Lauren's Hobbies
Playing Soccer
Ever since I could remember, I've been playing soccer. My parents put me in soccer when I was four years old, a time when the girls wore pink jerseys and the boys wore blue and games consisted of 3v3 little kids kicking the ball and each other until the ball got in the mini pug goal. Since then, I played AYSO until I was 10 and played for the Pateadores, a club soccer team. It was coached by my best friend's mom, a renowned psychologist at the University of California Irvine. She coached us with support and care which I think is an integral part of my soccer career; she helped me to love the sport.
Since then, I went on to play club soccer with SlammersFC, where I played more competitively. The coaches were interesting and I grew to love all of them. I was exposed to several different coaching styles: those similar to my freind's mom and those who were incredibly intense and harsh, yet supportive. I played high school varsity soccer all four years and was captain my senior year. I feel old saying this but those were the golden years and I wish I knew that it was at the time, I miss it and the team all the time. There was a point in time where I was considering pursuing playing in college. I traveled accross the country to different ID camps and tournaments that were littered with scouts, but I eventually decided to prioritize my academics. Technically, I am a bit too small to play super competitively. I mean, I think I could've played D3 somewhere but the schools I liked didn't have that level of programs.
In the end, I quit club soccer during college application season, which was genuinely heartbreaking for me but I had to get my priorities straight and my beloved team was falling apart. Last semester, I played club soccer at USC, but this semester, my workload is way too high and I've had to take a break from it, which has been sad to do but I am finding that I have better mental health and I am able to be a better quality student. In the end, I love the sport and I hope to find myself playing it again someday.
Hiking
I got into hiking mostly because my mom loves it. She hikes almost every other day and when she said that she won a lottery to hike the tallest mountain in the nation, I thought I should give it a try. I mean, I've been hiking since I was very little but nothing compared to this. We trained for a couple of months leading up to it. I was in shape mostly from soccer but hiking shape is completely different, especially at an extreme elevation and for 26 miles. In the end, the preparation was definitely worth it and was just enough to get me through the climb.
The day we drove to the base, we spent the night at 8,000 feet, which is the same elevation as Mammoth Mountain, to try to acclimate to the elevation because the biggest potential obstacle is altitude sickness. After a black bear encounter that night, we headed up the mountain the next morning, hiking 6 miles halway up to the base of the "99 switchbacks" where we camped for the night. That night, it was 20 degrees and it hailed, so we were freezing. Early the next morning, we summited and hiked all the way back down. The hike back down was so much worse than the way up; it is so hard on your joints and puts you in alot of pain, especailly since we have 35+ pound backpacks on. We made it to the bottom, grabbed some burgers, took a shower in a motel, and headed home!