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Dad and former Southern Utah University quarterback Brad Sorenson coaches kids during a training session on Friday, July 11, 2025, at Grove Park in Vineyard.

Jacob Nielson, Daily Herald

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A dad coaches kids during a training session on Friday, July 11, 2025, at Grove Park in Vineyard.

Jacob Nielson, Daily Herald

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A dad coaches kids during a training session on Friday, July 11, 2025, at Grove Park in Vineyard.

Jacob Nielson, Daily Herald

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A summer training camp in Vineyard started with one boy and his father, grew by a couple of kids, then spread to a few more.

By July, it has become a neighborhood event with upwards of 100 boys and girls participating in speed and agility drills facilitated by volunteer dads three mornings a week at Vineyard Grove Park.

The camp is a grassroots activity in its purest form — no cost, no website, not even an official title. It’s just an effort from a group of dads to turn their elementary-aged children into better athletes.

“You see kids from five-years-old, all the way up to early teen years showing up here, and it’s just an awesome, diverse group of kids,” parent Justin Hale said. “But what they all have in common is they’re all Vineyard kids. Many of them know each other, but a lot of them don’t, and they’re building friendships and getting to know each other and competing with each other.”

The camp was started by Dan Spirgen, who trained his son by himself until he teamed up with former BYU football player Parker Dawe earlier this summer to train his boys also.

Spirgen found that his son worked harder when competing with other kids, and that prompted him to invite other aspiring athletes to join. The training grew through text chains, with parents throughout the community telling their friends and neighbors about this new speed and agility camp at Grove Park.

The demographics of Vineyard — a young, rapidly-growing but still small community — made it an ideal place for the camp.

“It’s a perfect example of how Vineyard works,” Hale said. “It feels like a small community of people, and everybody knows each other, and everybody wants to help each other.”

Spirgen, a former BYU rugby player, knows over 20 men in the community who played Division I football, and said seven or eight of them even played in the NFL.

Many of them have kids in the first to sixth-grade range, and are willing bring their kids and share their time and experience with the community.

“The group of dads that I work closely with, the six to eight guys, they all have competed at an elite level and they understand that the rising tide lifts all boats,” Spirgen said. “If everybody’s getting better, it’s going to make you better.”

Starting at 7:30 a.m., the camp moves like a well-oiled machine, with kids lining up uniformly for different drills and not hesitating to follow directions from the dads in charge, some of whom are dressed in work clothes ready to leave for their 9-to-5 job.

Though many drills resemble non-contact football drills since some of the dads have football backgrounds, the training itself is not sport-specific. It includes running, throwing, jumping or ladder drills.

“I’m not trying to create a basketball player or football player or anything,” Spirgen said. “I’m trying to create an athlete. I think kids this age are specializing too soon in sports. People get caught up and say, ‘Oh, they have to play baseball year-around or football year-around, or they’re going to be behind by the time they get to high school.’ I don’t subscribe to that.”

Spirgen also has a greater vision. In the coming years, many of these young Vineyard kids will be high schoolers at Mountain View, a school Spirgen admits is not currently a sports powerhouse. He wants that to change.

“There was never a question, like, ‘Hey, we don’t want to train these other kids, because they’re going to be our kids’ competition later on,'” Spirgen said. “That’s never been a thought or a concern. Everybody’s getting better together, and then hopefully bring home a state championship from Mountain View in seven to eight years.”

But the most immediate impact of the camp — and the most rewarding — is the father and community bonding.

“Everybody’s just investing in their kids, spending time with their kids, instead of dropping them off somewhere and coming back later,” Spirgen said.

It’s a shared sentiment for parents like Hale, who brings his four kids to every training.

“That is probably the most important part of this, is that, yes, it helps kids become more athletic, but it builds a community,” Hale said. “It helps kids become better people by being together and doing a meaningful activity. … These dads are just volunteering their time, and what I found cool is you see the kids thanking them. You see them engaging. You see the dads light up when they see the kids getting better. It just builds this great community.”