7 July 2006

3:30pm CST

First long day on tour as we started with our breakfast club, which is an optional training session for any kids that want extra training. We started at 6:30 am and to my amazement, we had all 33 kids at training, yes that is right, all 33. Now some of that is because we are not adjusted but still pretty impressive.

After breakfast, we had morning training session. First player of day (POD) -game-session were awarded, although the kids will not find out until Saturday at breakfast. Our POD is similar to the Tour De France as the leader wears a yellow jersey. On SnS we have a POD jersey and when the tour is complete, the player of the tour will keep the jersey. Will list the POD's at end of update.

Lunch was great again, and then we had an afternoon session. After session, we walked the kids into town to visit a soccer shop and the internet cafe where some called home and some emailed. All kids are fine. Back to center for dinner, and speaking of meals, another great day for food, although it seems like we have to educate a lot of kids on nutrition habits. A lot of kids do not eat breakfast, an option not available to them on tour and most of them are used to options at meals, also not available on this tour. For lunch we had potatoes, salad, and meat similar to salisbury steak. Dinner was tortellini pasta with salad. Some kids have even commented on the quality of meals is better than they get at home. Will let you all sort that out amongst yourselves.

After dinner we went to an exhibition game where Schalke 04, a Bundesliga team, played Lippstadt, a 4th division team and Schalke won 3-1. Great game and exciting with small stadium etc. Weather was cool today, around 60 and rain during the game but it did feel good. Have games tomorrow so results will be coming at end of day. Curfew is now so have to head back to check in the kids.

More tomorrow

Player of the Day (POD)

P.S. Need to tell you that we are still handing out sit ups for various reasons, most of them for not knowing names on tour. Brandon has reduced his to 1500 and Ellen has reduced hers to 2000 but big winner was Adrian as he reduced his to 3000. Rock hard abs are in order for this tour.

Ed