Connor’s Corner: Nowhere To Run

By Connor Danz, Creative Editor

COVID-19 has certainly had a large effect upon many aspects of the day to day life of being a student, wouldn’t you agree? With the start of the pandemic dropping the ax on the remainder of the 2019-20 school year and causing schools taking many different approaches to reopen for the fall semester or first quarter. For many schools, this would end up restricting many extracurricular activities into new forms or cancel them altogether. 

Sports in this situation has mainly been on a case by case basis, with a good portion of sports ending up on the cutting room floor. This has meant that many sporting events were canceled, which has led to a much hollower school experience this year. Without sports like soccer or football, the students don’t have events to socialize with their peers and showcase their school spirit. 

Though the most affected by the lack of sporting activities has easily been the sports teams and the athletes that would have played on them. Speaking from my own experience as a distance runner during Indoor Track, Outdoor Track, and Cross Country for the past 3 years, sports teams help with making friends.

Being on a sports team, you naturally have to get close to your fellow athletes as you must all work together to be a stronger team. This creates a sense of family amongst you and your fellow teammates and it is truly a powerful bond. Now, when I walk past my former locker area known as “The Track Room” and see it completely deserted, it fills me with a sense of melancholy. 

Another item that comes along with sports is a great deal of motivation for those taking part. The motivation starts from working harder to get better at the sport that they are partaking in. However, this motivation tends to bleed out into other aspects of an athlete’s life such as their academic studies and other extracurricular activities.

I have found myself affected by many of these ideas and noticing the distinct lack of them with sports gone. I am still friends with all of my previous teammates, but I find that we aren’t as close as we used to be, as we don’t spend as much time with each other due to the fact that after school practice and meets was the time we would spend together.

It’s a weird empty feeling as you don’t get to spend time with the people you enjoy being with. Along with the social aspect, I also found that my motivation in general had diminished. Every day except for Sundays, I would go for a run that would range anywhere from four to ten miles to stay in peak condition.

With the lack of competitive sports and teammates pushing me to do better, I have found my mile count dramatically drops from four to ten to two to four miles a day. Without my friends there to push me and without me doing the same of them, running feels a bit more hollow.

With any luck, we may be able to have sports again into the 2021 Fall season if all this COVID hoopla is figured out by then.