BY MAKENNA ALLEN
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Tiger Athletics fans, we\u2019ve got some news for you – after an extended break due to COVID-19, track and field is back. The FHSU Indoor Track and Field team officially begins its season in a meet Dec. 5 at Washburn. This means it\u2019s less than a month until these Tigers hit the road for their seven-meet regular season.
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According to Track and Field Head Coach, Jason McCullough, the team\u2019s schedule is relatively full. However, individual meets will differ from years past with regards to the size of the events.
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\u201cRight now, we\u2019re looking mostly at competition against NCAA Division II schools and primarily MIAA schools,\u201d McCullough said. \u201cNothing has been set by the conference but it appears that we\u2019re just going to focus on competing against the schools that do a similar type of testing as us.\u201d
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When it comes to MIAA and national championships, the fewer number of participants in meets will translate to a smaller field of competition for Tiger athletes.
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\u201cThe National Championships will only be NCAA Division II schools but there will be several schools that don\u2019t compete this year so there will be a smaller field for all of the events when we get to that point,\u201d McCullough said.
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Ultimately, McCullough\u2019s goal is to progress through the season and MIAA Championships as planned, with hopes of sending select athletes to compete at the national level.
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McCullough also maintains the goal of helping his athletes to continually strive for the sport they love.
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\u201cThe athletes thrive off competition and that\u2019s what they\u2019re here for. The main thing I\u2019m excited for is just getting people back competing and doing what they love to do,\u201d McCullough said. \u201cIt\u2019s my goal that the athletes can find some sense of purpose and enjoyment out of what they\u2019re doing for this season.\u201d
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Athletes like junior distance runner, Abigail Stewart, have their own targets for the season.
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\u201cMy goals for the indoor track season are to take advantage of every opportunity to run the best I can, to PR, to score at conference and to make fun, lasting memories with my teammates,\u201d Stewart said.
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For Stewart, these goals stand regardless of any shifting circumstances.
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\u201cCOVID hasn\u2019t really changed my goals. However, it has made me realize how important it is to be flexible in your path to reach your goals,\u201d Stewart said. \u201cIt has also made me realize how important it is to take advantage of every opportunity to improve and to have fun.\u201d
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As these athletes work with the goals of any season, they have to keep in mind the restrictions of a COVID-19 season. Similar to many other winter sports teams, the indoor track and field team will be conducting weekly surveillance testing of athletes.
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\u201cAt this point, we\u2019re doing surveillance testing which means we\u2019ll just have a portion of our athletes tested each week to see how things are going and then anybody who has any symptoms will be tested and will probably be held out just for safety reasons,\u201d McCullough said.
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Ultimately, the process of training for the season has remained relatively typical for the track and field athletes.
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\u201cTraining is pretty normal right now, especially when we have good weather and we can be outside,\u201d McCullough said. \u201cWhen we have to use the indoor training facility, we have to have some restrictions when it comes to size and time but other than that, we\u2019ve been training like normal for the most part.\u201d
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