Camp Common Ground 2000

This was the first year that David Kano was a councilor at this great summer camp for all ages. For more information on the camp, see http://www.cgcvt.org/

David led a multi-session program called "Invent-A-Coopsport". Two sports were invented, one for each of the weeks of camp.

The first "Invent-A-CoopSport" was "CoopBockerball". We invited campers of all ages to participate in any of 5 - 2 hour sessions held throughout the week. However, when we really got serious about inventing, it only took one of the sessions to work out the basic rules.

The new sport is a combination of basket ball and soccer. We played with soccer balls on some old clay tennis courts. The basket ball hoop was setup about 50 feet from a passive radar (Speed-Check Personal Sports Radar) that was used to detect the speed that the ball was shot through the "goal". Any shot that got close enough to the radar to be detected scored.

We played 5 minute games.

Half the team lined up about 10 feet in front of the basket and the other half lined up off to the side of the basket, facing the radar. The people at the front of each of the lines participated in the next play.

The ball was handed to the person facing the hoop so s/he could attempt a free throw. Immediately after the shot attempt, the person facing the radar dribbled the ball soccer style up to a marker cone that was about 20 feet from the radar and took a shot.

The speed in miles per hour that the ball registered was the score for that play. If the free throw went through the hoop, the speed registered was doubled to calculate the score.

At first we played with one ball at a time, so returning the ball to the next person to make a free throw needed to be done as quickly as possible. Then on the last day we experimented with playing with 2 balls. This seemed to speed up the game, involved more people at one time and of course, increased our scores!

I don't know if this new sport will ever be played again, but we had fun inventing it and giving it a try! Once we got going everyone wanted to play again and again to see if we could better our best score. If you give it a try, be sure to let me know how it goes and what improvements you made to the rules, if any.

By the way, the radar device we used has other fun uses too and is fairly affordable (around $130). I am certain that it will be useful in future CoopSports and it is used by people to help improve their skills in many sports. It is available from a number of websites. Search for "Speed Check Personal Radar" or just try Sports N More. I have never baught anything from them, but they seem to have the goods!

Cooperative Sports
Lebanon, NH, USA
(603) 298-9882
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