Sweating lightly, I sat pedaling away on the old-school, yellow LeMond trainer along with 14 other classmates. We were the first of two Physical Wellness Dynamics groups to go through the 20-minute workout cycle.
I noticed several students showing signs of high fatigue: sweat running down the forehead, red cheeks, heavy breathing. But for me, as a track and field sprinter, this was just a warm-up.
About 25 percent of students are varsity athletes at Hillsdale College. I am one of them. Between orientation and graduation we athletes must take two semesters of physical education classes along with every other student. The requirement is illogical and worth reconsidering.
In 2009, the NCAA surveyed almost 3,000 Division II athletes to discern how much time they spent in sport-related activities during a typical school week.
The study found that men involved in Division II sports spend an average of 32.5 hours a week in athletic-related activities, and women spent an average of 29.6 hours. That works out to an average of 31 hours Division II athletes give to their sport every week.
In those hours, we athletes undergo intense workouts, become experts in our given sport, and train our bodies to perform the demanding tasks involved in collegiate athletics.
Given the extent and intensity of varsity practices, it does not make sense that we should be required to take physical activity classes.
Athletes must also engage in exercises that overlap with a normal practice routine. Take the class basic weightlifting, for example. Almost every athlete lifts weights regularly in their training. But in the name of completing the core, we must do the exact same thing as practice, only in a class-like structure. It is a meaningless redundancy that subtracts time from other commitments, such as — and don’t laugh — studying.
I am sure students who do not participate in a varsity sport benefit from physical courses, but varsity athletes already spend 30 hours a week training the body. No athlete needs to spend an hour or two per week learning what their practices already teach. To solve this illogical inconvenience, we athletes ought to receive an exemption from core requirements dealing with physical activity.
As I hopped off my Lemond at the end of the workout, I saw a group of students head to the shower, many probably glad the core only requires two semesters of activity courses. A handful of varsity athletes, including myself, also left, but the shower would only come after a tough running workout, technical event training, and a long lift — a lift much longer than the one hour spent at basic weightlifting.
