US O-Team Training Camp, 01 January 2007–12 January 2007

Contents

Attendees
Objectives
Location
Schedule
Exercises
Reports
Support
Anza-Borrego Desert O-Fest

Attendees

Accommodations in the house
January0102030405060708091011
Eric Bone××××××
Viktoria Brautigam×××××××××××
John Fredrickson×××××××××××
Vladimir Gusiatnikov×××××
Marc Lauenstein×××××××××
Ben Legg×××
Anna Shafer-Skelton××××××
Christoph Zurcher××××××
Sandra Zürcher×××××××××
Mikkel Conradi
Dan Greene
Tapio Karras
Andrejus Masalkovas
Kent Ohlund
Brad Wetmore
Rex Winterbottom

All are welcome to attend the camp. Registration is only through Attackpoint. Support is given to US O-Team members. There are no participation fees. Please register if you plan to attend, and notify Vladimir as far in advance as possible if your plans change.

Vladimir is in charge of the accommodation and the logistics. Sandra and Marc are in charge of the training. E-mail camp2007 at us-o-team.us.orienteering dot org to reach all participants.

Objectives

Emphasis is on physical training, with runs twice daily. The goal is to introduce, in a friendly company and a supportive environment, exercise levels that the athlete will thereon sustain on her own through the base phase of the training season. It is also hoped that the athlete engages in a meaningful build-up of running volume through at least the month of December, 2006, so that the exposure to exercise intensity at the camp is not abrupt.

Several technical training sessions will be organized on the weekend of 05 January 2007–07 January 2007, and possibly through the weeks. However, these sessions are not the main focus of the camp.

Location and Facilities

Camp quarters
Public transit
Trail loop
Track
Orienteering venues

Aptos is a small beach resort town 15 km east of Santa Cruz. The latter is home to University of California—Santa Cruz, with about 15,000 students. The water in Pacific Ocean is quite cold even in the summer, but running on the sand is possible. There are food and convenience stores, restaurants, banks, and movie theaters less than 2 km away. Much more entertainment is available in Santa Cruz. Other Bay Area sights are nearby. San Francisco is 1 hour 40 minutes away by car, 2 hours 40 by public transit.

Camp quarters: We have reserved a rental house for the duration of the camp. The larger unit (three bedrooms) is ours for the whole 11 nights. There are beds with linen, but bring your sleeping bag just in case. There are full cooking facilities. Everyone is responsible for her/his own food, but certainly we'll largely cooperate.

The house is within walking distance of the beach and public transit.

Public transit: To get to Santa Cruz and the camp from San Francisco, Oakland, or San José airports, first navigate to San José Diridon train station.

From San Francisco airport (SFO):

  1. Take BART train to Millbrae station. Fare is $1.50, time in transit is 6 minutes.
  2. Take Caltrain to San José Diridon. Fare is $5.25; you must purchase the ticket before getting on the train. Time in transit is between 41 minutes and 72 minutes.

From Oakland airport (OAK):

  1. Take AirBART bus to Coliseum/Oakland Airport station. Fare is $2.00 (cash only), time in transit is 20 minutes.
  2. Take BART train to Fremont station. Fare is $3.20, time in transit is 26 minutes.
  3. Take VTA bus 180 to San José Diridon. Fare is $3.50 (cash only), time in transit is between 41 minutes and 55 minutes.

From San José airport (SJC):

  1. Take VTA bus 10 to San José Metro station. Bus is free, time in transit is between 4 minutes and 7 minutes.
  2. Take VTA light rail (Winchester line) to Diridon. Fare is $1.75 (cash only); you must purchase the ticket before getting on the train. Time in transit is 23 minutes,

OR:

  1. Take VTA bus 10 to Santa Clara station. Bus is free, time in transit is between 17 minutes and 20 minutes.
  2. Take Caltrain to San José Diridon. Fare is $2.25; you must purchase the ticket before getting on the train. Time in transit is 9 minutes.

From San José Diridon to Santa Cruz and Aptos:

  1. Take Santa Cruz Metro/Amtrak bus to Santa Cruz. The route is called "Highway 17". Most buses go to Santa Cruz Metro transit center, and some, to the Dominican Hospital. Either one will work; stay on the bus until the last stop. Fare is $4.00 (cash only), time in transit is between 53 minutes and 80 minutes.
  2. From either Santa Cruz Metro transit center or the Dominican Hospital, take Metro bus 71 to the stop in Aptos Village. Fare is $1.50 (cash only), time in transit from the transit center is 34 minutes, from the Dominican Hosptial it is 19 minutes.
  3. Walk to the house using this map.

As you can see, driving may be more convenient. As of now there are no plans to rent a shared minivan. So, if you do rent a car, please help others get around, and share the expenses. Within Aptos and Santa Cruz, the Santa Cruz Metro system is quite useful. However, the orienteering sites are quite far from the camp quarters.

Trail loop: In Nisene Marks State Park, about 29.8 km. Shorter and longer options are possible. The initial and last 2 km or so are paved, the rest is fire roads and single-track trails.

The park itself is mapped for orienteering but harbors some of the most extreme terrain in the world (along with methamphetamine labs and marijuana farms), so is not advised for navigation sessions. The trails are ideal for training—the incline is such that they are barely but still runnable uphill. The Stanford University track team has been spotted on those trails on a sunny winter Sunday. Off-trail running is quite possible but there is some poison oak in the park. It will be ankle-high in January.

Track: At Soquel High School.

Orienteering venues: We plan to use up to four maps, all located within or bordering the city of San José. All of the venues are between 50 minutes and 80 minutes from the camp quarters by car.

Almaden Quicksilver (location)
Calero (location)
Joseph Grant Park, North (location)
Joseph Grant Park, South (location)

These maps are intellectual property of the Bay Area Orienteering Club, which has graciously agreed to let the US Orienteering Team use them at no charge. Several club members will be joining us in the training. Please extend them our warm welcome.

Please also bear in mind that the camp is not organized by BAOC. Permissions to use the venues has not been sought through regular club channels, but rather through informal talks with park rangers. We are not a large organized group, and are not holding a competition or charging fees. These permissions may not be granted yet, may never be granted, or may be withrawn at any time. Based on environmental conditions such as trail use and rain, we may have to rotate the venues or not be able to use some or all of them. We may have to use totally different venues on a short notice, facilitating a much longer drive than anticipated.

Please be as inconspicuous and low-impact as possible, and of course leave no trash behind.

Schedule

This schedule is fairly final.

Planned training of the day:

Morning Afternoon Evening
Monday 1.1 Arrival Jog, 0:40–0:60 20:00: Group meeting
Tuesday 2.1 Group run: Explore the terrain and get to know each other, 1:30 0:20 aerobic warmup and 0:40 strength training, led by Viktoria
Wednesday 3.1 Free pick (run or alternative training: bike, swimming, etc.) 17:30: Track intervals, Soquel High School Pasta party sponsored by SaMa
Thursday 4.1 Terrain run, Nisene Marks 16:00: Trail run, Marin Headlands (start at GG Bridge N vista point), 1:40 20:30: Dinner, Ristorante Milano
Friday 5.1 Free pick (run or alternative training: bike, swimming, etc.) 15:00: "Partner orienteering" course, Calero, 0:50–1:00 Course analysis
Saturday 6.1 10:00: Route choice and downhill sprints (integrated exercise), Joe Grant North, 1:20–2:00 13:00: BBQ (BYO meat, drinks, other food)
15:00: O on a self-made map, Joe Grant South, 1:00–1:30		 Course analysis
Sunday 7.1 09:30: O with a Sprint on an enlarged map, Qucksilver, 1:20–1:40 Free pick (run or alternative training: bike, swimming, etc.) Course analysis
Monday 8.1 Trail run 0:20 aerobic warmup and 0:40 strength training, led by Viktoria Movie night?
Tuesday 9.1 Trail run Track intervals Dinner out on the town?
Wednesday 10.1 Long jog (up to 2 hours) Rest
Thursday 11.1 Terrain run Free pick (run or alternative training: bike, swimming, etc.)
Friday 12.1 Trail run Travel













Exercises

Sandra and Marc are developing a training program for the camp, both the physical and the technical sides. The above schedule will be updated as our plans finalize.

Reports

01 January
02 January
03 January
04 January
05 January

01 January 2007   We arrived in Aptos late in the afternoon. Marc, Sandra, Viktoria, Anna, and Christoph ran for about an hour on the beach. John and Vladimir ran on the beach for 40 minutes later in the evening. Marc and Christoph planned the week's activities (to be finalized and announced soon).

02 January 2007 Morning   Anna, John, Christoph, Vladimir, Marc, and Viktoria ran from the house to the spectacular redwoods at Nisene Marks State Park. Everyone ran at her/his own comfortable pace, taking slightly different routes on the return and exploring the nice trails; Marc ran back and forth, making sure nobody got lost. Most everyone ended up right at 90 minutes with 15–16 km, about 380 m of climb. John and Anna did a little extra loop on the beach. Photos are on Sandra's site!

Afternoon   Viktoria led a one-hour gympa (strengthening exercises) session, attended by Sandra, Marc, Christoph, John, and Anna. The session was complemented by a 15-minute jog along the beach to see the sunset.

03 January 2007 Morning   This was a "free pick" in the camp program—everyone was free to run or do something else (biking, swimming), or nothing at all if not feeling up to it. Anna, Viktoria, John, Marc, and Sandra each ran for 40 minutes to about an hour, at Nisene Marks or on the beach. Christoph hiked for 1 hour 50.

Afternoon   This session was track intervals, at Soquel High School. After warming up for anywhere between 5 and 40 minutes, we did a "ladder": 800 m, 1000 m, 1600 m, 1000 m, and 800 m at the I pace. The rest between the intervals equaled 50% of the time it took to do the preceding interval. Marc, Sandra, Viktoria, Anna, John, Christoph, Vladimir, and Tapio participated.

Evening   Sandra and Marc hosted a pasta party in the house. The white sauce was deemed superb.

04 January 2007 Morning   Anna, Christoph, John, Sandra, and Viktoria ran off-trail at Nisene Marks for 40 to 50 minutes. Although we carried maps, the purpose of the run was not specifically navigation training, but practicing running through the woods. A lot of undergrowth made running on the steep hillsides quite a challenge.

Afternoon   Sandra, Vladimir, John, Viktoria, Christoph, and Anna went to San Francisco and ran in Marin Headlands, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. A traffic accident that closed all lanes of Highway 17 in both directions made for a late arrival, so the planned run was shortened to 1 hour and 5 minutes, 9.5 km (335 m of climb, 1, 2, 3). The sun had long set and there was only one headlamp for the six, so the pace, picking out sharp rocks and steps in the narrow singletrack trail, was quite slow.

Evening   The crew was joined by a few locals for a dinner at an Italian restaurant in San Francisco. After a long drive back to Aptos, everyone was quite tired.

05 January 2007 Morning   John ran for an hour on the beach.

Support

There is no entry fee for Team members and non-members alike. Camp budget covers the cost of the maps and the materials. Athletes are responsible for their own transportation, food, and entertainment.

Free accommodation in the houses is available to members of:

Training grants are available to 2007 US (Senior Foot-O) Team members to partially cover the cost of the transportation to and from California.

Anza-Borrego Desert O-Fest

The Anza-Borrego Desert O-Fest takes place in the Anza-Borrego desert on 13–15 January, 2007. Although both the camp and the O-Fest are indeed in California, it is an at least 8 hour drive from Aptos to the desert; it is more convenient to fly. Buy your return ticket from SAN (San Diego), PSP (Palm Springs), or ONT (Ontario) if you plan to attend the Desert O-Fest.

Created: 23 November 2006
Last updated: 05 January 2007
Vladimir Gusiatnikov