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The Thunderbolt

Timpview's official news site

The Thunderbolt

Timpview's official news site

The Thunderbolt

Timpview’s athletes on the COVID-19

Timpviews+athletes+on+the+COVID-19

The news of the COVID-19 and order to self quarantine was surely of distress for everyone. However, I want to focus on all of the spring athletes that just lost their season. As a senior athlete myself, I understand this news was devastating. All the hard work these athletes put into sport doesn’t get to be shown, and for the seniors, this was their last chance. For some juniors, sophomores, and freshmen this was their first year on varsity, the year they’ve been training and pushing for. There were teams at our school that were expecting to take state and players that were planning on getting recruited. It is surely a loss for everyone.

I have asked some of Timpview’s spring athletes to share their experience with COVID-19. I asked freshman softball player Abby Hansen, track and field junior Joseph Martin, junior softball player Emma Muavesi, girls lacrosse junior Katie Fiene, boys lacrosse junior Isaac Pestana, boys tennis senior Emmet Hart, boys soccer senior Niko Ventura and senior baseball player Caleb Conklin. Here are some of their responses.

What is your favorite part/memory about your experience playing for Timpview?

“Everyday being able to go out with my guys practicing to make each other better under the lights. Game days getting ready in the locker room, music playing the back. Walking out together. Taking the field and the crowd cheering.” -Isaac Pestana

“My favorite part of track is probably just the track meets themselves, it’s fun to have a lot of dedicated runners who’ve worked really hard all in one place to compete with each other. You really get to meet tons of new kids and it’s a good time.” -Joseph Martin

How many games, if any, did your team get to play before we were quarantined and what was memorable about them?

“We played only two games and I love my team! We’ve been playing together for a while. Even with new players we have a strong bond. There were phenomenal players that graduated last year, so we had big shoes to fill, but we were up to the challenge”. -Emma Muavesi

“We had a weekend tournament where we played in seven games and then we had two official games at timpview. Both jv and varsity won their games by a lot and everyone was celebrating talking about what a great season we were going to have this year. We had no idea those might’ve been our last games.” -Katie Fiene

What’s the worst part about COVID-19 postponing and possibly canceling your season?

“I don’t get to see the results of my hard work.” -Caleb Conklin

“Being my first year playing high school softball, excited to play with everyone on the team and get better through the season and we might not even play:(“ -Abby Hansen

“Well the problem is we’re not allowed to have practice which obviously sucks for all the sports but especially for track because it is all conditioning. We start practicing everyday in January to make sure we’re at top performance by the time season comes. If you take even two weeks off in the middle of the season you start to slow down a lot and it gets rid of all that hard work, so really our season is over before it even began.” -Joseph Martin

“Well playing number one on the team this year I was gonna have a chance at state to play for a college scholarship, if I played well I might have had a shot at college but now I don’t which sucks.” -Emmet Hart

“The fact that I’m a senior and knowing that everyone that isn’t a senior at least gets the chance to play next year. But for me and the other 5 or 6 guys in 12th grade this is gonna be it for us. And if we get no season then all the work we put in is for nothing.” -Niko Ventura

What was going to be special for you about this season compared to every other year?

“This year was big recruiting for me. Many colleges have been in contact with me and were closely monitoring my play this spring. I was also voted ⅓ team captains for our team. Being on of the top 2021’s in the state there was a lot of pressure and expectation for me to do well this year especially.” -Isaac Pestana

“I had really worked hard in the off season this past year and I’d made a lot of improvement. Normally people get slower and have to work their way back up but all I was able to PR in all my events before the season even started so with all that in mind I was planning to qualify for state pretty early this year and become a top competitor.” -Joseph Martin

Relating to sports or not, what have you been doing to occupy yourself while quarantined?

“I have been working out and spending a lot of time doing art because I didn’t have much to focus on it when we still had school.” -Katie Fiene

“Well I got tired of just tv and video games and stuff after a couple of games so I’ve been trying to come up with more active stuff to do while still practicing social distancing, so I’ve been doing a lot of running and long boarding the canyon.” -Joseph Martin

“Been batting a lot, staying in shape, and getting pitching reps, school work, reading.” -Abby Hansen


The announcement of the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak is scary and has caused a loss for everyone. However, I want to take this time to appreciate the spring athletes that put months of work into a season they never got to play. Especially the seniors, who feel they may take the field again, lost the chance at a scholarship, or can’t finish the year with the family they’ve gained through their sport. Simply put, it sucks. But, we’re athletes, when we fall down we get right back up again.

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