Where Are The Staging Camps for the 2014

The 2014 Pan Pac Swimming Championships will begin on Thursday, August 21st in the Gold Coast, Australia. With the host country being so far from the rest of the world, all of the visiting nations are coming in well in advance to adjust to the climate and for those countries on the eastern side of the Pacific Ocean, the time change.

Luckily, there is a glut of pools in Queensland, which is one reason why it’s the hotbed of swimming in Australia. That means that there’s plenty of room to house all of the teams without much of a secondary trip to get to the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre in Southport when the meet begins.

Below, see where each of the four founding nations of this quadrennially-spaced event will be holding their camps.

Team USA

The Americans who were selected to the squad had a quick turnaround after U.S. Nationals last week. They spent a day in Los Angeles and hopped aboard a flight and will have a training camp from August 13th-18th in Brisbane, Australia. Brisbane is about an hour up the coast from Southport – so not far, but still a little further than the Japanese. It will also be a few degrees warmer in Brisbane than the Gold Coast all week, with highs sitting right around 70 degrees Fahrenheit, where as Southport will be in the mid-to-low 60’s. Remember that the Southern Hemisphere is still in winter time, so those few degrees when training outdoors can make a difference.

Team USA will be utilizing three pools and one open water facility during camp:

• The Sleeman Sports Complex – a 50 meter indoor pool with blocks and a 25 meter indoor pool, which is a 30 minute drive from the team hotel.
• The Centenary pool, a 50 meter outdoor pool with blocks, that’s a 10-minute drive from the team hotel.
• The All Hallows School pool – a 25-meter outdoor pool with blocks, that is just a 3-minute walk from the hotel.
• Wellington Point Reserve – open water specific training site.

Japan

The Japanese will be camping at the Runaway Bay Sports Super Centre on the Gold Coast: very near the actual competition venue. From Runaway Bay to Southport is about a 15 minute drive due south, meaning that Japan can more-or-less maintain the same accommodations in the buildup to the Pan Pacs and during the actual meet. The Runaway Bay SSC makes for a fine accommodation and is designed to host these kinds of training camps with dining facilities, lodging, and a huge gym facility all on-site, along with a 50-meter 8-lane outdoor pool.

Canada

The Canadians will hold their staging camp at the Southport School from August 14th-17th. They too then will be located very close to the eventual hosts of the Pan Pac Championships, which is just across town. The Southport School has on-site housing and dining facilities, along with a massive 12-lane 50 meter pool and a heated 25-meter pool.

Australia

The Canadians, like the host Australians, are in a unique situation in that both countries are coming off of Commonwealth Games competition on the other side of the world in Glasgow, Scotland. The Australians have the benefit, though, of being the home team, so they won’t start their staging camp until Sunday. That means that the team for the most part is still at their home programs.

The team will fly in Sunday and head straight to the Mercure Gold Coast Resort, with no major staging camp planned. A huge portion of the team, as it turns out, already lives in Queensland, so the trip will be a short one for them.

Their pre-meet training, less formal than the rest, will be at the Gold Coast Aquatic Centre that is set to host the meet – which is about 25 minutes from the resort. As the home team, and with intense local media pressure, a little more distance could be good for the Australian team.