Our latest UDP Group (10) launched this past weekend in Vienna, Austria. UDP umpire Tim Meissner shares with us a report on the weekend, giving us an inside look at the UDP.
UDP Launch Weekend – Group 10 by Tim Meissner
Bleep bleep bleep start of level 10… oh sorry my fault! I’ll try it again. Launch of UDP group 10, ok that’s right. At the end of April UDP group 10 had its launch weekend in Vienna.
It all started on Friday evening with a short introduction from our mentors Carol and Michiel and a round of human bingo.
For all those who don’t know what human bingo is, this is for you: One week before we were requested to send a couple of facts about ourselves to Carol and Michiel. We all got a list with two facts about each one of us. We had to fill out our lists by asking questions during the whole weekend. After that and in preperation for the next day we all went to bed.
The next day started, as i mentioned in the beginning of this report, with a bleep test. But donÂŽt worry, we all passed đ
Refueling over breakfast, we were all set for the first presentation: setting the ground rules, which was joined by EHF Education Committee, Umpires Working Group Chair, Paul Box-Grainger.
For the UDP umpires, it is important to know how UDP works and what the program entails. It is also important to know each other so we all got a big sheet of paper and 20 minutes to fill in this sheet with details about ourselves and prepare for the five-minute presentation.
During the second day we had great opportunities to discuss the issue of communication and watched a video about body language. Saturday afternoon we went to a match in Austria’s first division. The umpires were from our UDP family, Michael Eilmer ( UDP Group 3) and Robert Papalecca (UDP Group 9). They both were so kind to join us afer their match for a short debrief.
Day three focused on the psychology of umpiring, reviewing some hockey clips and charting our personal development plan and our next steps. It was a great start to what we all hope will be a great journey to become the best umpires we can be. See you around Europe!
The European Hockey Federation would like to thank Thomas Eilmer and Austrian Hockey for hosting the latest UDP group.
Source: EHF/Tim Meissner