination of good skating and skill, we can become better hockey players. And that was what this camp did to us.