Coaches donned face coverings, players wore masks when they weren’t running, and everybody tried to stay at least 6 feet apart.
When in-person training for high school sports resumed last week, it looked much different than ever before.
The measures are among the Phase 1 and Phase 2 guidelines laid out by the Indiana Department of Education in its three-phase approach to return to athletics after spring sports were canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Phase 1 began Monday and ends on Saturday. Phase 2 runs from July 20 to Aug. 15 and Phase 3, which includes a return to live sporting events, is scheduled to begin Aug. 15.
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“During drills, we remind them to stay 6 feet apart, and at water breaks, it’s 6 feet apart,” new Columbus East volleyball coach Ellyn McIntosh said. “They’re supposed to wear their masks when they’re not on the court. While we’re on the court, luckily we’re not a contact sport, so they’re really not that close to each other for extended periods of time.”
In football, the opposite holds true. Contact is not allowed in Phase 1, but it will be permitted in Phase 2.
Not only has Columbus North football coach Tim Bless been following the IHSAA guidelines, but the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. guidelines as well. The Bull Dogs practiced about nine hours last week, which is less than the maximum 15 hours allowed by the IHSAA.
“The local rules are first and foremost, and in some spots, they may be a bit more stringent than the IHSAA guidelines,” Bless said. “We want to ease into this. We want to phase into it. We want to be safe and smart so that we don’t have any hiccups along the way.”
To stay under the 50-player limit for the field, the Bull Dogs have been training with seniors and freshmen on the field and juniors and sophomores in the the weight room, and vice versa. The weight room limit is 15, so three groups of 12 to 14 have been rotating through it — bigs (linemen), mids (linebackers, tight ends and running backs) and speeds (wide receivers, defensive backs, quarterbacks, kickers and punters).
Bless said each player has his own station and bar for 15 minutes in North’s weight room.
“Towards the end of that 15 minutes, I give every kid one of those gym wipes,” Bless said. “When the timer goes off, he wipes his bar, his weights, his bench, throws (the wipe) away, then reports to the next station and hits hand sanitizer on his way out the door.”
East football coach Bob Gaddis, who is the executive director of the Indiana Football Coaches Association, is following guidelines through the IFCA. Gaddis said he has asked for everyone to follow the protocol.
“It’s probably stricter than what the IHSAA says because our two goals are; one, to keep the health and safety of our kids and staff; and two, to make sure that we have a season,” Gaddis said.
When Gaddis had the Olympians’ first organized team activity on Tuesday, the players lined up 6 feet apart as they came in to check and see if they had their forms, re-entry forms and an updated IHSAA physical form.
After paperwork was turned in, the players went over to a table and received bandanas. Gaddis said he and the football staff want the players to get used to the practice of leaving the bandanas on and learn how to practice social distancing.
The players had their temperatures taken, and were assigned to groups of up to 13 for upperclassmen and then two 15-person cohort groups. The players immediately went to their coaches after their temperatures ware taken to go through a screening. If they passed both measures, they could stay at practice.
The coaches had to go through the same protocol — the temperature and screening checks that the players did — before practice started.
In the weight room, players go in with the same teammates, have to go through a screening and have a 45-minute window for the weight room. Athletes can only be on one rack, and after they leave the rack, it is properly cleaned. Any time cones, jump ropes, footballs or other equipment, they used hand sanitizer in between.
“Our coaches, what we chose to do, we took eight groups of equipment for the eight stations that we had, and then our coaches are now responsible,” Gaddis said. “They just took it in the fieldhouse and sanitized it all afterwards so we can use it again.”
When athletes first arrive at a school or training facility, they have their temperature taken by one of the coaches and are asked two questions — “Have they been around anybody that had been COVID positive?” and “Have they experienced any symptoms of COVID?” If they answer “No” to both questions, and their temperature is less than 100.4 degrees, they can stay and train.
If their temperature is above 100.4, they are checked again. If it is above that limit again, or if they answer “Yes” to one of the two questions, they are sent home. Coaches must report answers on a shared Google document for the corporation, and also to their athletics directors. If COVID testing has to be involved, that will be determined by the health professionals and their protocol.
New North volleyball coach Quin Shoultz put the Bull Dogs through a meeting and conditioning on the turf football field on Monday, and were in the gym on Wednesday. She made sure the players were entering and exiting the same doors.
At Hauser, girls basketball coach Chad Evans had protocols to follow at his team’s training sessions last week.
“They have everything marked off,” Evans said. “It’s up to each school how you do the conditioning and drills. We had to clean the basketballs and wipe everything down and clean the floor.”
North boys cross-country coach Danny Fisher wasted no time getting his team going. The Bull Dogs began their training at Midnight Monday morning.
With 46 kids on the team, Fisher had to add a second assistant coach to run with groups of less than 20.
“As long as they stay 6 or 8 feet apart on the runs, they’re good,” Fisher said. “It’s a little bit of a process, but it keeps the kids safe.”
