Due to COVID-19, LBCC suspended all sports tournaments and training for the spring and fall semesters, which led to student athletes taking matters into their own hands in order to train.
While some other Southern California schools managed to bring back athletes to their campuses to start training for next season, this is not the case for LBCC athletes yet.
When LBCC classes were moved to online and all competitions canceled, the initial reaction of Daisy Garcia, the starting center back of the Viking women’s soccer team, was that the team was just “On a break, but then they said they are extending (online classes) for the whole semester, and that’s when reality kicked in.”
She said that it was a very stressful time for her because she could not play the sport she loves.
Participation in team sports was affected by COVID-19 because team members could not exercise as a group, so each individual student athlete had to manage to work out personally.
At the beginning of the pandemic, Kimberly Izarraras, midfielder of LBCC’s women’s soccer team, had to start training by herself.
She said it was complicated to get the usual amount of training because “certain parks are closed and there are not many parks that have soccer goals. All I can do right now is work on my touches and stay in condition.”
Garcia started her workouts at night by doing soccer drills in her backyard and running around her neighborhood.
“My dad has been really helpful because he went out to buy exercise equipment,” she said.
Garcia added, “I feel grateful to have small resources because it was just enough to help me get back where I was at before.”
In order to keep in shape, Garcia and Izarraras had to create and adapt into new daily routines.
Izarraras’s routine consists of working out every day. Usually she starts by waking up at 7 a.m. and attending her online classes. Later, she proceeds to exercise in different ways such as running, doing full body exercises, and practicing on her touches by joggling and wall passes.
For her daily routine, Garcia said, “I’ll do a small warm-up run around my block. Then I usually start with strings and, depending on the day, I’ll do arms or other (muscle groups). Then, I would do a small stretch. After that I would go to my backyard and then pull up whatever work out that Eddie (the women’s soccer coach) already had for us for that day. From there that’s when I actually do the whole cool-down.”
Eduardo Nunes, coach of the women’s soccer team, keeps track of the students in order for them to be in the best shape possible. He sends training routines before the week starts in order for them to organize their time to complete all soccer sessions.
Nunes said “I post four workouts a week and some discussions each week as well. I try to do some team building, game analysis each week as part of the discussion.”
Izarraras and Garcia share the same goal of getting recruited by a four-year school. “I want to play at a higher level,” said Izarraras.
The soccer season is currently expected to be in-person in spring 2021.
In the previous year’s soccer league, the LBCC’s women’s soccer team finished in third place.
“Last year we were really close to winning league, so hopefully we get that championship as well,” said Garcia.
Garcia and Izarraras expressed how excited they are to train with the entire team again when the time is correct.
“It is hard to prepare for that (soccer league) when the whole team is not together, but I think once we go back to actually seeing each other and training with each other, we could be definitely prepared for our spring season,” Garcia said.