Handcyclists,

This years inaugural Armstrong Sports National
Training Camp was held in Bradenton, FL March 18-22 on
a beautiful piece of property known as Camp Dream
Oaks. Camp Dream Oaks is a camp that has sessions for
groups of varying disabilities and age groups. The
camp consisted of four fully accessible cabins and has
future plans of having 8 cabins that will house a full
host of campers. This first handcycling camp of its
kind in the US consisted of 25-30 campers from across
the US and abroad. The riders were of all ability
levels from advanced to guys that had never been on a
handcycle, much less had seen one. Also, riders had a
wide range of disabilities such as MS, amputees,
different levels of paras and cerebal palsy.

As far as the riding, the rides had different lengths
and intensities for your level of ability. The rider
always had an option of taking a short route and a
long route and always could turn around and head back
to the cabins. A sag wagon was readily available with
water and other supplies as needed. There were always
able bodied cyclists in the front and trailing the
slower riders from behind to make sure that everyone
was comfortable and no injuries were occurring. Many
miles were put in over the week under the Florida
sunshine with a few showers here and there, usually
happening between rides. Although, I did get caught
out in some rain after I had "bonked" on a 40 mile
ride during the morning but the rain was much
appreciated to cool off (LOL!).

Also during off time in the camp, the campers were
subjected to different seminars which were directed at
sports nutritions and diet, bike maintenance, and guys
that had been on the National Team spoke about their
experiences abroad in places such as Germany and
Switzerland. National team members, also, explained
the classification system that will now be in effect
to determine future national teams and this
classification system will also be in effect to
determine a National Points Series in the scheduled
USHF races this year giving people of varying
disabilities the ability to compete against people
within their same classification and similiar
disabilities. Therefore, there will be a variety of
disabilities that are capable of receiving
recognition.

Another intriguing part of the camp was the social
aspect. All to often racers forget that there are
other guys out there that are not necessarily
interested in the racing venue. These guys are just
interested in recreational riding with friends,
family, etc. which establishes social well being
within that person or persons. This social aspect was
taken into account at the camp as Michel Bond, Matt
Updike, Scott McNeice and Chris Peterson took the time
to give each camper some individual attention. There
were other guys that took this time as well, so, if I
dont mention your name, thanks guys. Another thing
that I got out of the camp is that we as handcyclist
need to as much as possible try to incorporate kids.
Getting to the kids and developing junior programs
across the nation is the ONLY way the sport is going
to grow in the future! We are always griping that the
races are few and far inbetween and there is so much
travel.......this is where YOU come in....if you ride
or have a group that rides, expose the handcyce to the
kids and the sport will grow!

All in all, the camp was a great experience physically
and socially. I learned a great deal from the "pros"
and I also learned things from the earliest beginners.
They always say, "you learn something new everyday".
This is so true, as we all know, isn't EDUCATION the
KEY!

Warren A. Strickland, Jr.
was111@...


PS I'm already looking forward to next year and
making a week of training under the Florida sunshine.
If you would like to know more about handcycling or
have any questions feel free to contact me @
was111@... and I will answer or find out
anything that you may need to know! If I dont have
the answer, I do have the means of finding the answer
for you!

__________________________________________________
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