By Gabe Perry
Staff writer
IG: gabep_24
The recent cold weather briefly put the outdoor spring sports of Hutchinson Community College to a halt.
The below-freezing temperatures and inches upon inches of snow in Hutchinson canceled or postponed many games, and have forced teams to adapt while still finding ways to practice and get their work in.
“We have been doing morning weights at 6 a.m. and occasionally getting inside at Prairie Dunes or golf simulators in Derby,” Tyler Walker said, who’s a sophomore on the golf team. “When we get the opportunity, we are always getting out on the course and playing and competing as a team.”
Golf is one of the only sports that does not have their own indoor facilities, so they are always taking advantage of any space and opportunities available.
“The biggest struggle for us is finding facilities that we can use. Unlike the other teams, we don’t have any indoor facilities on campus or locally that we have consistent access to,” Walker said. “So that makes it very difficult to continue practicing through the cold weather.”
With golf being a sport that is played on natural grass, the cold weather can also affect the course.
“Cold weather has been a big problem for the golf team because we play an outdoor sport on natural grass.” Walker said. “Even if the snow is gone but the ground is frozen we are not able to get on the course because we will damage the grass.”
Baseball is another outdoor sport that has been getting things moved around because of the weather.
“Most of our lifts have been moved to the arena due to our indoor (facility) getting so cold that all of our water bags freeze,” Freshman Jake Wolcott said. “We also have had games pushed back due to weather. We even had six inches of snow on our field that we spent days getting off.”
While the cold sucks for outdoor sports, there is really no way around it, and players have to find a way to embrace and adapt.
“Our pitchers have had to throw in the arena gyms with rubber baseballs because we can’t feel our fingers outside. We have had a few days where practice gets canceled, for example, on the snow day last week, we had an off day due to the snow,” Wolcott said. “We spend a lot of the cold days just embracing the cold and going to our indoor facility to get work done.”
Baseball and softball are sports that play a ton of games. Playing a ton of games comes with the risk of games often getting postponed or moved because of weather.
“The biggest struggle for our team has been not knowing if our games will get moved around and this can mess up our weekly practice plans.” Wolcott said.
