No live sport since mid-March 2020.

In mid-March the coronavirus stopped sport mid-stride. Most individuals, who have been confined to their houses, have not been able to watch live sports for nearly 2 months. However, there is good news on the horizon with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) joining the ranks of other organisations getting sports back on track.

The National Collegiate Athletic Association is getting sports back on track.

As sports in different parts of the world are starting to resume (check out what other sports have resumed, or are in the pipeline, here), the NCAA has announced that athletes may begin using the facilities on campus for voluntary training sessions from the 8^th of June. There are guidelines that have been announced by the American College Health Association which need to be followed. A few of the basic guidelines include:

• Ramping up education for the sports medicine staff,
• Having personal protective equipment (PPE) for all staff,
• Assessing the potential of Covid-19 transmission,
• Examination of the entire training facility to calculate space for social distancing and,
• Strict supervision of all workout sessions.

Not all NCAA sport will begin immediately.

Although the players and staff are allowed back onto campus now, this does not mean that all sports will start immediately. Assessments on sports need to be undertaken – such as whether the sport in question is contact or non-contact, and team or individual. It is more likely that the individual and non-contact sports will resume before the contact sports such as Football and Basketball.

A new dawn for sport?

Even if sports are coming back in all forms, it will all be completely new and different to how it used to be. There is no doubt there are going to be many changes to everything on campus and that it could be the start of a new beginning.

For more information on this topic visit: https://www.forbes.com/sites/karenweaver/2020/05/09/return-to-play-guidance-emerges-for-college-sports-colleges/#c080a611e9a3

 About the Author

Gregory Gordon.

Gregory Gordon is currently a Senior Video Analyst at VS Sports, who is highly involved in the analytics process by performing the analysis as well as managing the video analysts in the company. Gregory is in charge of training the video analysts in all the sports which are offered at VS Sports as well as ensuring that the quality of the analysis is being maintained consistently. He is passionate about sport conditioning and assisting athletes in optimising their sporting abilities. Gregory has obtained his Master’s degree in Sports Science (MPhil) through the University of Johannesburg as well as acquiring a Higher Certificate in Exercise Science through the HFPA. He previously has worked at Orlando Pirates FC for an internship where many different skills were learned and developed through the process.