Kevin Kaye - Westfair Communications

Kevin Kaye of Tarrytown has always had a love for soccer and a dream of opening a facility for the sport he loves here in Westchester. Through a shaky real estate market, some professional foresight and a serendipitous situation, he has been able to attain that dream and create OnTrack Sports, a Tarrytown training complex where soccer players can develop their foot skills or unwind after work.

“We”™re definitely different than the competition,” said Kaye. “We offer some of the same things but each of the facilities of our competitors are different and have their own identity. The game here is a lot faster, it”™s very tactical and you”™ve got to be quick about it, if you think too long here you”™re done, and that adds a real neat atmosphere.”

Though Kaye”™s professional legacy lies in the world of real estate and development, the past year has offered him a chance to create a business around his chosen sport.

Kaye”™s father, Roy Kaye, a Turkish-Iranian immigrant, came to the United States in the 1950s.

“He originally established himself here as the US arm of a company that was started in the Middle East, around that time he started a real-estate development company that blossomed,” said Kaye.

The company, Viewpoint Realty Corporation, based in Tarrytown has been developing land in New Jersey, New York and Connecticut ever since.

Kaye, who lives in Briarcliff with his wife and two children, grew up in Irvington and attended Hackley High School. He graduated from Purdue University in 1986 with a business degree. After a brief stint as an analyst at CitiBank, in 1987 he chose to leave to work with his father. Kaye promptly took over the real-estate side of family business, which had begun to take part in business investing.

“Since then I have primarily been dealing with the real estate arm of the company,” said Kaye. “My professional background is primarily entrepreneurial, starting businesses and running businesses.”

Starting a business is exactly what Kaye did when he took his acuity of the lack of soccer facilities in Westchester, seriously.

“I have been an avid soccer player all my life, I played at Purdue and played at a high level,” said Kaye.

When Kaye came back from college, he continued to play, started his own team, and even coached.

“I”™ve always said that I thought an indoor facility would do very well here, and that was reinforced when I saw Chelsea Piers open up in New York City,” said Kaye. “I actually criticized Chelsea Piers because I thought that they shorted themselves, and still to this day I think they did. They have three indoor enclosed rinks for soccer and I think they wish they had ten of them. There was nothing around here, not just for people who wanted to play, but people who wanted to practice, for youth teams all the way up to adults.”

It wasn”™t until the November of 2006 that Kaye received a call from a local business man, Michael Friedlander, who was negotiating for a building next to the Tarrytown train station.

They were put in contact through Kaye”™s friend and attorney, Richard Blancato. Blancato had been involved in an earlier attempt that fell through and knew of Kaye”™s desire to open an indoor facility.

“I was vaguely familiar with the building,” said Kaye. “I knew exactly where it was located, but I always said to myself, ”˜It”™s kind of small.”™ I pushed past and said, there”™s such a demand for this that maybe we can make it work, but we had to jump on it very quickly.”

After agreeing to take on the facility, Kaye worked right through the holiday season and was open by the middle of January 2007.

“Our first winter season was rough,” said Kaye. “We started out in the middle of the season, we were already late getting started, and getting promoted. We gave a lot of special deals and promotions to the people who did come in here.”

OnTrack showed a profit in its first few months, though, and finished its first true test, the off season of summer, ahead of forecast.

Kaye set a high watermark by penning a contract with the N.Y. Red Bulls, a Major League Soccer pro team, prior to even opening.

“They were looking at another facility and wanted to have a foothold in Westchester where they could run their Regional Development Center,” said Kaye. “The way the MLS has restructured themselves recently, they”™re trying to emulate what”™s going on in Europe. They”™re building a pyramid system where they promote from within the local youth and try and build them up through their programs in order to eventually get a shot at a spot on the actual Red Bull team.”

In the first year of the Red Bull sessions OnTrack was forced to close tryouts because of the amount of youth interested, with 160 players trying out for 72 positions.

OnTrack has also signed a deal with Mad Science Group of Westchester, a program that plans after-school programs as well as a one week summer camp. Ever the developer, Kaye continues to look for uses the OnTrack space could fill.

“We still have a lot of space that isn”™t being utilized,” said Kaye of his 26,000-square-foot facility. “It”™s just a matter of finding complementary businesses.”