RIDING THE BUS ADDS TO THE FUN FOR RAPIDS FANS
For amped Rapids fans, Centennial 38’s bus ride to the game is half the fun
The Broncos dominate sports talk radio year-round, the Avalanche appears headed to the Stanley Cup playoffs for the first time in four years and Rockies fans see good things in store at 20th and Blake this summer. But one of the best deals in Mile High sports is devoted to Denver’s plucky pro soccer team, the Colorado Rapids.
Unlike their more glamorous brethren, the Rapids don’t get to play downtown. They kick it in Commerce City at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park, a soccer-specific stadium seating 18,000 that owner Stan Kroenke built for the club in 2007. But getting there can be half the fun.
Centennial 38, the Rapids’ fan club (a supporters’ group, in soccer parlance) hires buses to deliver fans from soccer-oriented downtown bars to the stadium 10
miles away. The $10 charge includes beers on the bus, camaraderie and party music blaring from a loudspeaker that gives way to rowdy fan club songs as the bus nears its destination.
When the bus arrives at the stadium, a large tailgate party awaits with all sorts of food and beer on tap. The cost? Merely a suggested donation of $7. For the team’s home opener last week, the spread included custom-made pizzas baked on the spot, hot dogs, brats, barbecue pork, street tacos and plenty of beer to wash it all down.
“It’s all volunteer run, all donation-driven,” said Dave Wegner, a founding board member of Centennial 38. “We do this all on our own. It’s funny, when people come out the first time, they’re like, ‘Wait, what? It’s only how much?’ It just sort of works out.”
The Rapids, one of the 10 original teams of Major League Soccer from when it was formed in 1996 as America’s top pro soccer league, won the MLS Cup in 2010 and had the league’s second-best regular season record two seasons ago. Alas, last year they had the third-worst record in the 23-team league. This year, they have a new head coach with 14 new players, and there was an air of cautious optimism among the supporters.
“It’s never been easy, being a Rapids fan,” Wegner said. “Even in 2010, we were pretty mediocre and we were the last team to qualify for the playoffs. We just got hot at the right time. With all the changes and the way the club is aggressively putting money where their mouth is, there’s a lot of new stuff going on and the optimism is pretty contagious. There’s going to be a contingent of people that are like, ‘Once bitten, twice shy,’ fool-me-once kind of thing. But it’s really in the minority.”
The party buses are loaded with fun, win or lose. They pick up from the downtown area at the British Bulldog, the Celtic Tavern and Baere Brewing, plus the Three Lions on Colfax near City Park. Most of the riders are in their 20s and 30s. Andrew Rodda, 31, has ridden the bus about 20 times.
“I’ve always had a good time on the bus,” Rodda said on the ride from the Celtic. “You get to meet a lot of good people, go out, enjoy a game, have some beers, some good food. You get to have a good time. It’s a culture that promotes talking to the person next to you, as opposed to just sitting at a bar with a friend.”
Casey Bryant, 32, rode the bus last week with a “surrogate boyfriend” as she called him because her actual boyfriend wasn’t up for missing Florida State in the Elite Eight of the NCAA Tournament that night. Bryant is grateful the bus is an option.
“It’s just weird because it’s the only stadium that’s not in Denver,” Bryant said. “It’s a chance you get to tailgate without actually having to drive and then figure out how to get home.”
In fact, she joked that it was good that the reporter on board was talking to people before the game, “because on the way back, they won’t be coherent enough to speak to you.”
Bryant’s surrogate boyfriend was Chris Paice, who was quick to describe himself as “a proper Englishman.” He’s a Chelsea fan from the Isle of Wight who moved to the U.S. 22 years ago.This summer, he will be going to Russia for his fourth World Cup experience.
“I always take the bus,” said Paice, 54. “The bus is absolutely fantastic because of the camaraderie of the people on the bus. It’s a good soccer community, and to have that on the bus is great.”
Every year, Centennial 38 also charters a bus for a game at Real Salt Lake, the Rapids’ bitter rival on the other side of the Rockies. The price last year was $100 for the bus ride, a ticket to the game and hotel. About 140 supporters took advantage. This year, they’re also chartering a bus to a game at Kansas City on Cinco de Mayo weekend ($109).
The Rapids attracted a sellout crowd of 17,427 last week, with about 1,500 Centennial 38 supporters sitting (or standing) as a bloc in the south end zone. Last month, the Rapids had a nonleague game against Toronto FC that pulled in only 2,673 on a night when the tempera- ture was 3 degrees, but Centennial 38 was out in force.
“We had a full section, the rest of the stadium was barren,” Wegner said. “We couldn’t have been more amped. It was like, ‘Get it colder, make it snow, it doesn’t matter. We’ve all done this before.’ The energy in the parking lot and the stadium was insane. There’s no such thing as bad weather, just bad gear.”
Last week, the new-look Rapids scored twice in the first eight minutes but the visiting team from Kansas City scored twice in the second half — the final blow coming with just seconds left in the game — to earn a 2-2 draw. Such is the life of a Rapids fan.
“At the end of the night, everyone has had enough drinks that, win or lose, we have a great time,” said Jordan Ochoa, who served as “captain” on the bus from the Celtic. “It still is always a fun party atmosphere. It’s the best deal in town.”