England is holding an alpine training camp in Austria.
Spain and the Netherlands also are joining the Three Lions in the land of the Von Trapps.
France is having its own high altitude camp in the French Alps.
Defending champions Italy will set up their own training camp in the Alps next week.
And a handful of other teams from South Korea to Japan to Australia, Argentina and Brazil are taking training for the altitude in South Africa into serious consideration early in their training plans.
So why is Bob Bradley having his 30 man provisional camp in Princeton, New Jersey at a staggering altitude of just 98 feet above sea level?
Posts
3 comments:
I honestly don't see that as a problem. We're talking about max of 6000 ft during the group stages. The body gets use to being at altitude pretty fast, there doesn't need to be 2-3 weeks of altitude training
To put it this way, if the USA gets out of the group stage...their highest possible altitude is going to be ~5860 feet if they get second in the group and go to Jo'burg. Playing at Azteca is 7200 feet plus smog. They arrived early for that game and got adjusted enough for one game. I don't doubt they can't do the same thing in a less-polluted environ
It's not like they'll show up for their first game on June 5 just being in town for a couple of hours. To me, it's better to go full blast in a friendly at the location than to practice in a non-game situation in say Rio Tinto.
I won't be surprised however if someone says "OMG Bradley is stupid" here.
We didn't do it last year, why do it this year? So what if other countries are training at altitude? Soccer is a mental game as well as physical, and if Fabio feels training at altitude will give England and edge...good for him.
We had this same argument last year. I went so far as to post several articles describing how training at altitude makes no difference, interviewed a respected doctor on my pod show and he said it made no difference, yet every armchair goof ass with a blog in the U.S. called me out as being wrong.
Seriously, it's not an issue. Relax.
Jason,
Even if training at altitude doesn't effect fitness, it may still be worth it to get used to the playing conditions and how best to control the ball.
The Three Lions are working out their problems with controlling the new Adidas ball now and at comparable altitude:
http://www.mirrorfootball.co.uk/news/England-stars-are-struggling-with-new-adidas-World-Cup-ball-admits-Fabio-Capello-article436125.html
Post a Comment
Stateside Soccer reserves the right to delete any comment the staff deems to be offensive, profane or the result of spamming. Comments on posts older than a week are subject to approval.