Blue’s Randle a ramblin’ man

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This article was published 05/06/2017 (3040 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg Blue Bombers defensive back Chris Randle loves everything about his home in Salt Lake City, Utah, which he shares with his wife, Kylie, and their dog, Odom, a German shepherd-border collie cross.

He just prefers to spend as little time there as possible.

“Every other weekend we try and do something, go somewhere,” Randle said Sunday, after the Bombers wrapped up Day 8 of training camp. “That’s just the kind of people we are. We don’t really like being in a house.”

This past off-season was a particularly adventurous one for the couple, who met while freshmen at Utah State University and tied the knot in March of last year. In recent months, the two have travelled to all parts of the world, compiling a list of places that would make even the most luxurious bucket lister blush. Together, they walked the beaches in La Paz, Mexico, dined at restaurants in Newport Beach, Calif., channelled their inner-child with a visit to Disney Land and roamed the streets of Paris.

The most memorable stop, however, was a belated honeymoon to Africa, where they spent 10 days. Randle described the trip as “a humbling experience” and somewhere he had always dreamed of visiting but until now had never seemed to find the time.

“It’s just something we like to do, to see different walks of life and experience different things,” Randle said. “But in Africa, what we experienced was life-changing.”

What first inspired Randle’s desire to see Africa was a love for animals. He enjoys frequenting zoos but had longed to see exotic animals in their natural habitat, rather than a through a sheet of thick glass or metal fence. That’s why they dedicated half the trip to taking part in a safari, where the dream of catching an up-close-and-personal look at wildlife included long looks at zebras and elephants, monkeys and antelopes. The highlight would come when the tour crossed paths with a lion, which had just caught lunch.

“He was eating a buffalo 10 feet away from us,” Randle said. “It was pretty majestic, honestly, because there’s nothing like that. You can’t get that anywhere else.”

Just as hard to replicate — and just as memorable — was the feeling Randle got when he and Kylie visited a small village in Tanzania. Randle knew if he was going to get the most out of his trip he would have to fully commit. To do that, he entrenched himself in the local community. He asked questions about the school and political systems, and chatted with nurses at nearby medical stations. Used to putting in long hours on the football field and in meeting rooms, when Randle saw what daily life was like there it led to a new appreciation for what it meant to put in a day’s work.

“Everybody wants the best, everyone wants to be in the big city, everyone wants access to resources but there, they work with what they have,” he said. “We don’t have to walk to get water, we don’t have to walk to fish for food, we don’t have to create coal for heat, but for those people that work is everyday.”

Perhaps what surprised Randle most was how despite what looked to be difficult circumstances, the overwhelming attitude was one of joy.

“They had smiles on their faces and it felt sincere. That’s something I’ll never forget.”

Throughout his adventures, Randle’s mind rarely drifted from football. Whether he was on a beach or in a jungle, he made it a priority to start and end each day with something related to the game. That usually meant training in the morning and incorporating something less physical before bed, whether it was watching game film or spending time on the phone with a teammate or mentor or stretching out his body.

Randle also returned to his hometown of Merced, Calif., where he put on the first of what he hopes to be an annual football camp for kids. The camp is called Achieve Dreams and it takes place at Golden Valley High School, where a decade earlier Randle, as a senior, accumulated a 127.0 quarterback rating, throwing for 2,175 yards and 24 touchdown and rushing for 613 yards and three scores.

In total, the camp attracted more than 200 kids, with many of Randle’s former teammates, some of whom play in the NFL, also taking part. He hopes next year he’ll be able to run two camps, with the other taking place in Salt Lake City.

“I’ve wanted to do the camp for years now and it was just a matter of sheer will and doing what you put your mind to,” Randle said.

Randle, who turns 29 June 18, takes the same kind of determined approach in refining his own game. He has been around football long enough to understand what he puts into it is what he’ll get out of it. So he wasn’t about to take for granted that this off-season he had a healthy body to fine tune. At this time last year, Randle had just fully recovered from a torn ACL he suffered against the Saskatchewan Roughriders that ended his 2015 season in Week 11.

Stuck on crutches, unable to walk and feeling helpless, the injury eventually took a toll mentally. With Randle’s emotional guard down, doubt started to creep in.

“You can get to a sunken place when you keep going down that path, when you’re thinking about what you can and aren’t able to do,” he said. “I relied on my family heavily in those times. It was some of the toughest times for me in my life.”

Today, Randle couldn’t be happier with where his life is. He’s about to enter his fourth year with the Bombers and has high hopes for the season.

As for the home he loves but desires to be away from as much as possible, that, too, is about to change, as Randle and Kylie are expecting their first child later this year.

Asked if any grand social media announcement has been planned, Randle just smiles before hinting he prefers a more personal approach.

“I’m trying to play my role and support anything my wife wants,” Randle said. “But I think we’re on the same page for that one.”

jeff.hamilton@freepress.mb.ca

twitter: @jeffkhamilton