By CLAIRE CRUZ, Staff Writer
LYFORD — Five weeks after the UIL canceled the remainder of all spring sports seasons due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the organization took the first step necessary for having sports in the fall.
On Friday, the UIL issued a press release announcing “schools may, but are not required to, begin UIL summer strength and conditioning and sport specific instruction beginning June 8.” There are many strict guidelines schools will have to follow if they decide to begin in-person workouts.
East Valley football coaches are excited about the opportunity to work with their athletes again, but understand that health and safety remains the top priority. Coaches and school administrators are holding meetings to devise the best plans to go forward with summer workouts.
“I’ve been in meetings all morning, and I’m sure it’ll be like that all week leading into June 8. Our district administration is heavily involved,” Harlingen South coach Brian Ricci said Tuesday. “Our athletic director (Robert Davies), our strength and conditioning coordinator (Daniel Cortez), Manny Gomez over at Harlingen High and his strength and conditioning coordinator (Mike Aguilar), we’re all coming up with a plan together. Our goal is to come up with a plan that’s best for our kids and our coaches, and keeping everyone healthy.”
The decision is a green light to some normalcy for coaches and athletes, but the “new normal” will be quite different. Locker rooms will be off-limits, meaning athletes must report to workouts in their gear and can’t shower at the school facilities afterward. Sharing of water or food is strictly forbidden.
Schools must provide resources for students to wash their hands throughout the workouts, and all surfaces and equipment used must be disinfected between uses. Workout stations have to be spaced at least 10 feet apart, and the UIL is encouraging schools to keep students in the same, small groups (10 students max) to avoid socializing as much as possible.
“It’s incumbent upon us to keep this stuff from spreading amongst our groups because if we have outbreaks throughout the state, that’s going to end our season,” Brownsville Hanna coach Mark Guess said. “We’re going to have just one kid per station in the weight room, which is normally four, and we’ll do some weight activities outside that we’d normally do inside to spread the kids out more. We’ll have no more than seven guys in a group at a conditioning station. We’re just trying to keep everyone as far away as possible but stay effective in our training.”
Athletes in grades 7-12 can participate in no more than two consecutive hours of strength and conditioning and 90 total minutes of sport specific training, with a maximum of 60 minutes in the same sport, per weekday. During sport specific training, competitive drills that require more than one athlete, such as any offensive versus defensive drills, will not be allowed.
Harlingen High’s Manny Gomez said it’s going to be a slow process getting the athletes reacclimated and adjusted to the new summer workouts. It’ll take some time to get everyone back to performing at the program’s standards, but the Cardinals are ready to take advantage of any opportunity presented.
“We’re excited to get back out there and do what we love … but the health and well-being of our kids and coaches is going to be the most important thing,” Gomez said. “You can’t just be an old-school guy and say, ‘OK, guys, let’s get after it.’ We have to take some science into it and gradually go into it. They’ve been putting in work, but at their pace and their capacity, not that of the program. We need to take it one day at a time.”
Despite the challenges that could be posed, coaches and players are ready to hit the ground running as they hope to be playing under the lights this fall.
“We’ve been out of this stuff for about two and a half months, and it’s just killing us,” Guess said. “We’re all fired up. (The athletes) are ready to get back to our normal routine, and they want to get back in that weight room and work on getting bigger, faster and stronger.”
Said Ricci: “There was a time where it was grim, and we didn’t know how long it would be before we could even talk about sports. Just having this opportunity, even at a limited basis, gives us hope and excitement.”