Fasterskier.com checked out San Diego, US cross country team’s choice for a low altitude and high intensity camp in September (September 18 – October 1). We also talked to head Coach Trond Nystad about this.
San Diego
Men’s Journal Magazine (www.mensjournal.com ) named in their 2004 June issue San Diego, California (right next to the Mexican border) their #1 “Best Big City” in USA. They used 37 variables, like cost of living, air and water quality to amount of wilderness nearby to determine the winners. Endless sunshine and an average daily temperature of 70.5 degrees F was a big part of why San Diego landed atop of the list. Quote from the article: “sunglasses, flip-flops, and surf trunks are the uniform here”. I’ll skip other factors important to the journal’s male readers and stop the advertising there…
 miles from the beach and $1 million for a three bedroom with beach views. They didn’t mention the freeway traffic that can come to a stand-still any time of day seven days a week either.</p></div><div class=)
Lots of training options and things to do
A recent family vacation to San Diego gave me a chance to check out the site of US Ski Team’s September low altitude dryland camp site. OK, I didn’t go up in the hills and nearby parks where they might do their interval training, instead I went to the beach – every day.
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<BR><font size=1 face=verdana></font></center><BR></p><p>The skiers will for sure enjoy the beaches. Miles after miles of sand beaches with good surf waves! The most daring members of the team might try real surfing, where you stand on the board. The easy way out will be “boggy board” surfing where you lay on a smaller, hard shell Styrofoam board. That’s what I usually do. It all sounds easy but waves are not to be underestimated. The wave-power is huge even when the waves are only a couple feet tall. You need to learn how to go “under” the waves on the way out and roll and move with the waves when you get a wipeout on the way in.<br />
Other recreational or alternative training and activity options includes beach running, board walk roller blading/skating and kayaking.</p><p><BR><center><img decoding=)
Head Coach Trond Nystad comments on the San Diego camp
Trond, can you give our readers some information about your upcoming San Diego, California training camp. What’s the purpose, what type of training are you planning, where will you be staying and will you be doing any alternative training?
– The main idea with this San Diego camp is to go there and be able to train hard intensity at sea level. We will have quite a bit of altitude training early on in the year, so going to sea level to train hard becomes a priority after we have completed the altitude training. We are at high altitude (1800-2000 meters) in Park City from mid July to the beginning of August, and then we go to medium altitude (1500 m) in New Zealand. We are then training light in Park city following New Zealand before we head for San Diego. We do four weeks of normal training in Park City after we are done with the San Diego camp.
. All other training will only be to get ready for the next interval session. We will probably do some alternative training like kayaking or beach running, but this is only for recovery purposes.</p></div></div></div><div class=)
