With spring sports just around the corner, athletes, coaches, and directors have a lot to do to get ready for the upcoming craze. There are documents to be organized, pre-season training to go to, Impact testing, and tryouts to get through. 

Impact testing is required if you are planning on playing a contact sport at FHN for the first time, and it’s mandatory to take again after two years. Impact measures the baseline of cognitive functions, which gives the athletic trainer and doctors something to compare your cognitive functions to if you do get a concussion. It is also necessary for you to get a physical before tryouts every two years to determine if it is safe for you to participate in a sport. 

 Athletes and coaches agree that it’s important to re-train your body and work back up to a normal practice level. If you jump right into the season after practically no training, you’re more prone to getting an injury.

“As far as baseball goes, especially if you’re a pitcher, don’t just go out and expect to throw 150 pitches,” Jackee Hill, FHN’s Athletic Trainer said, “You’ve got to work your way up to that. If you haven’t thrown for long, you’re going to have shoulder pain, you’re going to have muscle imbalances, because you haven’t practiced that.” 

Many sports have been participating in pre-season workouts, and the lacrosse girl’s coach, Danielle Budde, says that part of team level placement is figured out during these sessions. Coaches are looking at the level of effort, motivation, and teamwork you put into workouts.

“The girls that are constantly putting in that extra effort on their skills makes a huge difference right at the beginning of the season,” Budde said. “You can definitely see the difference in girls who have been putting in the extra work, and it shows in the first week or two.

Pre-season workouts will be extremely helpful to you. During these workouts, students work on keeping up good form and do stabilizing exercises. Doing basic workouts helps build up fundamentals of sport specific skills.

“We’ve been working out with Jackee in the weight room, and just kind of up at school doing different cardio stuff,” athlete Maddie Swart said. “And then also we’ve been trying to get together sometimes just to have scrimmages or to just work on different, smaller aspects of lacrosse.”

According to Hill, it is important that you start eating right again, and make sure that you’re drinking enough water. Proper nutrition and hydration affect cognitive functions which are vital both inside the classroom and out on the field or court.

“A lot of times I’ll see students [in the training room due to fatigue] during tryouts because they’re not providing their body with the right kind of nutrients, or the appropriate amount of nutrients, so they can’t sustain proper energy levels during tryouts,” Hill said. 

Spring sports tryouts will be held the week of March 2. For more information about where and when your tryouts are, visit the activities office in room 53.