After Grinnell College cancelled all fall sports, athletes were left with little idea as to when they would play again. The S&B’s Shabana Gupta asked some of them about what routines they use to stay in shape without their seasons.
Sabrina Tang ’23, Tennis
“It’s been a little hard, especially during the summer, but exercise just makes me feel better even if I don’t have a competition to do it for,” Tang said. “I try to do something physical every day. Around here there aren’t too many people who play tennis, so I drive half an hour to do it with this girl that plays tennis. Since professional tennis started back up, watching the pros play a bit has made me want to, you know, play. I am fortunate enough to have a pretty good home gym and I’ve recently taken up biking, so my family and I bike around the nearby trails. I’ve biked up to 20 miles, which takes a while, and sometimes 10 miles if we want to do something light.”
Kate Tomczik ’22, Basketball
“I’ve actually been trying some different things. There’s a tennis court by my house and my friend—we’d play tennis a few times a week to stay active and do something that I wouldn’t normally do. Basketball’s just hard to do without others. I mean, I can work on my handling and shooting, but running up and down and doing defense—it’s harder to do the actual exercise. I mowed two of my neighbor’s lawns, whatever it takes to get some of my exercise in. I’m not going to lie, I mowed one today and it’s almost all up hill and it’s at least an acre. It’s definitely more like cross training right now.”
Tomczik stays in touch with her team as well. “One friend in particular, she has an Apple Watch and so do I, so we can complete against each other and it’s like a week-long, ‘who can exercise more’ kind of thing.”
Sophia de los Reyes ’23, Tennis
“Right now, my coach has two works outs on [Bridge, an app designed to guide workouts for sports teams]. One is the one we usually do during the season and the other is a body weight workout, so it’s like less weights, which is better because, well, not going to the gym,” de los Reyes said.
“I’ve been doing the harder one, the body weight one, because I haven’t had the chance to play a lot of tennis. On the hard one, I like doing the ones that are less sets but a lot more reps, where they’re like, three sets of 50. I hate when you’re on one set out of 20 because then you’re like, ‘Wow they’re so much.’ I’ve been doing these workouts, even the harder ones, with my mom because I actually stick with it if there’s someone relying on me.”
Kaylin Kuhn ’21, Volleyball
“I started out doing a bit of running, and then at-home body weight workouts. Then I decided I don’t really like running, so I kind of transferred into pyrometric stuff like jumping and agility things that will help what I need to work on with volleyball. That way I don’t need to run long distances, which I don’t enjoy. Some hiking and stuff, anything I can find really that’s outdoors and not in a gym. I just didn’t feel safe there.”
Kuhn is living in Grinnell and has access to the outdoor track. “It’s different intervals with leg exercises—jump squats, I’ll do lunges and switching jumps—just eight different leg exercises that involve jumping and then a lap around the track, and I repeat that a couple times.”
Kuhn has also taken up playing tennis to help with directional mobility. “My housemate and I play a bunch, and we have another off-campus person that we play with.”
Loyal Terry ’23, Football
“I aim to work out at least three times a week. I don’t have weights here but I was able to get a dumbbell before they all sold out, so I’ll do some shoulder exercises, goblet squats and core exercises. I rotate a lot with the dumbbell, do a lot of body weight stuff,” Terry said.
“Since I hate running, I have a little stationary bike that I share with my mom. If I see myself watching TV for a while or doing work, I get up and go do 20 pushups at the side so I’m not doing work the whole day. … My girlfriend and I, we’ll do some stuff together. Right now, we’re waiting on the gyms to work out to do outdoor. It makes a lot of difference if you have a workout buddy. My friends and I will challenge ourselves to see how much we can do. For example, I was able to do 63 sit-ups in a sitting. My friend was only able to do 50.”
Kian Djamali ’22, Soccer
“I don’t have any set routine that’s been given to me. I kind of do stuff based on what I feel. In the past week I lifted weights twice and went on a three-mile run twice. I haven’t been doing much activity, but coaches said they want us to have fitness benchmarks, so I’ve prepared for that. Nothing very routine,” Djamali said.
“When I’m working out, I’m working hard. It’s not a slow pace; if I’m doing something, I make sure I’m doing a hard workout. For lifting weights, [it’s] usually an hour. If it’s a run, it’s normally a half hour to 40 minutes. Usually it’s one or the other depending on what day it is.”
Djamali has shifted focus from cardio-only to a mix of exercises. “Originally the cardio was the exercise I needed to do to prepare for soccer. Also the reason I shifted is because I enjoy lifting weights more than cardio and, also, there’s not as much emphasis on soccer since I won’t be able to play anyway.”
