Kaeding, Gallery happy campers
Lars Headington and Zach Smith - The Daily Iowan
Issue date: 7/1/08 Section: Sports
Former Hawkeyes Nate Kaeding and Robert Gallery are anything but foreign to "camp."
As they enter their fifth seasons in the NFL - Kaeding as a kicker for the San Diego Chargers and Gallery as an offensive lineman for the Oakland Raiders - the two have gone through their fair share of minicamps and training camps every summer.
This week however, Kaeding and Gallery are reporting to a Coralville camp without the flashing lights and beaming cameras that tend to accompany the NFL variety
Serving as co-hosts, the two ex-Hawks have teamed up to put on the annual "Training with Kaeding and Gallery" youth camp. Now in its third year, the camp does more than teach football to its 7- to 14-year-old participants.
"I'm a big advocate of getting kids involved in as many sports as you can," Kaeding said. "We've got football, basketball, soccer, track and field - a bunch of different things. It's important for kids at this age to get out, get involved, get with teammates and friends and just get out and have fun."
In addition to running campers through drills in football, soccer and basketball, the camp teaches young people valuable life lessons.
"We have Character Counts involved," Kaeding said. "We have two 30-minute teaching sessions each day that teach them the importance of respect, responsibility and trustworthiness and try to incorporate that into a sports atmosphere.
"It's fun for the kids, and it's fun for the coaches."
Despite attendance being down from previous years, the roughly 300 campers are burning up the field and the court at Northwest Junior High School in Coralville. While competition is encouraged, Gallery acknowledges the significant role played by the love of the game.
"I think it's important, because I think sometimes kids lose track or their parents are pushing them so much they forget why they're doing sports," he said. "We're out here to have fun.
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