HSV summer training camp: a lot of hard work and a little bit of fun

Year after year, every club has to prepare for the new season. For the second year in a row HSV Hamburg has chosen Sölden for their summer camp.

For some players the memories of the Austrian Alps are linked with setting the foundations for a season which ended with the victory in the VELUX EHF Champions League – being one reason more for coming back in the summer of 2013.

“We have got everything we need here. A fantastic hotel, fantastic food, perfect training facilities and enough recreational activities for the players to relax and have some fun after a lot of hard exercise,” said HSV Coach Martin Schwalb.

Weights, medicine balls and muscle soreness

His team have been training at least twice a day, since their arrival on Sunday evening. A ten o’clock drill and a four o’clock drill have been broken up with teambuilding exercises and additional endurance exercises, such as the march up to the Alm hut ‘Gampe Thaya’.

Generally the ten o’clock drill has targeted the athletic skills of the players. 22-year-old Kentin Mahé was pleased but exhausted after another hard bout.

“The weight training was pretty challenging. But it feels good to be sending the messages to my body that the season is about to start and to trigger its adaptation,” said Mahé.

In the afternoon session Martin Schwalb takes the floor once more to specifically improve his player’s handball skills.

Recreational activities improve team spirit

In between training sessions, the players have enjoyed various activities. The word ‘rest’ doesn’t seem to exist in the players’ vocabulary. Although they have gotten through about 900 minutes of strenuous work-outs, the team still found time and energy to power up a mountain at 5.30 in the morning.

“They were so quick this morning, even I had trouble keeping the pace,” said Carmen Fender, the mountain guide in Sölden, who was clearly impressed.

It only took the players 60 minutes to hike up the mountain in the ‘Gigijoch’ region, which usually takes 90. After having overcome an altitude difference of 700 meters, the view was breathtaking.

“The view up there was stunning. It was really worthwhile getting up that early this morning,” said HSV goalkeeper Johannes Bitter.

2,000 meters above sea level, another highlights of the stay was a visit to the ‘Area 47’, an adventure park, in which the players showed their skills, flying off ramps and slides in the 22,000 metre squared big ‘Water Area’ and had the ultimate teambuilding experience of getting packed into three boats to go white water rafting.

“It was just as spectacular as last year. We would have loved to have stayed longer,” said right winger Stefan Schröder.

‘Das Central’ – a place where teammates get to know each other properly

When the players are not on the playing court, they spend most of their time in the five star hotel ‘Das Central’.

After a hard day’s work, Pascal Hens and his colleagues have the opportunity to regenerate thanks to massages by the physio-staff of HSV Handball and to the spectacular food, presented by star-cook Gottfried Prantl.

One of the highlights for the team in the hotel was a ‘Schnitzel cooking course’ which took place on Wednesday evening.

Stefan Schröder, for whom cooking is a great hobby, was impressed by the ‘world class player in the kitchen’.

“We were really lucky to be able to get to know him and he showed us a couple of tricks,” admits Schröder.

Roomies

Another important topic for the players and for the public is always the question: “who is in which room?”

This is not always an easy question for the coach to answer beforehand and requires quite an amount of thought.

“I think it is important to bring the playing position of the players into account. Although the competition is pretty tough, it is important for the players to communicate.

“It is also in my interest, that the team spirit is as good as possible,” said Schwalb.

In some cases though, the playing position was not the decisive. Joan Cañellas, the Catalan playmaker, is in a room with “Spanish” companion.

Davor Dominikovic, the Croatian left-back, played in Spain for numerous years and is supporting Cañellas linguistically.

“In Joan’s case it was important to that he gets some support,” Martin Schwalb confirmed and  Cañellas is glad for the support.

“Davor helps me understand the German that is spoken in the drills. Sometimes it’s a bit quick and then helps me out. He’s a big help,” said the Spaniard.  

Adrian Pfahl and Kentin Mahé do not share the same playing position, but are also rooming together.

“We’ve known each other for the past two years, as we played in Gummersbach together. Everything is easy going with Kentin. He snores a bit, but I think I’m not much better in that respect,” jokes the 30-year-old left-back.

Kentin himself is also glad to have his old and new teammate with him.

“I’m happy to be sharing a room with him. He knows that sometimes I have difficulties with keeping time. So when he’s with me, I’m punctual,” the young Frenchman admits.

The champions will be staying in Sölden until Saturday morning and leave early in the direction of Herrsching in Bavaria. There they will participate in a test match against the second league team SG BBM Bietigheim, before leaving for Hamburg on Sunday.

Here are some images of the team's training camp, photo credit: Michael Freitag