The Eurolanche book (9.)
Eurolanche will be gradually publishing the entire book about its history via its website throughout the summer.Lost in the city (2009/10)
In summer 2009, I was still getting over my first trip to Colorado. I wanted to return as soon as possible. The first two Invasions were a wonderful experience for the first Eurolanche members, who slowly grew more and more accustomed to the Fan Club. We already had two trips under our belt and we gradually gained more and more trust among our members. Eurolanche’s constant activities were further underlined by two smaller events. One in summer and one in fall.
Paul Stastny came over to Slovakia in summer. During his semiofficial visit, he played a ball hockey game in Nova Dubnica near Trencin. I’m not certain why the event took place there, but I remember that his father Peter was also there. Five Eurolanche members met at the game. We cheered for Paul as much as possible despite it only being an exhibition game. The whole experience felt almost surreal. A player from the NHL, then-starring for Colorado, was running around in sneakers holding a hockey stick in a neighborhood of a small Slovak city in front of a rather small audience. We immediately caught up with Paul after the game. He remembered Eurolanche from the first two Invasions and readily gave out autographs and took photos with us. His father Peter, who also knew about our activities, acted very much alike. It was a short, yet very intense experience from the Fan Club’s early years. I mean, how often does an active Avalanche player come to Slovakia? Following Budaj’s departure from the team, I think it only happened once, when Ryan O’Reilly came over during the lockout in 2012-13.
At the beginning of the 2009-10 season, we organized our second member meeting with the participation of four fans.The location remained unchanged, as did the majority of the program – a souvenir raffle, NHL Monopoly, playing NHL on PlayStation and watching Colorado play at night. The highlight of the season was still in front of me.
I noticed the first application forms for another overseas trip as soon as the season began. Following a short meeting with Austrian participants in Bratislava, my second Invasion was already waiting for me. Joining me on the Eurolanche Invasion III was Norbert, who participated in Invasion II, and his girlfriend Tina, whom we didn’t include in the official coverage of the event, as she didn’t join us to watch hockey, but to go on holiday. Her participation can serve as an example for other friends or family members of Avalanche fans, who are pondering the idea of joining us on our journey to the US, but to whom hockey is only a secondary reason. Everything’s possible. The group was later joined by Peter from Trencin, Chris from Austria and Robert from Romania. A truly colorful group without the dominance of one nation.
In case you’re interested in the unabridged, colored PDF version of the book, contact us at eurolanche@eurolanche.com. The physical copies are all sold out.
I’ve still had a difficult task ahead of me before we could fly to Denver. I had to supervise the preparations of our new website. Our first professional website didn’t have the capacity to support the up-and-coming Eurolanche project. The number of articles about Colorado, as well as about the Fan Club constantly rose and we needed to offer content to our readers in a different form. A number of active members then raised money for a new website, the development of which was a real challenge. The main idea of the new website was to cumulate all information about the Colorado Avalanche. It was a big, ambitious project, which ultimately didn’t last long. Prior to its launch, I got the idea of an entirely different concept and design, on which our current website is based. But it was too late for any significant changes at the time. The site was launched only a couple of hours before our departure. I remember that I edited some of its content almost an hour before I went to the airport. I didn’t sleep at all. Luckily, the website was up and running. It was dominated by a coverage box containing the five latest articles. On its side was a game box and a news box in the upper right corner. The website also contained a survey, a box with Eurolanche news, various categories of articles, even an own e-shop with Avalanche and Eurolanche souvenirs, or galleries and Invasion coverage. The layout of the website wasn’t too bad, but its childish graphic design was painful to look at. Sadly, I couldn’t change it. Let’s rather talk about Invasion III.
On the morning of January 29, 2010, we experienced our first difficulties at the airport in Vienna. The airlines limited the number of hand luggage to one. We were forced to put our laptops into our big travel bags (luckily, it has since change back in favor of the passengers). Chris found out that he forgot his ESTA and was in real danger of not being able to fly. Luckily, the airport was ready for such cases and Chris could buy new visa for 35 dollars. It didn’t matter that standard ESTA was now available for free from the comfort of your home. An interesting part of the third Invasion was Peter, who chose to travel alone via Chicago. He bought his plane ticket way later than we did, with the flight already being full by then. He managed his individual journey without any problems, but we chose to forego similar individual flights during later Invasions, as they created unnecessary concerns. The group flight rule from one airport doesn’t apply to those, who live a long way from Vienna, from where the majority of Invasion participants depart.
We arrived to Denver via London. A quick journey, no holdups, comfortable seats. It was truly incomparable to my experience from Invasion I. British Airways offered us top-notch service and became airline of our choice during the following years. Furthermore, we only had to transfer once, which is a great advantage during such a long journey. In Denver, we rented rooms in the Super 8 Motel, a chain of budget motels. Despite four of us being crammed in a single room with two bigger beds, the price was totally worth it. The breakfast was exquisite. I fell in love with waffles. I immediately bought a waffle maker after I came back to Slovakia and I make them regularly to this day. I also tried eating cereal with cold milk. Up until then, I always pre-heated the milk. I reverted to my pre-heating ways once back in Europe.
The Eurolanche Invasion III was the Invasion we walked the most among any other overseas trip. Our motel was in Stapleton, 12 kilometers away from downtown Denver. Not that we walked there, but the absence of a car took its toll. We transferred to downtown Denver by bus, which cost two dollars and took about 50 minutes. Honestly, the buses in Denver are extremely chaotic. The bus stops aren’t marked properly. There are no timetables, no route maps. At least there weren’t back then. That’s why you shouldn’t be surprised that we managed to get lost a couple of times during Invasion III. Once, we missed the last bus going out of town. We thought that the one which arrived after a short while was the one we were supposed to take and that it was only late. We went into the opposite direction we were meant to go. It was midnight. We exited the bus at an unknown location and looked up to the sky. What now? It was cold and no one knew where we were and what we were supposed to do. I called back home to Slovakia, where it was morning. Everyone back home had a good laugh about the entire situation. We weren’t in the mood to laugh, because the wait for Godot, for our bus line which may not even exist, was already taking several minutes. Luckily, a bus arrived shortly thereafter and following an exhausting ride (and us getting lost near the motel) we finally went to bed. Seven years later during Invasion IX, I passed a spot in Denver, when I suddenly recognized it. “This is the bus stop we were trapped at,” I said to myself. I finally found the place. I realized that it wasn’t so bad, because we weren’t far from downtown.
Traffic troubles were an everyday part of Invasion III. A car is car. A must in Colorado, where you won’t get far, and most importantly fast nowhere. This also applies to our transfers in Denver, where we walked all the time. Back and forth, back and forth. Our feet were worn out from the many kilometers we walked. I’d rather not write all too much about our transport to the team practice at the other end of Denver or its suburb to be precise. It was horrendous, but we survived and I learned a lot of lessons, thanks to which every next Invasion was better.
Back then, we even enjoyed all the trouble we experienced. We knew that Eurolanche was still in diapers and that everything won’t go according to plan. Without all this, we would’ve never made it as far as we did.
During Invasion III, we spent as much time in downtown Denver as during no other Invasion. Nowadays, we only have two hours at most for it, as we drive the majority of our time all around Colorado and other US states. But then, seven years ago, we couldn’t leave out any attractions in the city. We saw the aquarium, went inside the Colorado State Capitol Building (the seat of the governor) and went into the courthouse by mistake. We also didn’t leave out hockey activities like attending practices, meetings with players and expanding our photo and autograph collection. And last but not least, six home games of the Colorado Avalanche, with the team only losing once (the first game against the Rangers thanks to a hattrick from Gaborik, who stopped by to say hello after the game) and winning five times (we also saw Kyle Cumiskey’s most famous goal in overtime against Atlanta). Speaking about post-game player meetings, I once managed to mix up Ryan O’Reilly and Ryan Wilson, as both looked pretty much alike. I think that I even asked O’Reilly to sign Wilson’s headshot. Or was it the other way around? Anyway, we both had a laugh about it and I apologized to him. It was my first and hopefully last blunder like this. Don’t forget that it was O’Reilly’s rookie season and he was still seasons away from any real NHL fame. I consider my mistake smaller than those made by other fans (not Eurolanche members), who used to wait for players after the games with us during various Invasions. They always killed it by saying “ You played great!” to a player who didn’t even play in the game! You should’ve seen the puzzled looks of the players. And ours too, because we were ashamed for everyone present.
The biggest event of the entire trip was its second day. It was when Norbert and his girlfriend, who travelled individually, finally arrived in Denver, as they were stuck in New York because of a storm. Norbert thus had a really unique experience – he flew in, headed directly from the airport to the Pepsi Center and then joined us as we made our way to a small hockey rink, where we wanted to see Joe Sakic on the ice. Yes, he returned to the ice, but only as a coach of a peewee team. It was the first step following retirement. A year ago, he still had a stall in the locker room, but neither we, nor the participants of Invasion II saw him due to an injury. That’s why I looked up more information about him coaching peewees before we flew to Denver in 2010. It was a piece of cake.
On Sunday, January 31, 2010, we waited for Joe Sakic who stopped by us after he coached his team’s practice. I remember being so anxious for him to notice us that I almost followed him into the locker room, where he wanted to speak to his players. He elegantly batted me away, but everything was alright. I gave him our first brochure, told him more about the Fan Club, received autographs and, just like the others, took a photo with him. My primary goal was to get him to sing my first authentic Avalanche jersey, which I received four years ago for Christmas when I was still 16. It was another dream come true. I finally met an Avalanche legend and a big gentleman. In the diary on Eurolanche.com, I described this day with the following sentences: “Before lunch, we went to a peewee hockey game. Coaching one of the teams was none other than Joe Sakic. After the game, he stopped by us for about five minutes. Several photos and autographs are proof of our meeting. You can view the photos on Photobucket, the link being available in the Eurolanche Facebook group.” Like nothing happened! You can bet that my inner feeling were completely different from the boring text above.
Speaking about the aforementioned brochure, it was the very first promotional material intended to promote Eurolanche. On 36 pages of the small-format brochure, I presented the Avalanche front office, to which the brochure also found its way, with basic facts about the Fan Club, as well as a proposal for future cooperation. At the beginning of the small booklet, I wrote down my motto Winners never give up. Those who give up, never win. Five other people contributed to the content and design of the brochure beside me. Among the arguments why Colorado should consider working with us, I wrote our „high“ number of members – 50. Really funny. But at least we tried. What’s more important, Avalanche representatives could witness the birth of a unique project. We can only speculate if they believed, or if they didn’t, that we’ll exist for seven more years. Anyway, we asked for three things in the brochure: (1) information about our existence on the team’s official website, (2) occasional support of our contests with small souvenirs and (3) game tickets and meetings with players during Invasions. The second and final part of the brochure introduced the editorial staff and several Fan Club members.
Invasion III was also about other sporting events. We went to a number of games of the Colorado Mammoth lacrosse team and the Denver Nuggets basketball team. I was already bored by basketball back then, which is well- known to people from Eurolanche who have known me for a long time. One and done. I’ve had enough. I fell asleep at one moment during the Nuggets game. That’s why I didn’t go to the following games with the rest of the group, writing a note in my diary: “I went to take an afternoon nap at the hotel, because I really wasn’t in the mood for the evening NBA game. One basketball game in my life is more than enough.”
I also have to mention the media experience from the Eurolanche Invasion III. During the game against Columbus, we met announcer Kyle Keefe at the corner of the rink. It was only me and Peter. The others were supposed to watch us. Since we all had seats in different sectors and our little group was divided even further, chaos ensued. They didn’t want to let some of the group down to me and Kyle, because they didn’t have the ticket from the section. Kyle had to begin the interview, which is why only Peter and I stood beside him. Suddenly, Norbert came up to the big railing behind Kyle. And then it all began. He shouted “David, David, David, David, David, David ”. Each shout was louder and louder. Yes, I had to give a live interview to Altitude TV and if that didn’t make me nervous enough, then Norbert’s constant shouting certainly did. He likely thought I was just casually chatting with Kyle. The result? My worst interview ever. It was my fault, in no small part because I prepared the entire interview in my head. Let me give you a tip. Don’t do that. Never ever do that and rather act natural, or just prepare certain points, not entire sentences. That’s why I got a little confused, telling that we want to work with Colorado and that someone should tell me if there’s any other project like us
The second interview, pre-taped for the regional FOX 31 channel, went significantly better. With all the calmness I had in me, I presented Eurolanche’s website with an occasional smile and am boasting how Colorado has the best news coverage in Europe... And a cut to head coach Joe Sacco, who praised us, telling that they should win for us. Sacco was a class act. Although he lost a lot of games, I really liked him as a person. A slight mishap occurred during the whole news story, as the TV broadcaster said that “Puchevski flies to Colorado three times a year“. If only! The entire story was more than two minutes long. After we returned back home, I was satisfied with everything. It seemed like nothing could ruin my mood. Unfortunately, we didn’t go to Denver during the following season and all the positive feelings and thoughts were replaced by disappointment.
The season of the Colorado Avalanche: This year was supposed to be the year Colorado presses the big reset button. Joe Sacco became the team’s new head coach, Greg Sherman its new general manager and the team drafted Matt Duchene and Ryan O’Reilly in the opening two rounds, as well as Tyson Barrie in the third. Among the departures from the team were Ryan Smyth and Wojtek Wolski. Joining the team was goalie Craig Anderson. The Avs made it to the playoffs as the eighth seed with 95 points, where they didn’t make it past the opening round, losing 2-4 to the San Jose Sharks.
Eurolanche.com, Worldwide, eurolanche@eurolanche.com
08/08/2018 - 21:51
