As just one of 50 females competing to be Travis Kelce’s girlfriend, Lauren Schwab Donahue wore a crimson T-shirt that mentioned “Missouri” the initially time the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs limited finish laid eyes on her.
They fulfilled just after a very long, exhausting day of filming the 2016 actuality demonstrate “Catching Kelce.”
“The craziest roller coaster of my life,” he has called the practical experience.
Kelce stood at the 50-lawn-line of a football stadium in Los Angeles and viewed contestants, a person from every single state, walk toward him one particular by 1 from the finish zone. 1 girl did deep squats and lunges across the industry to impress him. The a person from Ga handed him a peach.
Donahue, her coronary heart pounding, skipped the theatrics. “I felt like I was walking toward my greatest buddy,” she instructed The Star this 7 days.
She remembers Kelce wrapping both of those arms all around her like a 6-foot-5-inch bear and “we just suit jointly like two puzzle parts,” reported Donahue. “Once we hugged, I did sense that relationship, that electricity.”
In the conclude, Kelce did not choose Donahue, who produced it to the remaining four. But now, seven several years later, she even now considers him a capture. And she is hardly by yourself in that.
“He has not missing his boyhood fun, appeal,” she stated. “But he also has this stature that is very attractive. And swag to the max.”
Increase your hand if your husband or wife has given you a hall move when it comes to the ruggedly handsome offensive lineman.
Raise your hand if you’ve at any time still left a comment about him on-line with a fire flame emoji.
Or messaged him each and every working day for a year. Yeah, some girl did that.
Ahead of he hosts “Saturday Night Live” this weekend, fawning followers have been asking yourself if he’s dating any one. The rumor mill is working incredibly hot.
And they’ve been binge-seeing “Catching Kelce.” The reality courting exhibit aired on E! and is readily available on streaming companies.
Kelce was requested about the show in interviews major up to The Chiefs’ Tremendous Bowl victory previous month. The clearly show propelled him onto a countrywide phase, setting him up as the team’s most qualified bachelor. A scenario could be made he even now is. (We’ll get to that in a bit.)
The females on the exhibit were being clearly impressed with the 8-time Pro Bowler. “Even his shadow is hot!” 1 contestant declared in a promo.
Kelce states he doesn’t regret doing the clearly show. But he has sworn off undertaking any much more actuality Television mainly because of it.
“I don’t consider I acquired portrayed as myself,” he reported on The Pivot soccer podcast in January. “And there were being a whole lot of things that just built me awkward about the show.
“I do not really automatically want to converse about it simply because I really do not want to say something about the women or any of them. But I was requested to do additional than I desired to. … That doesn’t normally operate out wonderful.
“I really do not essentially say I regret it but it was definitely a mastering encounter.”
Gasp! Actuality Television set isn’t genuine?
Viewers in no way observed that Donahue’s mom met Kelce’s mom, Donna Kelce, and the moms strike it off for the duration of a buying spree on ritzy Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills.
“I assume it was the most actual aspect of the show,” mentioned Donahue. “I consider that they did not present a great deal of the realness and a lot of the deep discussions. I believe they had a story line and they needed to retain it.”
Donahue is continue to one and a free of charge agent.
“It was particularly uncomfortable for the reason that I definitely did not have significantly to say about what we had been performing on the exhibit,” Kelce explained to The Pivot. “It was just kinda, E! took it.”
Quite possibly the women of all ages from Missouri and Kansas, each Chiefs fans, had been as well typical?
“You could notify they ended up wanting for entertaining girls … really significant energy, incredibly enjoyable-loving. They weren’t searching for wallflowers,” Kara Tolbert, who grew up in Overland Park and represented Kansas on the demonstrate, explained to The Star.
“I really don’t even see myself as super significant-energy. I believe I was just so psyched … that I was getting a good time and not having it too critical.”
Tolbert’s brother, Tanner Tolbert, inspired her to go on the present. He satisfied his wife, Jade Roper, the mother of their 3 youngsters, on the ABC actuality clearly show “Bachelor in Paradise.”
“I did not have really the exact results,” mentioned Tolbert, a Blue Valley West graduate living in New York Metropolis and doing work as a graphic designer. She can make jewelry on the side, way too, underneath the name KindCult. She turned 34 on Super Bowl Sunday.
She’s a longtime Chiefs supporter, mostly as a result of her father and brother. “And (Kelce) has a special spot in my heart because of what the Chiefs are now,” she reported. “So he nonetheless has a presence in my life for that motive.
“And also mainly because any time the Chiefs commence doing nicely I have a total slew of close friends that make a comment about me not catching Kelce.”
‘Biggest Chiefs fan’
Here are the long lasting impressions Kelce remaining on Donahue and Tolbert.
He is much more handsome in human being than on digicam. Has a form of Gerard Butler in the movie “300” issue likely on, said Donahue.
His swagger is assurance, not cockiness.
He smells good. No effortlessly recognizable cologne. He just smells superior.
The contestants did not know who the bachelor would be when they signed up for the present. They were advised only they would be competing for the affections of a specialist athlete. An NBA star? A Key League Baseball participant? They discovered just times right before filming commenced that it was Kelce.
Cannot blame the ladies from Missouri and Kansas for pondering they experienced an higher hand. At minimum they realized who he was.
“I’m the most significant Chiefs supporter and you are my dad’s favorite player,” Donahue explained to Kelce when they met on that L.A. football industry.
Kelce’s deal with lit up as he gushed: “You are totally beautiful.”
They spoke briefly, and as Donahue walked absent, the Tv set camera zoomed in on the rear perspective of her exit.
“Missouri,” Kelce claimed aloud. “Dad’s previously a enthusiast, huh?”
Tolbert scored an invite to the mansion exactly where the finalists ended up to live, and afterwards to a downtown L.A. bar with the other ladies. Kelce’s brother, Jason, who plays for the Philadelphia Eagles, confirmed up for wingman obligations.
She remembers two factors about that night.
Producers encouraged the women to do physique photographs. “It’s not my design and style,” she claimed.
And she simply cannot forget Kelce’s shoes — purple, high-prime sneakers that “had additional rhinestones on them than I have ever owned in my everyday living.”
Tolbert thinks the “fun girls” that producers needed for the show indicated exactly where Kelce was at in his dating life — he was not hunting for a wife.
“I feel at the time Travis Kelce was not ready to be caught,” reported Tolbert.
Basically, he was there for the dollars.
Kelce has mentioned he rebuffed E! a number of times over several months in advance of he agreed to do the exhibit. When his manager explained to him it would include 50 women, one particular from each individual point out, he was mildly intrigued.
“And lastly they came to me with … an present fiscally … all correct gotta do this,” he explained to The Pivot.
“I was so lousy fiscally my initial few of yrs … I practically went through my initial pair of checks like it was almost nothing. … There were moments in the offseason I was keeping away from the hire woman. It was that lousy.
“So i read about this condition wherever I could make six figures in two weeks and I was like ahhhh … and 50 women? I’m like this is truly starting up to seem a minor superior.”
‘You’re so normal’
Donahue, who is 36, life in Marina del Rey, California. At the time she was on the exhibit she owned two gyms in California. Right now she hosts retreats and operates a espresso business named Laleigh — in honor of her grandfather, “who was my most effective friend” and who had Parkinson’s sickness. He died about a 12 months and a half ago.
Even though she competed as Miss Missouri, Donahue grew up in Valley Middle, Kansas, just north of Wichita. The producers definitely liked her but experienced already tapped Tolbert to characterize Kansas.
The producers experienced seen her work on a 2014 actuality show known as “Opposite Worlds” the place she lived inside of a Louisiana cave for two months. So they experienced her represent Missouri since she experienced lived in Kansas City for a although ahead of moving to California.
“We think you would genuinely like this person,” producers instructed her before she was told it was Kelce.
She decided going in that she would not fake or fake nearly anything, just be herself. Aggressive. Christian. A non-drinker.
She felt like she related with Jason Kelce, who is now married with small children, when he was on set with his young brother. “I like father jokes, I like humor,” she claimed. “So Jason, Travis and I definitely connected all over humor and not getting daily life so very seriously.”
In the course of a personal discussion, Kelce questioned Donahue, “you’re so typical, what are you doing below?”
She told him, “Same to you. You’re ordinary, what are you doing right here?”
“After that, the producers kind of required to maintain us apart,” Donahue said. “Because I feel the link was true. Soon after that, I imagine there ended up periods he desired to invite me to items, and they weren’t letting him.
“He told my mom, ‘I would have been spending a whole lot far more time with your daughter.’”
Soon after the two attended a Jessie James Decker concert, Kelce advised the region singer that “Lauren is wifey content.”
“And I assume at that time, I really don’t assume he was seeking for wifey product,” Donahue reported. “For me, the link was actual.”
She said just after she remaining the show the producers called to apologize, telling her “we didn’t want it to close up being the Lauren and Travis show.”
How to catch a Kelce
Kelce has not shied from offering particulars of his private lifestyle on social media.
He and Maya Benberry, the Kentucky female he chose on “Catching Kelce,” have been both active on social media and reportedly break up before the clearly show even aired. He advised The Pivot that “she shares a ton of the exact persona attributes that my ex carried.”
5 months later, he commenced a romance with Instagram product and on-air host Kayla Nicole. They dated on and off for five several years before splitting up last 12 months.
But he’s been somewhat circumspect this year, leaving his admirers and keepers of sporting activities and gossip blogs to speculate. Is he dating? Who could it be?
“I’m in the free of charge market appropriate now, guy,” he advised the podcasters of The Pivot. “I’m out there just enjoying existence, centered on my occupation, acquired my feet up outside the house of soccer.”
“He wants Catching Kelce 2,” reported Tolbert.
Any one who has layouts on Kelce demands to preserve a couple matters in head, Donahue and Tolbert claimed.
“I imagine that you would have to mirror his swag, be unapologetically by yourself and shoot your shot in your DMs,” said Tolbert
“I would say he has a very, incredibly distinctive and close connection with his mom, Donna,” reported Donahue. “So I would get close to Donna. I would get to know her. Make guaranteed loved ones is first and that you know his relatives.”
It would not hurt, either, to engage in athletics, explained Donahue, “because he’s almost certainly searching for a breeder. The subsequent two brothers to perform versus just about every other in the Super Bowl will be his.”
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