Die Reithalle

              Our winter break ended at the beginning of January, and it was time to begin our preseason for the second half of our season. After being in sunny Florida for 2 weeks, I returned to Germany January 12^th and was greeted by freezing rain and temperatures in the teens. The first few weeks we trained in the gym and did interval running outside. The weather was not conducive for soccer training outside, so we had to come up with another solution.

            There are not many indoor training facilities near our town, so instead we are training in the next best thing; die Reithalle, meaning riding hall. It basically looks like an indoor soccer field, except that the ground is a combination of sand and dirt instead of grass. Oh and the fact that there are nearly 40 horse stables lining the outside of the field. You can literally hear the sounds of horses neighing while we are playing.  

This is the inside of the Reithalle. 

The field is to the left and on the right are the horse stables. 

This is a close up of the ground. Those are footprints in the sand/dirt ground.