It’s been a pretty exciting Olympics for the USWNT so far. They beat New Zealand last Thursday and France on Saturday. Tomorrow, they play Colombia in the final game of the preliminaries. What are they doing on their days off, you wonder. Well, I’ll tell you what they’re not doing and it’s wandering aimlessly into the jungle.
For the past month the USWNT’s Youtube channel has been running a series called “WNT Animated,” where a story from each player on the 2016 Olympic roster gets turned into an animated short. There’s no real theme to any of them, and almost none of them are directly soccer related, but why not! Ritz Crackers presents! Megan Rapinoe has one about her and her twin sister being elementary royalty called, “When Waychy and I Ruled the Playground,” Morgan Brian has one about her teammates trying to prank her with a lizard – something she’s terrified of – called, “The Lizard Tale,” and Lindsey Horan gets international with one called, “L’Escalator.” Again I ask you: why not?
In one titled, “What Not to Do in Brazil,” midfielder turned defender Kelley O’Hara tells a cautionary tale about a traumatic experience she and her teammates had when they traveled to Brazil with the U-17 National Team. It’s a story that she’s apparently never told anyone until now, but thank god she did. It starts when O’Hara, along with Tobin Heath, Alyssa Naeher, Meghan “Best Hair in the Game” Klingenberg, and Casey Nogueira have some free time and decide to go for a hike up mountain on an unmarked trail deep into the jungle.
If knowing that a herd of bulls could have wiped out almost a third of the 2016 U.S. Women’s Soccer Olympic starting line-up isn’t enough to keep you out of the jungle this Olympics, I don’t know what is. Thank you, Kelley O’Hara, for this important bit of advice, and for your hustle.
Can I say how stoked I am to see the women’s teams playing on grass instead of injury-generating turf for the Olympics.
Meghan “Best Hair in the Game” Klingenberg! Yesss!!!
Hair so good it’s rippled back in time to make every age of Kling best hair Kling. (She didn’t get it cut that way until 2015!) BTWs, thanks @yikesoclock for this gem.
THIS gem http://www.autostraddle.com/look-at-that-alternative-lifestyle-haircut-wwc-2015-edition-293034/
in the words of wise Alycia Debnam
yup, “I was seventeen once”
I really want to know what the context of this quote was.
Clicked on this to see what “USWNT” meant, which probably means I have to send back my toaster.
I really appreciated Jill Ellis’s* (the coach) mainly because it mentioned her wife and kid like it wasn’t a big deal at all.
*Jill just because you were in a cute animated video doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven you for some questionable coaching decisions.
I’ll never forget Frank the Tractor! Tobin Heath is a treasure :)
This article was ahead of it’s time!