Greetings Parents and Guardians!
On behalf of Fredericksburg Youth Roller Hockey (FYRH), please let me start out by saying thank you for deciding to spend your valuable time with us! We’re extremely excited to have the opportunity to share our love of inline hockey with you and the young players in your life. It’s a responsibility that we take very seriously and we will do our best to be good stewards of the game so that everyone has a positive experience this season.
My name is Dan Betzing and I am director of the newly formed youth roller hockey league. A few of you have probably seen me around the rink at the Learn to Play clinics or at the Stick n Shoot meet ups we have during the weekdays. I’d like to take a few minutes to tell you who Fredericksburg Roller Hockey is and what you can expect from the upcoming season.
Fredericksburg Youth Roller Hockey is a registered 501(c)3 non-profit, non-partisan enterprise whose mission is to build strong, productive, and successful young boys and girls through the sport of inline hockey. We’re made up of a core of volunteers who live to play the game and love sharing it with others. We’ve partnered with Fredericksburg Parks and Recreation to give the community of Fredericksburg a local place to learn and play the game of hockey in a safe and encouraging environment.
This season, we’ve structured things in more of a non-traditional format so that we can best address the current needs of our young player base. In the early stages of a player’s career, skill development is critical to player growth, future success and enjoyment. This is best achieved through structured practices, where every player gets multiple opportunities to touch the puck and work on their skills. USA Hockey recommends a 3:1 practice to game ratio to best develop a solid foundation of hockey skills to build future success upon.
We understand that committing to multiple days a week for practices and games can be extremely challenging. In an attempt to mitigate multiple travel days, the first 25 minutes of each hour of playtime will be allotted to team practice. This will allow our coaches to assist their players in developing skills that will help them be successful. Due to the small team sizes, the opportunity for more personalized instruction increases greatly. Following the practice, the game will commence.
The game will consist of two 15-minute halves, with 2 minute intermissions between. The season will consist of 8 regular games and 2 play-off games, culminating in the league championship. Each participant will receive a medal and first place will receive trophies. Please do your best to be punctual so that we can make sure each child gets their full hour of hockey. Schedules, standings, stats and pertinent league information can all be found in the FYRH Team App. Schedule adjustments and cancellations due to weather will be announced via the News Feed on the Team App website and through our Facebook/ Instagram page. Links to all of these locations are provided on our website: https://fyrhl.org/. Please ensure you enable notifications on TeamApp so that you don’t miss an announcement.
Your hockey player’s safety is a top priority to us. All of the adult coaches who will provide instruction to your players have had a background check conducted through the Amateur Athletic Union. Those records remain on file with FYRH and will be renewed as required. We want to make sure that your kids have positive influences on the rink that will contribute to their growth, both as players and as people.
Lastly, I would like to touch on spectator conduct for a moment. Hockey parents are one of the most passionate groups of sports fans in existence. Please keep in mind that this is youth roller hockey and that the members of FYRH are all unpaid volunteers. We’re here to have fun! Conduct in the stands that’s not supportive to that is unacceptable and cannot be tolerated. Also, please note that the experience level of the players in FYRH varies widely. There are kids who have been playing for years and kids who have never played before all on the same rink. Your child’s level of play is not a reflection of you or them. However, being an athlete that is coachable, respectful, and resilient with their efforts is. We will make every attempt to foster that environment and we just ask that you do the same. If there is an incident (either on ice or in the stands) that requires league disciplinary attention, both you and your player will be asked to leave until the FYRH disciplinary board can determine the course of action that is best for everyone. Thank you in advance for your compliance.
Again, we are all extremely excited to have you take part in this journey of creating a thriving hockey community with us. FYRH is a constantly evolving entity and we are always looking to get better. If you have ideas on how we can improve, things you would like to see, or are interested in getting on board as a volunteer, please let us know! Your input and opinions are greatly valuable and will be a critical piece in making sure that Fredericksburg Youth Roller Hockey provides a great experience for everyone. We’ll see you at the rink!
Best Wishes,
Dan Betzing
Youth League Director