Randy Farris can remember the days when there were about seven kids at his Park City Soccer Camps. It was the mid-1970s and the camps were held on beaten-up football fields.
“Soccer was just starting to take off here,” he said.
Farris and Bob Martin, creators of the Park City Soccer Camps, have been involved with furthering the game of soccer in Park City for nearly 30 years. Next week, the famed local camps return to the pitch here in town.
“I’ve been doing camps forever,” Farris said. “Thousands of kids at camps every summer. We have kind of set our own niche here. It’s very unique if you compare it to any other soccer camps.”
One of the longest running recreation programs in Park City, the camp has its own flair, Farris says. It makes the game fun, involves original training techniques, and all the while teaches players how the game should be played.
“Our focus is a fun camp,” he said. “We incorporate skills into a bunch of games and activities that are super unique.”
There’s “cat-and-mouse,” an activity in which players try to run the length of the field while dodging soccer balls that are being fired off by athletes at midfield.
“The kids absolutely love that game,” Farris said. “It’s like a tag game with the soccer ball.”
Another activity featured in the Park City Soccer Camps is called “gumball.” Dozens of balls are placed at the center of the field and it’s a free-for-all until every ball has been put into the back of the net in a specific amount of time.
The camp, for boys and girls ages 6 to 16, is quickly divided up into groups the first day of camp. It builds character and team unity, according to Farris, and helps promote a competitive drive and rivalry over the course of the one-week camp.
“It’s basically a running World Cup,” he said. “Each team represents a country for a week. They get so into it.”
“I like the fact that it provides an alternative to a team camp or the camps that a club provides,” he said. “We’re very fun. It’s not really for the one who’s trying to get ready for high school soccer during the season, and yet we still have a lot of very good soccer players who come to our camps.”
Farris said he has a group of athletes this year who are approaching the age when they will no longer qualify to participate in the camps. He said some of the kids are looking for roundabout ways to stay in the camp and participate.
“They’ve wanted to become junior counselors,” he said, laughing. “It’s kind of a fun dilemma to be in.”
The 2011 summer schedule is four one-week sessions at the North 40 fields: June 20-24, June 27-July 1, July 5-8 and July 11-15. There will be full-day camps, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., or half-day camps from 9 a.m. to noon.
For more information on how to register, visit: http://www.parkcityplaymagazine.org/webreg/Activities/ActivitiesDetails.asp?ProcessWait=N&aid=232 .