GRASS ROOTS x REPRESENT

We had this image come through today from a young jet out of Western Australia, Lloyd Hopkins. He plays for the Western Australian U12′s that are competing in the Nationals on the Gold Coast in a few weeks. Lloyd plays with a bunch of friends who’s fathers all played together back in the day. Great to see a talented crop of juniors coming through and loving the game. All the best to Lloyd and his team-mates at the Nationals.

Are you a frothing junior who has a photo of you and your Gryphon? Wanna represent like Lloyd? If so, email your image through to admin@gryphonhockey.com and we’ll look to throw it up in our “Grass Roots” section. We’re looking for images of crew from the world over so send them on in with a small bio about yourself!

HELLO x SMITS x JUNIOR AMBASSADOR

Hi,

 With my team (JD1) we won both the autumn championship 2009 without any loss and in the spring competition we won all 10 games, so we won the championship again and we played the Dutch national championship. Earlier this season we also qualified for the Dutch Indoor championships. Last season I was invited by JC1 (an age group higher) to play with them in the National ICC tournament. In October 2009 I became second in the Dutch National Hockey Technique tournament and I’m training to improve my techniques every day. I was also the video camera man for HC Eindhoven’s first team last season. They play in the Dutch Overgangsklasse (2nd dividion) and as a reward I was invited to play the last 5 minutes of the last game. We won 5-3 and I scored the 5th goal.

 I’m playing with a Gryphon stick for 2 seasons now, and the stick that I’m currently playing with, is the Taboo Junior. I like the stick very much. I saw that one of my favourite players at Oranje Zwart, Rob Hammond is also playing with Gryphon. I met him a few weeks ago and he told me he recognized me from the video he placed on Gryphon-life.com on the 15th of April. He mentioned my goal to his friends in the entry called 3D GOAL x VIDEO x ORANJE ZWART YOUTH; “one of the youth teams recently played and a young kid scored the most amazing goal. This kid, Lennart Smits, is like 12 or 13 years old, and what he did I would challenge most seniors to do!” (here is a link to that page). This video also was shown on Holland’s most visited hockey website www.hockey.nl as Video of the Day. It was viewed more than 3000 times. There are a few more video’s of me on YouTube that you can find by searching for Lennart Smits.

I’m happy to have become part of the Gryphon Boys of OZ and a JUNIOR AMBASSADOR in the Gryphon-Life community! And I’m looking forward to the upcoming season. Hopefully I can write a lot about the great success of JC1 here! Our first practice games are planned on the 15th an the 22nd of July. Bye for now, cheers,

Lennart

GRASSROOTS x WA COUNTRY CHAMPS

This past weekend was marked by the first round of the Australian Hockey League [AHL] for Men. International players a plenty. But what else is happening around the hockey world?

In Perth, the Womens Western Australian Country Championships were played. Called country week, in the month of June three week long competitions are held for a massive amount of hockey clubs that are not based in the city. One competition each for men, women and juniors. Perth happens to be the most isolated capital city in the world, and the state of Western Australia is huge. Perth is closer to East Timor and Indonesia than it is Melbourne, Sydney or Brisbane. WA itself is about 5 times the size of Texas or 20 times the size of England.

The towns are sparsely distributed. These country weeks are  big deal. Huge amounts of teams and players influx into Perth and play great hockey at the home of Hockey in Australia, where the Hockeyroos and Kookaburras play and train.  It’s a great experience.

With this in mind, below is the an article in the Kalgoorlie (about 600km east of Perth) newspaper today about the tournament. Their team came second in division one, but looking at the coverage that the paper gives, it’s not taken lightly. The photo features Ashlee Lavery running deep in attack in the final with her Gryphon Taboo Magnum.

These events are supported heavily by a Gryphon Premium retailer in F-H-E.com as a major sponsor.

Up next are the Junior Country championships held at the same arena.

For more photos of the Mens and Womens finals days of these events at grassroots hockey, DC’s gallery has the latest.