JRM Skates and Skills Camp
Impresses Players and Parents
By Darby Rhodes
The Swedish-based JRM Skates and Skills camp made their debut in
the United States recently at the Clearwater Ice Arena. Close to 30
campers came to the camp’s opening on January 2, not fully knowing what
to expect.
JRM’s unique style of training is new to these players, most of whom had
watched YouTube videos of the drills, and were intrigued by what they
saw. At the same time they were a bit intimidated. Watching coach
Joachim Ahlgren skating so low to the ice on his edges was an eye
opener.
One of the campers, 10-year-old Matthew Wallace, who plays
for the Florida Alliance and possess great skating skills,
said that he “never remembers falling so much doing drills
before.”
His father, a New York native, thought it was a little strange
to see Matthew falling on the ice during the drills, and thought
that this camp and the drills involved were “very challenging.”
Although challenging, Matthew was quite the opposite of
disheartened. “This was a fun camp and I want to do it again! I
hope more of my teammates come next time,” he said.
The ability of the campers was very strong to start with, but after the
three-day event, everyone was a better skater – and that is
exactly what the coaches of JRM shoot for.
They believe in building a skater’s core strength, and their drills are
designed to do just that.
Former NHL standout Filip Kuba (Florida Panthers 98-99, 99-00, 12-13;
Tampa Bay Lightning 06-07, 07-08), and current head coach of the 14U
AA Tampa Scorpions, enrolled his son into the JRM camp based on what he
had heard in the past about Ahlgren and his staff.
And they did not disappoint. Kuba said that his players who took part in the
camp were the best on the ice at their following game. He saw that they
had more confident on the ice.
Before the JRM staff traveled back to Sweden at the close of their
successful first Florida camp, Kuba invited them to run the Scorpions
90-minute long practice at CIA. In addition, the Scorpions coach
will have his team take part in JRM’s next camp in late summer.
As their inaugural U.S. Skates and Skills camp, JRM welcomed
players from around the Southeast to take part in their threeday
camp. Dan Wagner traveled from the Atlanta area so that
his 9-year-old son Holden, who plays in the Atlanta Jr. Knights
program, could take part in the camp.
“It’s the first camp that he went to that he came off the ice
exhausted,” Wagner said.
Holden enjoyed that this camp pushed him out of his
comfort zone. Pushing players beyond their comfort zone
is one of the main goals of JRM.
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