TranscriptKevin M.: Mixing it up with the Fitness Community is a podcast created by Fit Mix that introduces you to local health and fitness individuals along with their stories.Kevin M.: Episode eight. Andres Trujillo with the New Mexico Runners. On this episode, Andres talks about arena soccer and how it differs from outdoor soccer. He also talks about the first couple of seasons along with their goals going forward.Sara Y.: Hey, Andre. How are you doing today?Andres T.: I'm doing fantastic. How you doing, Sara?Sara Y.: Good. Thanks for asking. OK, so you are joining us because you are the president and CEO of the New Mexico Runners Professional Arena Soccer team. Some people may not know that New Mexico has a professional arena soccer team. Talk to us about how that even got started in the first place.Andres T.: So, yeah. So one thing is, is Arena Soccer has been around for quite a while since the since the 70s. And though we play in the Major Arena Soccer League and we actually got founded in 2018. And so we've been around for a couple of years. And we just rounded out our second season back in March. And so, yeah. Arena Soccer. It's one of those things where it's exciting, fast paced, high scoring and for most people it's kind of hard to understand playing soccer indoors. And they kind of don't understand how the how the mechanics work. As I get questions of, oh, do you play on a full size soccer field inside? And and the answer is no. It's actually playing soccer on a hockey rink sized field. So in New Mexico, there's been teams that have been around semi-professional level back in the late 80s, early 90s. But unfortunately, it disappeared or just there wasn't, I guess, popularity with it. And so it kind of disappeared. And I know leagues dissolved back then. And then there's opportunity to bring a team to this market. I jumped on that in. Yeah. And we're we're get ready for season three, which is at the end of this year.Sara Y.: That's awesome. How did the first two seasons go for the runners?Andres T.: First season was great timing. Kicking things off is a is always a challenge kind of building things up and building up your business, building up the organization, build up the staff required to operate a sports organization. And so first year was great. We got through it successfully. And and of course, the successes obviously showcased in season two as we had a successful season two. And unfortunately, it was tough because we our season did get cut short due to the Covid-19 pandemic. And we actually got cut short three games. We had two games left to play in Mexico and one more home game that got canceled. So a tough finish for us in our second season. But at the end of the day, it's great. We've had successful two seasons. We and and we're just really focused on building up for for our season three.Sara Y.: Yeah. When does season three start?Andres T.: December of this year.Sara Y.: Awesome. Do you think it will go on without a hitch, despite everything going on right now?Andres T.: I'm hoping. Where staffed and we're planning on it, we're planning on we're putting the pieces in place to ensure we have a third season. Our fingers are crossed. We're lighting those candles and praying and hoping that it does. This this whole thing settles out and we can kind of resume our normal lives. But again, the uncertainty we just with the uncertainty, we just don't know. For us, it's we're planning on kicking it off in December.Sara Y.: And where do you get the players from? Are you recruiting locally or is this like a national kind of recruiting process?Andres T.: So it's both. My focus and our head coach focuses on local players. I think there's a lot of local talent in soccer that goes unnoticed. And I mean, we do recruit outside as well outside the state. And this past season, about 90 percent of our players were local and about 10 percent were from out of state like California, Colorado and Las Vegas, Nevada. So we do focus on the local talent. As I mentioned before, sometimes players go off to college. And and one thing that that happens is that when these players go off to college, they do their thing. They play soccer, they're on their pathway to run up the hierarchy of of of soccer. Well, unfortunately, in New Mexico, it happens a lot in our communities, is that these athletes have to come home and help their families with work and bills and in the household. And and so they end up kind of losing track on their dreams, on their on their career pathways, and they end up coming home. And so my focus along with our head coaches, to pick these guys up and give them a platform to play. A lot of these players have roots already established here. They may have wives or kids and they kind of establish their roots, but they are still talented soccer athletes. And so we pick those guys up and these guys come fromt. And they graduate from Cleveland High School, Rio Rancho, Volcano Vista, Del Norte, Highland. Played at you and UNM when UNM had their men's soccer program. So but again, our our focus is the local scene. That's that's what we like to to promote because, you know, we are a locally owned and operated. Professional sports team.Sara Y.: Had many these players also play at UNM or other local colleges?Andres T.: Yes. We've had i wwould say out 50 percent of our guys have played soccer for UNM. They went, they did those rounds, they played at UNM. Then they went to another level playing in USL or playing in a developmental academy or league or what not. And so but again, they end up coming back home and they're here and they're you know, they still have it in them. They still have gas in the tank and they want to play. And so we're able to utilize their talents on our squad.Sara Y.: Yeah. And like you said, I think it's totally different from outdoor soccer. Which is probably refreshing to them if they've obviously played outdoor soccer their entire lives, whether it be like middle school or high school or college. And then they come into the arena style soccer, where it's much more fast paced, everything is much more exciting. So it's probably refreshing and fun for them as well.Andres T.: Absolutely. And like you said, it said the different style of pace is very, very attractive to a lot of these guys. And when you look at at a soccer athlete, the one thing that's really interesting about indoor guys is everybody that plays indoor soccer or arena soccer can play outdoor, but not everybody that plays outdoor soccer can play indoor soccer, due to the proximity, the amount of, the frequency you touch the ball, on the frequency of of passing. When you are in the indoor game, you're passing and your touches are less than a second. And you're never on the ball more than two seconds because of the fact that that your it is so tight of an environment and just so everybody knows indoor soccer is Six V six so five field players per team and a goalkeeper. And so these guys run a lot more than they do outdoor. And I have a our coach will attest to that and tell you the our guys run a lot more than if you were to to play an outdoor game.Sara Y.: Absolutely. And it's a lot of just sprinting, you know, back and forth. It's like one minute the ball is on the other end and in like a second later, it can be down at the other end. So you're constantly sprinting back on point. It's really tiring from experience.<...

Ver todos los episodios