Juan Porras
Juan Carlos Porras is a Senior Coach for the prestigious Burlingame Soccer Club and Director of Operations for “Juan and Dusko’s Premiere Soccer Camps.” Juan is originally from Buenos Aires, Argentina and developed both his love for the game and world-class ability by playing on the streets in his neighborhood. At a very early age, his potential was recognized, and the renowned Club Athletic Velez-Sarsfield recruited him to play for their youth divisions. Throughout his youth career with Velez, his teams won 4 league championships and were touted as one of the region’s most talented. At the age of 18, Juan was called up to trainings with the first team and played all games with the reserves squad.
After leaving Velez, Juan was signed by another Argentine giant, San Lorenzo de Alamagro, to play with the first division team. With San Lorenzo, Juan was fortunate enough to train and debut alongside Argentine national team stars, Roberto Acosta and Nestor Gorosito. Juan finished his play in Argentina with four very successful seasons for Club Athletic Old Boys and C.A. Los Andes in Argentina, where he earned the reputation of being one of the most solid midfielders in the league.
After finishing his Argentine professional career, Juan was offered a contract to play in Mexico for Aguas Calientes F.C. in Mexico’s 2nd division. Juan finished his six-year stay there by playing a major role in winning the 2001 2nd division championship, earning the honor of most valuable foreigner at the 2nd division All-Star game. After retiring from his playing career, Juan spent two successful years as the Vice President of the Aguas Calientes F.C. team.
Juan Carlos is a well-respected coach who has trained two American prospects to the professional level, using techniques he learned while playing in Argentina. He now wants to make a broader impact on American Youth Soccer by showing them the great impact playing and training in Argentina has on a player’s development.
Mike Varas
Mike Varas is a Senior Coach for the prestigious Burlingame Soccer Club located in Burlingame, California, USA. Son of an emphatic Chilean soccer enthusiast, Mike began playing competitive soccer at the tender age of 9 years old, and later became a promising talent while playing for the 3-time State Cup Finalist and nationally ranked World United Futbol Club in Los Altos, Ca.
His Accomplishments at the youth level include representing the United States at the World Professional Futsal Championship in Russia, being a U14 Nor Cal ODP team selection and consistently leading his club and school teams in scoring. Varas was a significant contributor to teams that played in prestigious tournaments such as Dallas Cup and Surf Cup, where his team achieved the semi-finals, and was part of a team that won two Northern California Premiere League State Championships. During his high school years, Mike traveled to South America every summer to play for the youth divisions of Chile’s top professional team, C.D. Universidad de Catolica, and spent 7 months of his junior year playing in the top professional youth league of Chile. Although Mike was offered an opportunity to sign professionally for the historic Chilean Club Deportivo Naval, he decided to return to the U.S. to finish his senior year at Burlingame High School. In his senior year at BHS, Mike scored 17 goals and had 18 assists in 14 games, leading his team to the Central Coast Section Semi-finals and earning the Golden Boot. Upon graduation, Mike decided to walk-on to the University of San Francisco men’s soccer team, despite having scholarship offers from other schools.
Mike went on to play four successful years for the University of San Francisco Division I Men’s soccer team, winning the 2005 West Coast Conference Championship. He graduated USF with a B.S. degree in Accounting and earned West Coast Conference Athletic Honor Roll multiple times. Placing in the top four in scoring after only his sophomore season, Mike followed that up with two highly productive years despite a severe knee injury. Varas played in 53 official games for the USF Dons, including the 2005 NCAA Tournament, which was the first NCAA appearance for the USF Dons since 1994. Upon graduation, Mike trained under the tutelage of Juan Porras and was fortunate enough play as a developmental player with the 1st division professional side, C.A. Santiago Wanderers of Vina del Mar, Chile.
After a year of playing in Chile, Mike returned home to become a well-respected youth coach dedicated to realizing his dream to expose American Youth Soccer players to the wonderful soccer passion he enjoyed in South America.