Sports Training Destinations in Europe By Dan Williams At Isnare.com Ezine Articles

Achieving your potential in any sport requires talent, commitment and dedication. But to reach the very top of their sport, athletes rely not only on their own abilities, but also on things like highly skilled coaching staff, adequate financial funding and access to the best training facilities. You may think that countries such as Australia and the USA lead the world in sports facilities but in Europe there are now some of the finest dedicated sports training centers in the world. The southern countries of Europe such as Spain, France and Italy make ideal locations for these facilities, benefiting as they do from a mild winter climate while still being within convenient traveling distance from most European countries. In this article we will look at some of the biggest and newest facilities available and explore the new and upcoming concept of sports tourism.

The Canary Islands, part of Spain, lie on the southern-most edge of Europe in the Atlantic Ocean. The climate there is consistently mild, never experiencing really cold weather, seeing low levels of rainfall and, even in summer months, remaining relatively cool compared to some European mainland areas. Because the islands are already a popular tourist destination, there are frequent flights to Tenerife, Lanzarote and Gran Canaria from many other countries, making the islands very accessible. Air fares to the Canaries during the months of January, February and March are very reasonable and provide a low cost way of escaping the harsher weather of more northerly regions in Europe.

On the island of Lanzarote lies the long-established sports resort Club La Santa, which opened in 1983 and welcomes sports fans from all over Europe. The club offers year-round training facilities and boasts a 50m open air swimming pool, six lane tartan athletics track as well as huge indoor fitness areas providing Nautilus , Cybex and Tetrix equipment. Also indoors are six badminton courts while outdoors there are 10 hard court floodlit tennis courts. Everyday the center puts on organized events like group runs, mountain bike rides, aerobics sessions and other coaching groups.

Tenerife, one of the other larger islands in the Canaries, is home to a very new centre located close to the southern village of La Caleta. Tenerife Top Training, or T3 as is more likely to be known, is a brand new high-tech sports training center that opened its doors in October 2008. It has 3 swimming pools, 50m and 25m outdoor pools in addition to an indoor therapy pool with water flow technique improvement facilities. Indoor physio and training rooms complement the outdoor tennis and football pitches. Close by is a luxury hotel providing high class accommodation, although visitors may chose to rent one of the many holiday villas close to the resort. The international airport, Reine Sofia is close by ensuring very short transfers times for visitors.

On the island of Cyprus, which is accessible by flying to the nearby and newly renovated Paphos airport, the sports resort of Coral Bay provides fantastic facilities. It was used by the Great British Olympic team as its training camp prior to the Athens Olympics and provides an outdoor Olympic 50m pool which is heated all year round. There are also 4 tennis courts and indoors a well-equipped gym and relaxation pool. Flights to Paphos are available from the UK, and with a flight time of around 4 hours, Cyprus provides a convenient location for mild weather winter training.

If a flight to Cyprus is a little too far for you, then you may opt for a shorter flight to Mallorca, the largest of the Balearic Islands where you will a range of superb sports training facilities. The Son Hugo swimming complex provides two 50m 10 lane swimming pools, one indoors and one outdoors. Also on Mallorca is the MegaSport Fitness center located close to the capital Palma and its international airport. The center provides a range of indoor and outdoors sports areas and is located close to the international cycling velodrome and football stadium.

So for both professional and amateur athletes alike, a trip to one of these warm weather sports training centers will provide a great kick-start to the season ahead. With cheap flights provided by a number of companies to the airports nearby, the trip need not cost too much either.

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