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Blog Entry 4 of 7 Colorado Rapids
My name is Stephen Keel and I am a defender for the Colorado Rapids. I am currently going into my third year with the team. This blog will give you, the fans, an inside look from a players perspective of the the activities and things that go on with the Colorado Rapids throughout the year.

Blog Url: http://denver.yourhub.com/~StephenKeel

Colorado Rapids update from across the pond

Contributed by: Stephen Keel   on 3/13/2007

Hello one and all,

Long time no talk, I apologies for the lack of updates. However, I am back and ready to flow. We are currently in London, England at Arsenal's training grounds. The team arrived here on Friday morning after a nice over-night flight from Denver. Once here, in the Queen's land, we had a light training session with our good friend Hector. It was a good session to get the flight out of us, or at least try to. Also, to keep us from sleeping so we can adjust to the 6 hour time change.

The next two days would follow our typical two sessions a day preseason style. One of the cool things, among many, was that after training we would eat lunch at the training center in their cafeteria. It is pretty cool to be gnawing on some chicken and look over and see Hleb, Fabregas, Jens Lehmann and other of Arsenal's players. I must tell you that Emmanuel Adebayor is even bigger in person than he is in on TV. I think there is a good chance he could rebound over Yao Ming with no troubles. I can't tell you how big this guy was, but just to say he was large.

We played two games while here. The Rapids were victorious in both by a score of 1-0. Our first match was against League 2 locals Barnett. They were a quality opponent with some rather large and loud Englishmen. Dan Gargan would get the game winner in the first half off a glorious flick header on a corner kick. In the second game against Millwall of League 1, Nico would score a banger in the first half to push the Rapids to an undefeated trip in England. Both games were watched by Arsene Wenger which was pretty cool.

Aside from soccer the hot topic around the team is filling out NCAA tournament brackets. I would tell you who I have in my final four, but that information is to remain top secret so no one on the team steals my great sports knowledge. I can not afford that information to get into the wrong hands, could cost me some money, and we don't want that happening.

The food has been good. However, the steak/meat here is a little bland. It is almost like they lost the salt in the kitchen. But other than that, the food and desserts are spot on. The hotel is a famous one, stayed in by pretty much every professional team ever to visit London. The hotel is about 10 mins away from the training center. However, it sometimes takes longer depending on the traffic. I am not talking about lots of cars in front of the bus; I am talking about traffic coming the opposite way. See the roads in England are rather small, so when the bus is going down the street, all the traffic coming the other way have to get off the road as far as they can. It is like a puzzle sometimes, moving cars around as we make our way down the street. Also, the beds in the hotel rooms are very close to each other. In fact, when you first come into the rooms the beds are actually touching. Harvey and I quickly had to separate them. But I am not going to lie, sometimes I will wake up and Jordan is sleeping facing me and me facing him. It is a little strange to wake up and have your teammates face two feet from your own.

Another cool thing is in the steam room at the hotel. Not only do they have steam in the room, obviously, but there is Vick's Vapor Rub smell in the steam. It is brilliant. Really opens up the sinus and chest. Why haven't we thought of that?

That is about all I have for now. We are off to Valencia, Spain tomorrow morning. There is a nice 3 am (yes that is a three) wake up call in our future. I think the word early is an understatement. I will be back to let you all know how our trip in Spain goes. Check back later!

Cheers,
Stephen


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Submitted By: 04 FABREGAS
posted on 3/15/2007 @ 4:33:22 AM
(Not Rated)
Hi there Stephen, Dan here from sunny old England - been an Arsenal fan for over 20yrs and looking forward to linking up with you guys (have just ordered my Rapids shirt for the new season) glad to hear you enjoyed your time over here, apologies about the food! Great results against Barnet and Milwall - congratulations! Look forward to hearing more from you, all the best - Dan
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CONTRIBUTOR INFORMATION

Stephen Keel

Littleton , CO

Stephen Keel has posted 7 blog entries and 0 comments since joining on 2/19/2007. Stephen Keel 's average blog rating is 4.93.
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