The Pride of Vallekas

The Rayo aficionado project continues! This is the story of a Rayo fan, one that involves a transformation from being a Real Madrid fan to being a Rayo Vallecano one... A bit about yourself and your background I grew up in the north of Madrid as the smallest of three brothers and as far as I remember I got my brothers taste for Real Madrid. My mother took the opposite position of supporting Atlético Madrid and my father has been a proud supporter of Sporting de Gijón since he was a child. Anyway, I was the one who loved football the most - my brothers chose basketball as their favorite sport. I lived really close to the old training field of Real Madrid, and to the stadium, so for me everything revolved around this club, including my first match at the Santiago Bernabéu. It was February of 1998 and my father took me to watch the game against Sporting, who were already set for relegation to the 2nd division (they won just two games all season) and I can remember two things: th...

@DonDiegoVaula is a 30 year old Norwegian who lives in Oslo and has been passionate about football since the age of six. His local team is SK Brann from his hometown Bergen. Go ahead and follow him on Twitter! How long have you been a fan of Rayo and what made you support them in the first place? I've been a proper fan of Rayo for four years now. I used to write for a Norwegian football site, and because everyone else supported either Real Madrid or Barca I chose to write about the other teams. I had my own section where I would write previews and summaries every round about a match not involving the two "big" clubs. I watched an enormous amount of games that year, and I was intrigued by Rayo both because of the fans and the style of play. One of my first special features was on Rayo and I read up on the club and its history, and that was it. I decided they would be my club from then on - it all just appealed to me. Describe your first visit ever to Vallecas and t...