More than a

month before the official start of practice for the 2003 high school football

season, nearly two dozen young men came out under the hot sun at Starr's

Mill High School last weekend to study their specialty kicking.

It's still

overlooked on many teams, but you can't say the name of the game without

"foot" and you can't even start a game without having a player

put his or her foot into the ball. More and more players are recognizing

the importance of focusing on the kicking game, and now there are camps

available strictly for punters and placekickers.

One such example

is last weekend's Specialty Sports Training camp, featuring instruction

from two renowned kickers: Greg Davis, a 12-year NFL veteran who has coached

kickers for nearly two decades, and Mark Fleetwood, a former All-American

kicker and now a college coach.

Davis led the

nation in punting his senior year at The Citadel and was drafted by the

Tampa Bay Buccaneers as a punter. He went on to score nearly 1,000 points

as a placekicker for several NFL teams, including the Atlanta Falcons,

Arizona Cardinals and Oakland Raiders. He was the first kicker in NFL

history to connect on two field goals of 50 or more yards in the same

game.

Fleetwood played

at the University of South Carolina as a punter and placekicker and earned

All-America honors in 1982. He was drafted by the Dallas Cowboys and spent

a brief time in the pros, moving on to the coaching ranks, where he is

now the offensive coordinator at Troy State University.

What brought

these men together was the fact that they both played for Lakeside High

School in DeKalb County. Chip DeBartola, another former Lakeside player

and now a parent of a Starr's Mill player, began Specialty Sports Training

and brought the camp to Fayette County.

While several

players came from the immediate area four from Starr's Mill, three from

East Coweta, one each from Fayette County and Sandy Creek, and three from

Woodward others came from Tucker and McEachern high schools and even as

far away as Rome and Dawsonville. A couple of high school coaches also

attended the camp as observers.

The three-day

session covered such areas as stretching and flexibility training, strength

training, form and technique, mental toughness and preparation, the physics

of kicking and punting, field placement management, and such specialties

as onside kicks and pooch punts. There were also training sessions for

long snappers. Field sessions were augmented with classroom work and video

analysis of each player.

The final session

was Sunday and featured various competitions, such as long-distance field

goals and high time on punts and kickoffs. The weekend was a great success,

DeBartola said, with perfect weather. He plans to bring the camp back

every year to Fayette County and looks for more participation in the future.

For more information,

visit www.specialtysportstraining.com or call 678-817-7405.

Back

to the Top of the Page Back

to the Sports Home Page