The college athlete and the pandemic

Sports are a foundation that help students in college lean on a hobby or area of work while aiming toward work outside of college whether it is in sports or outside of it. COVID-19 has impacted many aspects of collegiate life, from increased virtual class offerings to decreased athletic events.

Since the start of the pandemic in early spring 2020, many or all sports programs across the country stopped in order to slow the spread of the virus to the students. However, since fall 2020, some sports programs have begun practicing and starting their seasons on time or in a fixed schedule. 

Taylor Hohenbrink, a second year student at California State University, Fresno, is in the track and field program. “This is my second year in college, but technically I’m a red shirt freshman because of Covid,” Hohenbrink said via text. While she is able to practice again, there are some changes.

“Practices are pretty similar to how they were before, just our groups are smaller and we have to wear masks,” Hohenbrink said. “Also practices are shorter in order to limit how much we are all around each other. We are still about to have meets, just no fans.”

Hohenbrink went on to compare how track and field restarting and performing is different from some of the other major sports programs. “It is a little bit different than other sports cause we are outside and it’s an individual sport,” Hohenbrink said. “So we are already more distanced than say, basketball.”

While some colleges have restarted their sports programs, others haven’t had that luxury of being able to practice and perform.

Jacob Rudolph is a third year student at the University of California, Davis. He is on a soccer scholarship, but hasn’t been able to practice formally since the pandemic began. He has relied on individual workouts instead.

While not being able to practice, he has stayed in pretty good physical condition by working out regularly at gyms. Rudolph did not state, however, if he would return to soccer if the program started back up.

The Mountain West track season is scheduled to run until April 30, 2021. The Big West soccer season expects a decision by late January on a return to competition in the conference.