GIMME 5: Team USA kicks back

By Jeff D'Alessio
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 02/07/08

Heather Mitts, who earned soccer gold at the 2004 Olympics, gives us five ways the national team likes to have fun away from soccer as it gears up for Beijing:

1. Shop. Practice is two hours a day, or four if we have two training sessions. That leaves a lot of time for the mall. We are in L.A. a lot, and since we spend the majority of our time sweaty in soccer clothes, when we get the chance, we have to try to be trendy.

2. Hit the beach. We usually train in California, so we already spend a lot of time in the sun. The beach is a necessary pastime to try to reduce the strange-looking tans from soccer socks, shorts and jerseys.

3. Ride the mechanical bull. Not like we do this that often, but there is a place we like to go and see who is the best, or worst, cowgirl. It definitely gets competitive, just like everything we do.

4. Search for American coffee in foreign countries. We have been known to take harrowing 30-minute cab rides in China just to get a vanilla latte.

5. Eat. We pretty much just eat, sleep and play soccer while we're on the road, but going out to a nice dinner, and eating some more, is one of our favorite things to do.