Sass Peepre Junior Training Camp

Between all the events happening at home and abroad in the last couple weeks, it is hard to keep track of it all. Things seem to have settled out a bit with WCOC, COC, JWOC and now WUOC coming to a close. BUT before you all go into orienteering withdrawal, World Masters is starting today and we still have WOC and NAOC to look forward to. 

It is so much fun to be able to see our athletes compete nationally against each other and doubly exciting to see them compete on an international stage. When watching a GPS dot squiggle its way across your screen while following a big international competition, sometimes you stop and wonder about the long journey they took to get there. One of the stepping stones for a lot of our athletes was attending the Sass Peepre Junior Training Camp when they were young. Below are two camp photos from the early 2000s. Bonus points for anyone who can guess the year! If you look close enough you can see many a familiar face including much of our senior national team! As well as those that have gone on to be orienteering Canada committee members and coaches! 

This is our camp photo from this year. How many future Canadian athletes, coaches and committee members do you think there are here?! 

This annual junior training camp has been happening for years with many volunteers coming back year after year (after year). Kitty Jones being the first name that comes to mind, but there are many more! Then there is the participant turned volunteer , like our head coach this year, Meghan Rance who has attended a countless number of the camps first as a participant (try and spy her in the old photos) and then as a coach. The junior camp is a great way to bring together youngsters from all across the country to make friends in a sport that doesn’t always have a big club in their home town. I know I have many fond memories of attending the camps. 

This year the camp was based out of  Cochrane AB. The training exercises were planned ahead of time by our head coach extraordinaire Meghan with the kids grouped according to their LTAD level. Throughout the camp there were orienteering exercises, talks from a couple of Olympians that were present (Mike Rascher and Joanne Woods) as well as presentations from some of the coaches and athletes present. Of course it wouldn’t be complete without some sort of fun dress up relay at the end!

 

Thank you very much to all of the volunteers that worked tirelessly to put this event on year after year and continue to legacy of this amazing camp!