By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer
I just returned from four days in Colorado Springs where I worked on the venue evaluation team for the State Games of America. This is a national event, kind of a national championship, for participants in state games programs around the country. Overall, about 10,500 athletes competed in 30 different sports, and Minnesota had about 50 athletes competing, who qualified by medaling in our state games, the Star of the North Games. I haven't totaled up the medal haul, but I noticed a lot of Minnesota athletes taking home medals in figure skating and track and field.
One of the venues I visited was the athletic facilities at the Air Force Academy (AFA), which were the site for track and field, martial arts, gymnastics, road cycling, mountain biking, tennis and soccer.
It was interested to compare the AFA soccer venue with the National Sports Center. The AFA complex is relatively large, 22 fields, but that's still less than half the size of the NSC. With over 200 teams playing in State Games of America, it took four full days of play to complete the tournament.
As everyone who has played at the NSC know, our campus is flat as flat can be, as is the surrounding neighborhood. If you've been to the AFA, you know its neighborhood resembles Everest base camp more than Blaine, Minn. The entire campus is build on the slope of the Colorado Front Range. The soccer fields sit on three tiers carved out of the mountain slope. The vista is stunning, both up to the peaks and east toward the plains. But if your shot misses to the east, the ball could roll a long, long way. Like to Kansas.
Above: Here's a view of the Air Force Academy soccer fields, looking west toward the Rocky Mountains. What a scene, huh?
If you're not used to the altitude (over 7,000 feet) supplemental oxygen might be required to climb up from a lower tier of fields to a higher one.
And if you think the parking at the NSC is tight, you should see the parking at the AFA. First, there are no parking lots, at least none next to the soccer fields. So everyone parks helter-skelter alongside the access roads. It's tight, beyond tight really, and drivers stuff their cars into every available open space. It's a dog-eat-dog, survival-of-the-fittest kind of parking situation. I would guess the incidence of door dings and fender bumps is pretty high.
Finally there are the thunderstorms, which when I was there, arrived on schedule late every afternoon. They would roll over the mountains, with spectacular lightning strikes against the peaks. Yes, the NSC has its share of summer thunderstorms, but the spectacular setting of the AFA soccer complex gave these mountain storms jaw-dropping grandeur. But just like the NSC, when lightning comes, games are suspended. And that's when the mad dash to the cars begins, and the real door-dinging commences!
By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer 
Left: James Tainter in action on the NSC Velodrome earlier this summer. 
