Sacramento Knights' Fraser does it all By Joe Blenkle/Sacramento
Sports News Editor
Iain Fraser (right) coached and played the 1999 Sacramento Knights to the WISL title.
Iain Fraser, player-coach for the Sacramento Knights of the World Indoor Soccer League, has had a busy past few months.
Fraser was named as the WISL’s Defender-of-the-Year and Coach-of-the-Year as the Knights recorded a 17-5 regular-season record.
Posting a 7-6 win over the Dallas Sidekicks at ARCO Arena on Dec. 12, the Fraser-led Knights captured the WISL Championship. The Knights’ title run included an incredible 14 game winning streak to end the season and a 14-0 record on their home field at ARCO.
Now with the WISL season concluded, the 35-year-old Fraser can turn his attention to another sport he loves - snowboarding.
Fraser was born in Jedburgh, Scotland, but grew up in Canada. His first tracks came on cross country skis rather than a snowboard.
"I grew up in the Toronto area," said Fraser. "There’s not a lot of hills or mountains up there, so downhill is kind of rare in that area. So, I grew up cross country skiing. There are a lot of parks near where our house was - actually straight from our backyard - so when we had the snow I was able to just jump on the skis and go. As long as I can remember - from the time I think I was five years old - I was on cross country skis."
Fraser said his wife got him interested in downhill skiing and one of his Knights teammates - Chris McDonald - turned him on to snowboarding.
Iain Fraser
"My wife’s a good downhill skier and she finally talked me into trying it a few years back. Being a soccer player I was always concerned about starting up a new sport due to the possibility of injury, but I finally took the chance and I just loved it. I finally decided to try snowboarding, as well. It was Chris McDonald who got me to try it - and I found that I absolutely loved it."
McDonald took Fraser to Sugar Bowl to get him hooked on the sport and Fraser said he also likes to snowboard at Northstar-at-Tahoe.
"We’ve been there several times and I just love it. Because my wife likes skiing so much, what we usually do is try to go half and half. I’ll ski and I’ll try to get her to snowboard, but I tend to snowboard more than she does."
Having tried cross country and downhill skiing, as well as snowboarding, Fraser said that it’s the nature of the sport that makes snowboarding his favorite.
"I just find that you feel like you’re a little more free with it. To be honest, it appeals to me more because it seems like it’s a younger person’s sport and it kind of ties in with the way indoor soccer is. It’s more an extreme sport type of thing and that’s kind of my mentality as well. I love to in-line skate and snowboarding is another sport along those lines. It appealed to me a little more than skiing did."
Fraser sums up his love of the sport of snowboarding with one special late-season trip to Northstar-at-Tahoe a few years back. "There was one time a couple of years ago when we were at Northstar and it was one of the last days of the year that it was open. There was hardly anybody there. We got there early in the morning and even though the snow wasn’t the greatest, the whole place was just so quiet and peaceful. There must have been less than 30 people there and we just kept going - and going - and going. We’d get to the top and we would just go again - and get to the top and go again - and it was just awesome.
"Time kind of stops when you’re in that part of the country and you look around at the top of the hills and think, ‘man this is awesome.’ You’re going down the hill and seeing other people doing all this crazy stuff that they’re capable of doing. I know I’ll never get to that level and with the career I’m in, I don’t want to do that stuff anyway, but it’s so fun just to be out there being graceful and smooth and feeling kind of free that way."
