Monday Morning finish line

 

 

February 15, 2021

 

 

By Michael Newman

[email protected]

 

 

 

The problem with this 2021 track season in Illinois is not getting to the state series meets, but rather how we get to that point.

 

I am not worrying about whether that we have a real state meet in June. We will eventually get to that debate in due time. The main thing we must worry about how getting to a state series will look like. I worry about that. The last week those thoughts have turned from dreams for the coaches and athletes to what could be a nightmare.

 

We can thank your school’s athletic director for that. Athletic Directors in some schools have trouble thinking out of the box. Thinking out of the box is something that we need to be doing to create a schedule.

 

I accepted the reasoning last fall from administrators that told us “At least the kids get to compete”. I cannot accept that now as we head to April, May, and June.

 

I have been getting e-mails and phone calls from frustrated coaches about what their school administrators have planned. Bring back the dual meet is the call of the day by those AD’s. The athletes in this state deserve so much more considering what they went through in the spring of 2020.

 

There are some athletic directors that get it. They have been to a track and cross country meets and listen to what their coaches have to say.

 

There are some AD’s, the head of the school’s athletic activities, that have stayed away from a school meet. One athletic director last fall was going to cancel the school’s cross-country season. It was too dangerous he thought. It changed after hearing from the parents of that team.

 

There have been some good ideas that have been thrown around by some coaches. One idea was to combine the two school’s invitational meets to be held over two days. The first day at school #1 would have the distance races along with a couple of relays. The second day of the meet at school #2 the throws, sprints, and a few more relays would occur.

 

It is a creative idea. The problem was that the Athletic Director at School #2 said that would not work. It was not his fault. The fact was that the other AD’s from rest of their conference had agreed on only dual meets with the meets only against conference schools.

 

This was decided in February when the season starts in April. There are some schools that are waiting until March to release their schedules. Conditions are improving. So why wait until the IHSA and the IDPH change the guidelines to reflect the improvement as well as giving high school athletes better opportunities to compete before deciding on a schedule?

 

By the way, the two schools that were planning that two-day meet are only separated by seven miles. The conditions are so dramatic, so different at the one school so to limit the athletes a chance to compete against different athletes from different areas. Why do not we have a process within the schools in this state to develop a fair schedule? Every region in the state at the time of this writing is in Phase 4. For Track and Field, a low-risk sport, the IDPH and the IHSA state “Non-conference contests, out-of-state contests, tournaments & State Series allowed. There would be a 50-spectator limit.”

(IHSA COVID-19 Page)

 

This is not thinking out of the box when looking at this. Why aren’t some of these schools, some of these Athletic Directors, using logical thinking when coming up with a schedule for their track teams?

 

I know. That would be a novel concept.

 

One school is forward thinking The second school and schools within their conference are not.

 

The thinking of athletic directors in some of these conferences is narrow minded. Then again, that term could be too nice of a thing to say about them. The type of scheduling that these Athletic Directors are thinking of is like the scheduling of team sports like football and soccer. They want to apply that theory to track and field.

 

Track and Field scheduling is different to that of those team sports. Track and Field is a “low-risk” sport according to the IDPH and IHSA. Football is considered a “high-risk” sport. Why treat the two sports the same when it comes to scheduling?

 

We are not going to have the mega invitationals with 16 to 20 teams in competition.

 

A track schedule is like a salad. There are so many ingredients that make a great salad. The same is true for an invitational meet. The athlete gets a better chance to run or have better performances running against better competition. The dual meet, in most cases, does not give the athlete that opportunity. A track meet, possibly with 8 to 10 teams, should work especially with the guidelines that should be upgraded in the coming months.

 

There is a conference in the middle of the state that is moving forward with dual meets. The change for these schools is that all the meets will be co-ed.

 

It is something that most states have done. It has not happened in Illinois. This could be a testing season to see if it works.

 

At the same time, when we are concentrating on social distancing to prohibit and slow down the spread of COVID-19, isn’t this opposite thinking to have Boys and Girls team from the same school at one track facility?

 

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced last Wednesday that large sport venues across New York with the capacity of 10,000 people or more could re-open at 10% capacity as well as other guidelines set forth the by the state’s health department beginning on February 23.

 

It is the first state of many that we could see guidelines changing. That includes Illinois.

 

There was one school during the fall that had to quarantine for two weeks because one of the members of the team tested positive. The coach of that school said that the runner contracted it from someone outside of the team. The coach was proud after the season that the team stayed safe and followed the rules. We did not see huge outbreaks during the fall cross-country season or huge outbreaks within the school. So why are the athletic directors treating scheduling like everything went wrong during the fall?

 

We have some great kids in this sport that knew the consequences if they did not follow the rules. Why cannot the Athletic Directors acknowledge that?

 

We are making progress in this state. We may be going to meets social distancing and wearing masks this season. Still, we should not punish athletes to get the opportunity to race or compete against the best from other areas because administrators are not willing to think out of the box.

 

It would be smart to have the dual meets, or triangular meets, or quad meets to happen when the season starts in April. It will give some of the athletes who have not had the chance to compete in over a year a chance to get their feet wet. It is like what we have when we start a season in a normal year when the season starts indoors.

 

What scares me is that administrators will rob their athletes of having a true track season.

 

Let us take the time to see what the guidelines look like in a month and then make the choices and the schedules that need to be made.

 

At the same time, I hope there is some wiggle room to make modifications for schools to add schools to a meet or add meets to their schedule. There have been indoor meets this winter conducted safely in the Midwest. Conditions will improve. Why can’t school administrations realize that?

 

This is not the time for knee-jerk reactions.

 

This is the time for clear thinking and thoughts that float outside of the box that benefit the high school athletes that missed competing when COVID-19 broke out in 2020.