Mt. Whitney Portal Store & Hostel Forums General Mt. Whitney Portal Store Message Board Acclimatization (and the US men's soccer team)

The US men's soccer team is playing Mexico today at the 7,200 foot stadium in Mexico City. Here's what newspaper reports have on the choice made with respect to the US players preparing for the match at high elevation:

"U.S. players weren't given much time to acclimatize to the 7,200-foot altitude. Players from Major League Soccer and Europe gathered in Miami, then traveled to Mexico yesterday.

"We have worked for a long time with different people, different experts, on altitude training, including many from the U.S. Olympic Committee," U.S. coach Bob Bradley said Monday. "The research we have stuck with is one that says if you don't have enough time to acclimatize, which can take 10 days or so, then going in late is your best bet."

Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09224/990219-139.stm#ixzz0NxxIcdLz

This doesn't seem to square with the prevailing thinking on this board (which I again followed, by spending several days at high elevation prior to my successful July 30 hike this year.) Any thoughts on what The Experts are thinking these days?

I don't claim to be an expert but my personal experience tells me I start to feel good on my 3rd day at elevation.

acclimatization enough to avoid AMS and do Whitney: only 1-3 days

FULL 100% acclimatization - really does take 4-6 weeks. This is a combination of respiratory, metabolic, oxygen diffusion, muscle, red blood cell, and other changes.

I Googled this- seems like reasonable site:
http://www.sport-fitness-advisor.com/acclimatization-to-altitude.html

PS: one would want 100% acclimatization if running Olympics at altitude, or climbing Everest.

listening to my breathing on my Muir Trail videos from this year, I think it takes easily 3 weeks to get well acclimated. I never felt sick, never felt slow, never felt like I was being slowed down by lack of acclimation, but I can tell from the amount of heavy breathing in the early videos compared to how little of that is audible 200 miles down the trail that there are significant changes that happen after several weeks at altitude than the 4-5 days I usually give it before even starting the hike.

For what it's worth, the LA Galaxy Pro Soccer team uses an altitude tent for training for upcoming high alititude cities. My doc is their doc and even suggested I try to get them to let me use it to prep for Whitney hikes. I would be surprised if the US Team did not have a similar option--it's no surprise that the US Olympic training center is in Colordo Springs...about a mile high. Perhaps a little bit of pre-game "talk"??

Well, unfortunately they lost 2-1.