After being put on evacuation alert due to a wildfire near its pre-season training base outside of San Diego, it looks like Canadian Premier League champion Cavalry FC will be able to finish out its California camp without problem.
Cavalry has been training in Chula Vista, located some 15 kilometres south of San Diego, since Jan. 19 in preparation for the Feb. 6 start of its two-legged CONCACAF Champions Cup series against Mexico's Pumas UNAM.
An evacuation alert issued by local authorities at 3:30 a.m. local time Friday threatened to disrupt the camp. But the travelling squad of 27 players and 11 coaching/support staff was able to stay put.
"It's fine," Cavalry coach head coach and GM Tommy Wheeldon Jr. said Monday from California. "We had a couple of days of rain."
But it still made for "a very strange 24 to 48 hours, to be honest," he added.
Cavalry is slated to return to Calgary on Wednesday as scheduled with Wheeldon saying the only disruption from the fires was a scheduled Friday friendly with the Columbus Crew.
The fixture was called off when the MLS team, which was due to leave California after the game, decided to leave early due to the fires.
"We just went to a different location. A day later, the smoke had cleared and back to training," Wheeldon said.
Wheeldon said while the team could see a wildfire on a mountain opposite, fortunately, there was a reservoir in between. He said the squad is no stranger to smelling smoke from wildfires, having had to deal in Calgary with the smoke from past fires in northern Alberta and B.C.
With the Columbus game cancelled, the team went to the beach for the day and returned to training at a different location the day after.
U.S. Soccer opted to move its under-17 men's and under-16 women's training camps from Chula Vista to Mesa, Ariz., due to the wildfires. The two camps, originally slated to start Sunday, began Monday at the new location.
The Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center sits on a 155-acre complex adjacent to Lower Otay Reservoir. It boasts sports venues and support facilities for more than a dozen summer Olympic and Paralympic sports, and cross-training abilities for various winter sports.
"It's an excellent facility," said Wheeldon.
Cavalry hosts Pumas on Feb. 6 in a game shifted to Langford, B.C., because of the Canadian winter. The teams play again Feb. 13 in Mexico City.
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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 27, 2025
Neil Davidson, The Canadian Press
