Winter Training Camp in Gargano: Developing Excellence.
The Swiss National Team official training camp in Gargano has officially ended.
Some PWT Italy athletes also took part in this intense training week, that took place
both in the historic city centers in the province of Foggia and in the Foresta Umbra.
The Swiss Team, consisting of 43 athletes and 10 staff members – coaches,
physiotherapists, psychologists – is one of the strongest national teams
internationally, providing valuable lessons in terms of logistics management,
organization of evening meetings and planning trainings to develop specific
orienteering techniques. This week was a full immersion in the school of orienteering
excellence.
ph. Orienteering Focus
The average number of training sessions per day was two, usually one at
low/medium intensity and the other one faster; sometimes two were not enough: the
toughest days included a third session, forest orienteering.
This training camp was a significant checkpoint for the upcoming season. It was an
opportunity to work on basic orienteering techniques and to find as many control
points as possible. This laid a solid technical foundation for our runners, crucial for
approaching the season with confidence and clarity of goals.
ph. Orienteering Focus
The menu included:
– High-quality and varied training to practice orienteering processes and
techniques.
– Fast-paced training for all disciplines to practice competition speed.
– Mass start trainings to practice relay orienteering and knockout.
– Developing “excellence”.
ph. Orienteering Focus
This last point is very important for the Swiss team, and we want to discuss it here as
a general inspiration.
Developing excellence means giving your best in every single
act of running, refining processes to minimize seconds lost in competition, getting
closer to perfection in forest and sprint orienteering, challenging oneself to become
the best version possible. Physical training alone is not enough; the right mindset,
willingness to take risks and perform self-analysis, along with self-awareness of
personal capabilities and potential, are essential.
The Swiss team has been working
on excellence for several years. And you can see that.
ph. Orienteering Focus
Alessandro, Annarita, Lukas, along with new team members Fabio, Jessica, Pietro,
Caterina, and Mattia, accompanied by team manager Gabriele Viale, got themselves
engaged in some training sessions with the Swiss athletes. Besides being an
excellent training opportunity, it was a chance to build the group and motivate each
other for the upcoming season.
In conclusion, the team manager stated, "It has always been one of our goals to
provide our athletes with training opportunities with the best in the world. That's how
improvement happens. Additionally, this allows us to grasp cutting-edge training
methodologies through direct comparison. Our task, beyond supporting our athletes
in the short term, is also to think about the training of future coaches and thus
contribute to the development of orienteering in Italy.
The Swiss National Team is one of the most structured and high performing teams in terms of competitive results.
A reference model considering we are on the other side of the Alps. For years, the
main orienteering national teams have relied on us to manage their training camps in
Italy, which is a testament to our organizational and managerial reliability."
Training camp is now ended, but do not worry, another one is right behind the corner:
next appointment is the MOC camp 2024 in beautiful and historical Paestum. We are
looking forward to seeing you there!