One of the chapters in “A Hero’s Journey: Beyond Little Norway and Olympia Sports Camp” involves the Four Pillars of Olympia. All four pillars; Summer camp, Outdoor education, Fall and Spring Basketball Tournaments, and Heroship, are vehicles for people to have fun, grow, and learn about themselves on their personal journey. The fall and spring basketball tournaments have a multitude of schools that fall into the category of regulars from all across Ontario. Some go every year because of the coaches having an Olympia connection, while others are told about the Olympia tournaments, decide to take their team there, and then are hooked. 

 

People like Tina D’Orsay.

 

Tina’s got her start at the Olympia tournaments was when she was a teacher/coach at Cardinal Carter Catholic High School in York region. A friend told her about the tournaments, and she decided to take her team. Her girls loved the experience, so Tina has continued to go back every year…. For 20 years… at two different schools. Now that’s a lifer.

 

Tina (R) and Colleen (L) in a picture most Olympians 

can relate to. Good friends enjoying Oxbow

A truly caring professional, Tina marvels at the impact of two nights and three days at Olympia has on her students and that is the reason for the 20-year run. The first year all the girls talked about was how much fun Olympia was, and how much closer they became as a team because of the experience. She loves that every year at tryouts the first question is if the team is going to Olympia.

 

Tina coaches the junior team, with many of the girls being in grade 9, and the tournament being in September it’s a great way to remove the nervousness and uncertainty and form a team identity. 

 

“The whole aspect of the entire team sharing a cabin, eating meals together and cleaning up afterwards creates the team atmosphere that may show up on the court but mainly it’s about the friendships they form,” Tina says,” I even have grads come back and tell me that the tone of their whole high school career was formed at Olympia. You can’t put a value on something so special.”

 

After five years at Cardinal Carter Tina moved to Burlington’s Assumption High School. New to the school and coaching junior girls’ basketball in the first weeks of September, she proposed to her new principal about taking the team to Huntsville. Credit to the principal who approved the trip. A team in Burlington could find many tournaments in the Golden Horseshoe area that wouldn’t involve a three-hour bus ride and the other expenses the school would incur at Olympia. Tina sold the principal on the value, and values, that a trip north would provide. 

 

That busing issue meant Assumption would often share the cost of the bus with another school, thus allowing the girls to meet other players. In the last few years Assumption took both their junior and senior teams. This meant that senior coach Colleen Quinlan, who Tina has coached with for years, joined the trip. It also meant that many students had an Olympia experience all four years of high school. Students who were ‘veterans,’ could play a little bit of a mentor role for the new kids. 

 

The true value of an Olympia basketball tournament is an aspect of the hero’s journey that the staff works hard to promote. If the journey is 48 hours in September or a week in July or August, the goal is the same; the sport is just a vehicle for removal of self-limiting thoughts and create a feeling of confidence that propels a student along their path to wherever it may lead. There is no Dave Talk, but the message of the Hero’s Journey is evident everywhere you look throughout the weekend. Whether it be a group doing the zip line or the quick flight, encouraging each other to accept the challenge, or the clinics that Jim Petropoulos developed and leaders like Megan Reid led. All this is much more central to life than what takes place on the court. Process over results.

 

“I love the clinics that Megan ran. She brought her players from Mohawk College and University of Guelph to help her,” Tina says, “Megan’s clinic was much more than just about skills. It was cool for my students to interact with her players who play at the next level, first during the clinic and then chatting with them in the dining hall later. My girls learned that character development is more important than skill development. The  role modelling these girls provided  is a great example for my students to pay it forward and help others on their path. It’s truly next level care.”

 

Speaking of care, Tina loves the way the staff run the tournaments and the various challenge courses around camp.

 

“The staff are so full of energy and positivity. They are genuinely interested in the students. They are just so cool to be around. We could go to local tournaments to play basketball, or we could go to the various challenge facilities in the area for team building, but Olympia offers a package deal. And an experience the students will never forget.”

 

Tina loves coming to Olympia before the team really knows each other, and the Olympia experience can get them all on the same page. And she loves that the setting is so rustic.

 

“When we first get here some of the girls are shocked as to where they will be staying because it is so different,” Tina reflects,” They’re all going to sleep in one cabin, they must share a bathroom, it’s cold at night. But they all buy in that they are part of a community and are in this together. What were complaints when we first arrive become unifying factors. One year we had 15 on our team and were offered two cabins but the girls said no and put mattresses on the floor so that they could all stay together. How priceless is it to see these young girls fending for each other? For them to look at each other and say, ‘That’s my teammate, that’s my friend.’ Friday afternoon some of them are unsure and by Sunday they don’t want to leave.”

This great reflection may be a tribute to the tournaments but Olympia's summer camps are the best too. I want to use the forum of this blog to promote registration for camp next year. Dave and the staff  need allies, and there are hundreds of us.

 

 I think 2022 will be a great year as the camp will return and flourish, but we need to be allies. Now is the time to get the word out to our circle of influence The camp website is  www.olympiasportscamp.com Check out the website. Register your kids. Get your kids to get a few friends to join them at camp. Send a note to your club teams, your school teams. Do it for the kid whose life will be changed because they got to go to Olympia Sports Camp in the summer of 2022. Help spread the vibe that after two years the best sports camp in Canada ( with the four reasons we hear at every opening) will be back and be better than ever.  

The link to the blog is TuesdayswithDave.blogspot.com

This blog is about the journey of the writing of the book A Hero's Journey: From Little Norway to Olympia Sports Camp. The blog will contain excerpts from the book and my personal thoughts on what the place and the people that make up Olympia's journey is all about. The title comes from the great book Tuesdays With Morrie, by Mitch Albom. The blog's title is recognizing Dave Grace as Camp Director, but all content is my own.