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Community Corner

Athletic Trainers Getting Their Kicks From World Cup Stint

Gig Harbor pair traveling as trainers for the U.S. women's World Cup soccer team -- and they have certainly seen the sights.

When it comes to side jobs, these two just may have the coolest gig in the world – literally.

Bruce Snell, founder of Gig Harbor’s Northwest Sports Physical Therapy, and Dave Andrews, one of the clinic’s athletic trainers, are traveling with the U.S. women’s World Cup soccer team.

Being there for the training games, the camps – and next month, the World Cup, means that the duo has traveled everywhere from Austria and Egypt to Australia and the Caribbean.

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“It’s an exciting time,” Andrews said. “You’ve got girls who have made the team for the first time, and some vets with high expectations. There’s a lot of energy, and it’s fun to be a part of it.”

Snell started his clinic in 1984, during which he was in the midst of more than a decade as a professional trainer for the Tacoma Stars professional soccer team. In the late 1980s, a couple of players he was treating asked if he had any interest in a consulting position with the team.

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He worked his way up the ranks, starting with youth teams, and ended up at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney with the U.S. men’s soccer team. His next stint was with the U.S. men’s World Cup team, with whom he visited Korea and Germany.

“If you do a good job, hopefully, people recognize that,” Snell said. “If players like you and respond to you, you get to keep going.”

Six months ago, he was rehabbing Hope Solo, a Richland native and the goalkeeper for the women’s team, and she mentioned that they were looking for trainers.

Andrews also got his start through the Stars – one of the athletes he treated was an international star, and the next thing he knew, he was joining the U.S. Soccer Federation.

“He thought we did a pretty good job with him,” he said. "So I started doing the national ages and built my way up.”

Andrews, who grew up in the Tacoma area, traveled with the U.S. men’s team to three World Cups and is in his second year with the women’s team.

The pair met at a tennis tournament when Snell was the Stars’ head athletic trainer, and Andrews was just starting his career.

“Who would have thunk it, 22 years ago, that I’d be able to attend (World Cups) and be a physical trainer for the country’s best soccer players,” Andrews said. “It’s kind of surreal.”

The team’s schedule means that they can be on call as the women play Mexico in New York one day, and then on a plane to Germany the next. The pair has spent the most time in Central America because that is the U.S. team’s region for qualifying.

“They’re always good games because they’re important games,” Snell said.

Snell’s favorite trip was the 2000 Olympics, when he spent a month in Australia, and he also looks forward to returning to Germany for the World Cup, June 22 to July 17.

“The soccer fans there are very rabid,” he said. “It will be a great atmosphere for the team.”

Andrews loved the general “atmospheric adventures” of his trio of World Cup trips, but also enjoyed Geneva and Cairo, Egypt.

“Just to walk out of my hotel room, and there’s the pyramids right there,” he said of the latter.

Snell said that no matter where the team is playing, there is something special about representing the United States.

“When the flag goes up, and the National Anthem is playing, you realize that you’re part of something bigger than just your team,” he said.

Andrews also said he is “blessed,” but added that the job isn’t all fun and games.

“Everybody thinks it’s all glamorous, but when you’re in a hotel room in Columbus, Ohio (for a training-game trip against Japan) …”

“You’re there to do your job. It’s work – but fortunately enough, I enjoy my work, so it turns into fun.”

Even if he does miss dinners at home.

“The food’s always good, but it’s hotel cooking,” he said. “It’s not home-cooked from the wife.”

Snell said that one challenge is leaving the clinic at a moment’s notice.

“It is really hard,” he said. "But the beauty of it is the way we treat patients here – we’re very team oriented, much like a group of athletic trainers for a pro team.”

There are four trainers working at all times, so if Snell or Andrews has to travel with the team, their colleagues share the load.

Besides, Snell said, they are able to bring new techniques – “outside the mainstream medical things” – back to the clinic and really have an impact on patients.

“Whether it’s high-school athletes or just people involved in the community, they realize that it helps them, too, to some degree. So they at least tolerate me going abroad.”

"And," he added. "They see me on TV and kind of get a charge out of that, too."

It is an experience that Snell never thought he would have while growing up in Aberdeen.

“Arguably, if you’re an athletic or physical trainer, the pinnacle of your career is if you win a World Cup or a Super Bowl,” he said. “But the number of trainers who get this opportunity …”

He laughed ruefully.

“To be honest with you,” he said. “I pinch myself periodically.”

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