Find out more about our upcoming Sports and Camps!
We saw many old friendly faces and some new enthusiastic faces ready to tackle an exhilarating weekend full of sports and activities. Thank you to our volunteers Charlize, Ryan, and Mali for always bringing a great vibe to the camp and supporting our staff and athletes.
The camp started off with some ice breaker games on the field, while everyone rolled in ready for a good weekend. After a filling dinner, everyone came together to do some fitness challenges, games, and some competitive futsal. Friday night ended in a coaches/parent vs. athletes’ game of futsal. The athletes worked hard to score, but the coaches/parents team pulled through to win by just one goal!!! Everyone headed to bed exhausted but excited for the weekend.
Bright and early Saturday morning, athletes had the opportunity to glide through Narrabeen Lake on kayaks. After a well-deserved breakfast, the athletes had a choice of either a swimming session or a football session. The swimmers worked hard doing freestyle speed drills, fun backstroke drills and finished off with a spectacular relay. Meanwhile, the football stars focused on some technical drills, to prepare them for game day on Sunday.
The streams combined for a big water polo session, starting with an aerobic warmup, then a rotation of drills and finally, athletes had to put their teamwork skills to the test in a competitive game. After drying up and having lunch, athletes had a choice of football/touch footy or basketball. Out on the oval, athletes played a mix of soccer, touch football and Oz-tag. These athletes showed promising potential in all games and looked more than ready to face the North Sydney Bears and St. Ives Football Club. To cool down, the athletes attended a very relaxing yoga session, which was just what they needed to continue into the afternoon. Half of the athletes chose to put their skills to the test in an invitational touch footy game against the North Sydney Bears All Abilities Team, with plenty of laughs and good sportsmanship. The other half channeled their inner Robin Hood/Katniss Everdeen and learnt or refreshed some of their skills in archery.
To wind down before dinner, CPA’s star athletes’ alumni Mali Lovell and current Maximos Papaconstantinou shared their experiences from starting at CPA camps to competing at national and international levels. These two inspired everyone in the room and showed that dreams can come true with hard work, determination and good sportsmanship.
After dinner, we arrived at the sports hall, waiting for the much-loved and anticipated games night. As athletes rolled in dressed to represent their favorite sporting teams or sporting hero, they were excited to compete in some thrilling minute-to-win-it challenges. First, the 5 teams had to choose 2 of their best nose pickers within each group. As you can imagine, a lot of the athletes were hesitant to get up, but some brave diggers got up and dug deep to get their team some points. Other competitors had to endure a toilet paper challenge, an egg and spoon race, a drop and catch game, a balancing cup challenge, and a blowing the ball challenge. Finally, after the last throwing competition with some questionable judging, uncanny tactics and most importantly, smiling faces, the parents persevered in winning the Team Challenges – walking away victorious and gaining bragging rights until the next camp.
After two jam-packed days, finally came Sunday’s much anticipated rematch against St Ives Football Club. The athletes warmed up and got ready to get into game mode. The CPA All Stars were split up into green and yellow teams, and the game was divided into 4 quarters. When the game started, the St. Ives team came out strong, scoring a couple of points in the 1st quarter. While the first team was working hard, the other team was on the sidelines chanting and supporting the other team. In the 2nd quarter, the CPA team bounced back, scoring a few more points, which put them in a good position on the scoreboard. In the 3rd quarter, St. Ives scored some more points, but CPA persevered and put them in the lead. In the final quarter, CPA pulled through, winning the game. A great show of sportsmanship from all athletes present, as everyone shook hands and congratulated each other – celebrating the spirit of sport.
To round out an amazing weekend, the Sports Awards were presented. A big congratulations to our Coaches Award winner: Dylan Molloy, and to our Best & Fairest Award winner: Charlotte Gibson. Both were very well-deserved recipients of recognition for their individual development and growth since attending CPA Sports Camps.
Thank you to all our athletes for showing up to the camp and giving every activity your all. These camps are amazing opportunities to engage in your favourite sports but, most importantly, grow alongside other like-minded athletes and build a community like no other.
This community: every participant, their support network, parents, siblings, family, carers, coaches – bring joy, passion, and determination like no other. Within this community is a place that encourages participation and fosters inclusion for all, where we can focus on refining fundamental sporting skills, create a passion for physical movement and fitness, develop friendships and teamwork, and resilience (this last one is hard to do, considering how resilient each athlete already is).
It was a full weekend of football, touch football, swimming, water polo, oz-tag, kayaking, archery, basketball, futsal, bike riding, ninja warrior, team challenges, hanging with mates, making new friends, learning new skills and refining old – just to name a few. We hope these experiences have left all our athletes feeling pleasantly exhausted, yearning to try new things and aiming to increase or develop their skills whenever the opportunity arises – even in the ‘off-season’!
Find out more about our upcoming Sports and Camps!
