Fanelli eyes return to Rangers
Posted Jun 23, 2011 05:41:25 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Ben Fanelli is spending his summer on the ice and that is a very positive sign as he continues on the road to recovery.
Like many junior hockey players, Ben Fanelli is spending his summer on the ice.
But it’s not just skating and drills for the 18-year old defenceman, who has not played an OHL game in almost two years. Fanelli is competing weekly in a summer league in Brampton.
“It’s a mix of Junior ‘A’ guys and OHL guys so it’s a pretty high level, high skill league,” Fanelli shares. “But it’s not a full game pace. I’d guess it’s about 85 per cent.”
That includes 85 per cent of the usual body contact as well, something Fanelli was cleared for in practices with the Rangers several months ago, but something he has not absorbed in an OHL game since suffering a devastating head injury on October 30th, 2009.
Fanelli says the summer league intensity does pick up from time to time, leading to play that’s a little more aggressive and physical. He calls that the “perfect level of contact” for him to get back into it.
“It” would be an OHL game, something Fanelli steadfastly maintains as a personal goal.
“Yeah, 100 per cent. Nothing has changed in that area,” Fanelli readily admits, when asked if returning as a regular in the Kitchener Rangers line-up remains his ultimate goal.
Even while training for a triathlon — a 750 metre swim, followed by a 30 kilometre bike ride and a 7.5 kilometre run that he finished in just over two hours and four minutes earlier this month — Fanelli had his sights set firmly on hockey.
“I’m trying to keep up my size for hockey and if I wanted to do a better time (in the triathlon) I think I would have had to just train for a triathlon,” Fanelli speculates with the wisdom of someone who has trained long and hard. “That’s not what my goal is here. My goal is to maintain my size, get bigger even, for hockey.”
When he finished with that triathlon at Milton’s Kelso Conservation Area on June 5th, Fanelli immediately refreshed himself by wading into the lake. Even though he admits the swim was the toughest part of the event for him, it was such a hot day that the post-triathlon dip seemed almost necessary. By the next day, Fanelli says he felt no ill effects from the gruelling competition.
That’s a testament to not only Fanelli’s training but to his courage. For a time, after that devastating body check that fractured his skull, doctors weren’t sure Fanelli would live. Today, he’s talking about training camp with the Kitchener Rangers, which opens in August.
He’ll be ready. But what about beyond that? What will it take for Fanelli to earn that place on the Rangers roster once again?
“I’m not even sure right now. I’m doing the work out part of it and my agent is taking care of the rest,” Fanelli offers. “I just know that there’s still some work to be done.”
Another doctor’s appointment looms this summer but, with an admission characteristic of a teen, Fanelli says he’s not sure if it’s just another check-up or if that appointment represents the next hurdle to clear on his way back to the Ontario Hockey League.
The important thing for him, right now, is that he’s in peak physical condition and has felt no ill effects from the punishment to which he has subjected his body over the past number of months.
The Rangers open the 2011-2012 campaign on home ice on Friday, September 23rd. Will Fanelli join his teammates in being introduced as a member of that starting line-up?
He sure hopes so.
