IU Dive Camp

Question
My son recieved an invitation letter to attend a dive camp at the Indiana Diving Academy.  Should we make the effort to attend this camp, or are there other camps in SoCal that would be as good?

Answer
Mark -

The camp in Indiana is known to be one of the best in the country, run by an Olympic level coach.The advice I can give you about going to diving camps is that they are mostly found at colleges like IU. This is because of the elite level of coaching, the facilities and that they have dorms for the kids where non collegiate camps are usually only day camps. In general, camps are very intensive and some divers are not ready for diving all day long. I do not know what level your diver is, but if he or she is not used to diving a lot, they will find that the IU camp is more work than they thought it would be.

In SoCal, there are a lot of club diving teams that offer summer programs. There is also a diving camp at UCLA conducted at their brand new facility that you may want to look into. Go to
www.uclasportscamps.com and look for the diving camp run by the head coach, Tom Stebbins.I am sure that it will be a very well run camp and less expensive in the end than flying to Indiana.
To find day camps run by club teams, go to www.usadiving.org, click on Clubs and then Find A Club. Enter California and a list of teams will come up. Contact the ones in SoCAl and see what they have to offer this summer. The team at Mission Viejo is one of the best in the US and I know that they have run summer camps in the past. Go to www.mvndive.com for more info. I am sure you can find something local that will be very good and less expensive than an overnight camp at a college.

Good luck in your search.