Ben’s Ford Christian School athletes are learning the proper fundamentals of being a better athlete in the Parisi Speed School Speed and Agility Camp at Ben’s Ford.

The camp, which is led by Parisi Speed School program director Jay Fournet and assistant program director Nate Korkut, helps show the 50 participants the proper mechanics of changing direction, acceleration and top speed. The clinic ends around the end of the month.

“We’re teaching proper arm action, proper acceleration and deceleration. Basically the proper running techniques,” Fournet said.

Fournet and Korkut take the students through three phases of warming up, the stationary, movement and muscle activation phases.

“We’re training these kids how pro athletes get trained, but on a youth level,” Fournet said.

Fournet, who works at Parisi in Slidell’s Cross Gates Family Fitness, was one of two Parisi program directors out of 80 facilities selected attend the International Health, Recreation and Sports Association Convention in Las Vegas.

He said the athletes are improving.

“They’re getting better at the fundamental stuff,” Fournet said. “Their arm action is improving. They’re more technically sound and coordinated. Their attention to detail has definitely improved.”

Something else the coaches are talking to the students about is hard work and being leaders.

“You’ve got to have heart. If you don’t have heart you’re not going anywhere. You also need to have desire. If you have desire, a belief and commitment, you can do anything,” Fournet said.

Some of those involved are already seeing the results.

Freshman Kaylin Stewart, who is a running back and safety on the Eagles’ football team, said it’s a good clinic.

“They teach us how to be leaders,” Stewart said. “It teaches us a method of how to stay on our toes, change direction, how to accelerate and reaccelerate.”

Stewart feels the camp will be a big help to the Eagles and is seeing good results.

“I see a lot of speed on this team now,” Stewart said. “Everybody’s getting faster. The other night, they had a baseball game. The (player) on our team was slow at first, but you could see a big improvement in his speed since then.”

Eagles’ football coach and assistant baseball coach Tommy Pittman said he thinks all of them will see improvement.

“What’s been amazing to me is a lot of these kids are in great shape, but they were sore at first because they were working muscles they haven’t worked,” Pittman said. “I see it in baseball. We’ve had some bang-bang plays with stealing second or plays at home. We have a chant when we steal, ‘speed school.’ It might be a half a step, but that can make a big difference. We’re excited about having these two guys from Slidell.”