{"id":4018,"date":"2013-03-05T16:32:05","date_gmt":"2013-03-05T21:32:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/?p=4018"},"modified":"2013-03-05T16:32:05","modified_gmt":"2013-03-05T21:32:05","slug":"qa-with-former-academy-player-current-san-diego-aztec-defender-julio-alarcon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/qa-with-former-academy-player-current-san-diego-aztec-defender-julio-alarcon\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A With Former Academy Player & Current San Diego Aztec Defender Julio Alarcon"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/strong>After suffering a preseason injury in August of 2012,\u00a0 former Grande Sports Academy defender Julio Alarcon is eager to get back on the pitch. The former academy standout was set to begin his career at San Diego State University when a non-contact injury in<\/p>\n

\"Julio<\/a>
Julio Alacron<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

training resulted in a broken foot. Now after months of rehab, Alarcon is just weeks away before he makes it back onto the pitch.<\/p>\n

While at Grande Sports Academy, Alarcon helped anchor a\u00a0 backline that featured Home Grown signee Carlos Salcedo. In his last year at GSA he started in 27 games.<\/p>\n

Real Salt Lake-AZ Assistant Coach Tony Bruce talked about Alarcon’s presence on the field.<\/p>\n

“Big, strong, intimidating. Held the backline really well with Carlos Salcedo. His physical game was the best part of what he did. Very strong, trough to beat, very good 1v1 and was very good at starting the attack. could pick players out with a very good long ball.”<\/p>\n

Grande Sports Academy caught up with Julio and here is the Q & A:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> How long were you at the Academy for?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “Two years.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> Where did you come from and what was your former club?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “El Paso and the Texas Fire.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> How did you get recruited to the academy?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> Greg Vanney, who used to be the head coach here at the academy, saw me at a U-17 MNT camp. He called my club coach and he invited my team to tryout and they picked me and 5 other guys from my team.<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> What was U-17 camp like?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> I”t was seriously a different level. The best players from the country are there trying to earn a spot on the first team. It was hard and a different mentality because everyone knows what they want. You have to be focused and you have to work hard.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> What really intrigued you about coming to the Academy?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “I knew it was a higher level than club, and I was motivated to go there because of RSL. Hopefully getting called up and being around a professional environment convinced me.”<\/p>\n

Grande –\u00a0<\/strong>What was it like being away from your family?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “It really wasn’t that hard because I was my club team traveling all the time. I was used to leaving the family and it was something I got used to with club.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> What did you learn at the academy?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “Learned many things. How to be a better person and how you have to think about your decisions in every day of life.\u00a0 In soccer I became a way better player, training every day, and having a nice facility to work out in.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> What was your partnership with RSL’s Carlos Salcedo like?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “I was really secure with him back there. He is just really talented and he knows how to organize. Learning from him and doing things that he did made me want to be a better player. It was a learning experience playing with him back there.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> Right now you’re dealing with a foot injury that kept you from playing college last fall. What happened?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “It happened in preseason training and when I did a cut to then sprint, I just felt my foot pop. I knew it was broken or I it was fractured. I went over to trainer and they told me I had fractured it.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> How has being on the sidelines helped you see the game differently?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon<\/strong> – “Seeing all the mistakes that my teammates do and helping them become a leader.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> What’s your current status on the injury?<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “Right now mainly running going to start agility soon. In a week or two I’m going to start training with the team.”<\/p>\n

Grande –<\/strong> Thank for your time, good luck!<\/em><\/p>\n

Alarcon –<\/strong> “Thanks.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After suffering a preseason injury in August of 2012,\u00a0 former Grande Sports Academy defender Julio Alarcon is eager to get back on the pitch. The former academy standout was set to begin his career at San Diego State University when a non-contact injury in training resulted in a broken foot. Now after months of rehab, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19,195,12,29],"tags":[271,196],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"grandesacademy","author_link":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/author\/grandesacademy\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4018"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4018\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grandesportsacademy.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}