Hockey Day in GA a continued success

Times Reporter

 

The third annual Hockey Day in GA was just as successful as it has been in the past. This year there were 138 kids who registered, which is almost on par with the previous year for the event, which is held in Gleichen.

“The kids had a blast, even the ones that were playing outside, we had the older kids outside first, I think it was more the spectators that were cold because the kids didn’t seem too complain to much at all,” said organizer Cara Sheppard. 

“They just had a blast, they just skated their little hearts out, got all sweated up and had a really good time. Last year we lost the ice due to warm weather and this year we just about lost toes. It was cold, but by the afternoon it had warmed up significantly.”

Because of the issues last year with the ice melting and many of the little kids falling all the time and getting soaking wet, organizers decided to just have the little guys outside once, just in case the weather did go bad, and they played inside for the other two games.  

“The dressing room issue still seems to be a dressing room issue, so we’re going to talk about it at a meeting and see what we can do about dressing room issues, see what we can do next year,” said Sheppard. 

The issue was, and still is a lack of space. This year some people brought their stock trucks, and the plan was to cover them with plastic and make them a sort of make-shift dressing room. The cold prevented it from happening, but Sheppard feels if the weather had played along it would have worked out. 

An extra rink was added outside this year and Sheppard said she doesn’t think they will add another. 

“If need be we could divide it (the bigger outdoor rink) in half so that would give us four outside and two inside. But I think if we got to the point where we have lots and lots of numbers we’d make it a two-day event instead of one. I don’t think we’ll ever put any more rinks in, I think three is probably our capacity,” said Sheppard. 

Wheatland County Councillor Ken Sauve was in attendance along with Gord Hira, chair of the Hockey Alberta pond hockey committee, George Kallay and Graham Parsons who are both zone directors for Hockey Alberta, Mike Oleson, Senior Manager, Systems and Administration for Hockey Alberta, and Howard Wurban, who sits on the committee with Sheppard.