American Football Youth Mini Camp and Thank You Dinner

Monday started off bright and early.  George and I had been asked by Jonas Grip to put on a sort of mini camp for a local school, so I met George at the field a little before 8am to set up.  Around 8:15 we started seeing students showing up, with a teacher shortly thereafter.  Oh, the freedom of the Swedish school system!

We ended up working with two groups of roughly 25 students each, boys and girls, for about an hour each.  George introduced the game to the students, including the equipment necessary to play.  We then put them through a brief warm up followed by short sessions in split groups of blocking, tackling, route running and catching, and kicking.

It turns out that the students were all about 17 years old and enrolled in an international studies program at Hässleholms Tekniska Skola.  Despite the age group, everyone had great attitudes about trying something new and giving a good effort.  There were some athletes in both groups and, hopefully, we were able to pique the interest of a few of them to pursue careers in American football as Hurricanes in the very near future.  Our exploits were again captured in the news here.

George and I stopped on our way back from the field at the cafe in the Heritage Park for a late morning fika and to discuss some of the athletes in the camp.  But mostly for fika.

I'd ridden on this bike path on the way back to the Cordeiro's a number of times before, but today it looked particularly peaceful and pretty.  I love how the light peaks through the trees.

Monday night I rode with Shawn and Katarina to Infinity Pizzeria where we were guests of George and Laurie for their Thank You Dinner.  In gratitude for all of the hospitality they'd received while in Sweden, the Contreras's took out a number of people they've met while in Hässleholm.  I was lucky enough to be invited without really deserving it.

Guests included Johan, Mariana, Christian, Elin, Uffe, Ulrica, Rasmus, Jonas, Linus, Helena, Mats...

... Johan, Thérése, Frank, Shawn, Katarina, Me, Lucas, and Sarah.  The food was good, the company was great.  These people had all been very welcoming to me as well.

George said a few words of thanks to the group, as did Jonas to George, Laurie, and even me for my brief time with the team.  He then presented a game ball to George that had been signed by the team.  I very cool memento of his time spent in Sweden, I'm sure.