After a trip that encompassed 11 days to Hungary that included training, sight seeing, as well as large doses of heat, humidity and mosquitoes, the Coronado High School Boys Water Polo Team has returned home.

The excursion was the second half of a youth student exchange program which brought members of the 18 and under BVSC (Budapest Railway Workers’ Sports Club) water polo team to Coronado from July 8-18. The CHS team then went on the road to Budapest and points east from July 19-31.

According to CHS Head Coach Randy Burgess, the fact that the Coronado players stayed in family homes meant each Islander athlete had a unique experience. "You can stay in a hotel and never get the flavor of the city. Some of our kids stayed in what I would describe as projects, while some stayed in nice places or apartments. Some of the kids walked to practice each day, some took the bus, some took a train and some were driven.

Each kid had his very own experience within the trip. Some of their kids spoke very solid English and were speaking in full sentences. Some didn’t speak any English at all. I tried to get out kids to learn five basic words, such as ‘please,’ ‘thank you,’ ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ and ‘good’ or ‘ok.’ Just real basic stuff."

BVSC is a club which encompasses soccer, track and many different sports. However, the club has several hundred athletes involved in water polo alone. Although the sport of water polo was founded in Great Britain, it is the national sport of Hungary, hence the large enrollment in the water polo program of BVSC.

A team from Sacramento was also touring Hungary at the same time and the two teams met in a scrimmage twice. Humorously, teams from cities located 815 miles apart traveled 6,282 miles to play each other. But, that wasn’t the point of the trip.

While in Budapest, the team took an hour-long boat trip down the Danube River, experiencing the culture of a country that has changed borders and names for thousands of years.

Over one weekend, the team went to Lake Balaton, which is the largest fresh water lake in the world. While there they played beach water polo, which Burgess said was a throw back to the origins of the game. "It was a different version of the game, with a total of five players, four field players and a goalie. It brought out different skills in our players. People sat on the dock and watched the game. The kids had to jump off of a will about 10 feet high to get into the lake. It was great to get out of the city and into the country."

Assisting Burgess on the trip was former Olympian Genai Kerr (CHS ’95), who flew to Hungary after giving a clinic at Bucknell University (Lewisburg, PA). "Genai did a wonderful job. He was the good cop. Last week I had to take a back seat (CIF coaches are required to have a ‘dead period’ when they cannot coach kids in their sport, even while they are abroad) and couldn’t coach. The kids appreciated him as a person and it was a ton of fun having him there."

Burgess assessed the team’s development, directly attributable to the trip. "Water polo-wise, the style in which the game is played and the application of the rules is very different. The adjustments the kids made to the rules were great. It is much more physical there. The benefit was that it brought our team a lot closer together. We probably could have been training harder in Coronado, but this was a different type of training."

The team survived the weather conditions and remained healthy. "We were pretty well stocked with medications. It was very warm, but we made sure the kids drank plenty of fluids. The kids really took care of themselves. They had great behavior on the trip, which included their attitude in the training and in the games. They traveled well and the maturity of the kids in terms of traveling and being in another country was great. The heat and humidity were very bad; almost unbearable at times. And the mosquitoes were devastating."

The Islanders return 14 of the 20 players who played at the varsity level last year. One of the highlights of the coming season will be the America’s Finest City Tournament, which will be held Sept. 23-24. The tournament will include Coronado’s first regular season home game at their new facility. The tournament will expand to 32 teams this year. The competition will be held at four locations, including the new Coronado Community Center, the La Jolla Coggan Family Pool, Rancho Bernardo High School and Miramar College. The first varsity road game will be played Saturday, Sept. 17 at Newport Harbor High School.

Not one to let grass grow under is feet, by the time you read this Burgess will be safely ensconced in San Jose, where he will be presenting a coaches’ clinic at the annual Junior Olympics competition. The Coronado Aquatics Club will be well represented on the girls’ water polo side, as they have team entries in the Under-14, Under-16, and Under-18 and will compete from Thursday through Sunday.

The clinic is one of a series that Burgess has helped present, in conjunction with Mike Lewis, Director of Sport Development for USA Water Polo. The clinics have been previously presented La Jolla, Houston, Annapolis, and Monterrey. "It’s a base-level clinic for coaches," Burgess explained. "The topics include rules, practice theory, teaching skills, how to write a practice plan, discipline, a code of conduct, and budgets. Also, the coaches have to be current in CPR and first aid. It’s a national certification process, which they have to have by January of 2006. We’re expecting a good audience of coaches, probably 75 at this clinic in San Jose."

One of the most frequently asked questions during the summer months, is "When are the athletic physicals being offered this summer." With considerable assistance from CHS Athletic Director Sandy Ferguson, Your Natterer is conversant on the subject.

Athletic physicals will be held Monday, August 15, 2005 from 6:30 to 8:30 pm at the Bank of America Building, located at 1050 B Avenue. The costs for the physicals are $15 per child; if there are two children from the same family, the physicals cost a total of $25; if there are three of more children in the same family, the physicals are $10 each. Coronado Middle School and Coronado High School students may participate.

Doctors, who provide the physicals, turn the fees over to the CHS Athletic Department, which uses the funding to supply the CHS training room. Local doctors who have given of their time for this worthy cause in the past include: Patricia Kettlehake, John Pedrotty, Laura Sagerlund, Steve Schelkun, Donald Dill, Tom Moore and David Hansen.

Athletic forms that need to be completed prior to the physical can be downloaded from www.IslanderSportsFoundation.com.