Elite-level anxiety Patience not just a virtue, it's a necessity for young Manitoba athletes whose training regimes, competitions and summer jobs have been upended by COVID-19 By: Mike Sawatzky Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Monday, Apr. 27, 2020 Last Modified: 8:23 PM CDT Monday, Apr. 27, 2020 Updates

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This article was published 26/04/2020 (1714 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In a pandemic world, athletes can feel pretty hopeless.

When gyms, swimming pools, weight rooms and arenas close indefinitely, what are you supposed to do?

Megan Van Heyst was in that spot earlier this month. The 17-year-old from Stony Mountain, a Grade 12 student at Stonewall Collegiate, is a triathlete with a promising future on the national scene.

In 2019, she competed at the Western Canada Summer Games in Swift Current, Sask., finishing seventh in the individual event, third in the female relay and second in the mixed relay.

At the close of the competitive season, she was honoured by Triathlon Manitoba as its junior female athlete of the year.

This spring was to have been the start another breakthrough season and she spent the winter running on a treadmill and riding her bike on rollers in a converted part of her family’s garage while also getting up in the early morning hours to squeeze in some much-needed laps at the University of Manitoba pool.

Then government restrictions closed all public training facilities and Triathlon Canada moved to cancel all of its events until at least June 30. The outlook was bleak.

“The first week was pretty difficult to get myself to keep going because it felt like, ‘What’s the point of this?’ says Megan. “But next year, I’m hoping to get to the Canada Games and that’s what’s keeping me training.”

In Van Heyst’s case, there was a glimmer of hope. With temperatures warming, she will soon be able to resume running and cycling outdoors but the seasonal changes are no help for swimmers.

Megan’s parents, Dave and Lauri, are big supporters of their daughter’s athletic career and they were puzzled over what to do. Then Dave struck on a potential solution when he remembered seeing swim spas, which are small machines that allow people to swim continuously against a current.

“That was what twigged me to the idea to do something like this,” says Dave. “I saw there was a company that makes an above-ground pool but it’s really small, intended to be a swim spa. The problem is all the small above-ground pools would be too shallow.”

Dave’s construction idea was ingenious in its simplicity.

“The first week was pretty difficult to get myself to keep going because it felt like, ‘What’s the point of this?’” – Megan Van Heyst

“I was thinking about it for a few days, almost a week, and looking on the internet and then I thought, ‘I’m just going to try something,’” says Dave. “We picked up a cheap (pool) liner at Canadian Tire and some plywood and a couple of two-by-fours and started framing something up. Surprisingly, it actually worked.”

The finished result was an octagonal pool measuring about 10 feet across and deep enough to hold three feet of water. Although there is no current in the pool, Megan wears a belt over her wetsuit that is tethered to a wall of the garage. The wetsuit makes her more buoyant and she has quickly adapted to the environment, often swimming continuously for an hour or more.

“The first swim was kinda strange,” says Megan. “It took me a while to focus on how my body has to move because the main thing with swimming is you don’t want to lose your technique. So that’s what I’ve really been focusing on. Now I’ve figured it out and it’s really good.”

The water is cold, which is no big deal.

“I would say some people wouldn’t use it,” says Lauri. “Megan likes the cold more than the average person. Even in triathlon races that are held in lakes early in June, people are suffering but she’s comfortable.”

If one triathlete can adapt her training during the COVID-19 crisis, how are other elite Manitoba athletes doing? Here’s a sampling:

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Solo training is one thing, but what about top tennis players? Indoor courts have been shuttered citywide and outdoor courts, normally open May 1, weather permitting, are no guarantee this year.

“I’ve been trying to do some home workouts,” says Kevin Kylar, the province’s top-ranked male professional. “It’s tough for me because I’ve never been that keen on going to the gym. I’ve always done it for tennis, right? So without playing tennis, it’s tough to find the motivation.

“But I’ve been trying to keep a daily routine, whether it’s working out or doing some school work, just to keep myself sane. If you don’t do anything, it’s awful.”

The combination of not playing tennis and having nothing to do has made it tough.

Kylar, 25, returned to Winnipeg earlier this month from England’s Loughborough University, where he had been wrapping up his first year of studies in the school’s sports science and management program.

He is able complete his schoolwork online but the pandemic has thrown the rest of 2020 into turmoil. Kylar was planning to return to England in late June for a three-week summer job as a statistician at Wimbledon.

Now, that income is lost as are the earnings he was planning to accrue as a teaching pro back home.

“To lose that is tough, income-wise, and then just to not play, I think since I was 10 I’ve grown up at the tennis club,” says Kylar. “To not have that has been really different. It’s the longest I’ve ever gone without doing anything tennis-related, whether it’s teaching, stringing, playing.”

The shutdown is also impacting younger players, such as 12-year-old Andrea Oros.

Oros, a Grade 7 student at Robert Andrews Middle School in East St. Paul, has been playing seriously for four years and cracked the national top-20 rankings in her age group last year.

Late last month, a trip to the spring nationals in Vancouver was cancelled and the competition schedule for the rest of 2020 is uncertain.

“I’m missing a lot,” says Andrea. “I’m missing my mobility to play as well as I did when I was practising every day. It’s hard to keep up the level I was on.”

Andrea is maintaining a fitness program at home but that has limited appeal for someone who is used to spending up to four or five hours on court per day at the Taylor Tennis Club indoor facility.

There is a ray of hope, however.

Kylar’s father George manages the city-owned Sargent Park Tennis Club, which has six fully redeveloped courts. George Kylar hopes that by observing physical distancing and strictly limiting the number of players in the facility, he can receive approval to be up and running early next month.

Until then, they wait.

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If you’re a football player during the pandemic you’d be hard-pressed to find a better setup than what Brody Williams has built at his family’s home in Oakbank.

The 21-year-old University of Manitoba linebacker had his 2019 season interrupted by a torn rotator cuff but he has returned to full health and his off-season training regimen hasn’t suffered a bit. The Bisons have some of the best training facilities in the country at IG Field but Williams’ home gym, which occupies a portion of a quadruple garage, has everything he needs.

“Any type of football training, really,” says Williams, a chiselled 5-10, 220-pounder. “I’ve got the (weight) rack outside. I have another machine, it’s what we call the prowler. It’s basically a sled that you put weights on. It’s just to simulate running. I’ve also got a couple of speed ladders outside and parachutes for running.

“I’ve even got some of my equipment around here so if I ever want to put on my pads to get the game feel on, I can do that well.”

While workouts have continued unabated, Williams says the cancellation of Bisons spring camp was a gut punch. And the eventual start of the season is far from guaranteed.

“Honestly, just knowing there isn’t going to be any type of a camp, it’s a bit devastating,” says Williams. “But at the same time, hey, I have to keep training. I have everything I need. There’s nothing that can slow me down. It’s not the same for other guys. Other guys don’t have a home gym. I’ve seen a couple of guys using water jugs as dumb bells.”

Two teammates have joined him occasionally for workouts but care is taken.

“I know how some people can perceive how athletes haven’t been social-distancing as well (as others) but at the same time, I know we’ve at least kept to the rules,” says Williams, who’s enrolled in the U of M’s criminology program. “It’s been difficult but at least a couple of us have been able to maintain the bodies we had.”

Some other teammates have texted, hoping to secure an opening at the Williams gym.

His response? “Hey man, I wish I could but I can’t,” he says. “But they’re very understanding.”

Some of the hardest-hit Bisons are receiver Macho Bockru and defensive lineman Brock Gowanlock, who are eligible for the CFL Draft but lost a chance to move up in the rankings when the national combine was cancelled.

“We all felt for them on that,” says Williams. “That’s hard to see two of your boys work their tails off all off-season and end up with nothing.”

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The pandemic shutdown has been bad news for basketball players left without a place to play, but that isn’t stopping Lorence dela Cruz.

Dela Cruz, a starting guard on the St. Paul’s High School varsity boys team, has been hard at work on an improvised mini court constructed with patio blocks in backyard of his Amber Trails home.

Joined by his uncle and personal skills coach Anthony Carino, dela Cruz has been trying to refine his jump shot while also adding lift to his vertical leap.

“It is what it is,” says the soft-spoken dela Cruz, who will be entering Grade 11 next fall. “I can just play here and get better.”

The astonishing thing about dela Cruz is that despite standing only 5-7, he is a prodigious leaper and capable of dunking, owing to his 42-inch vertical.

“We play one-on-one, we train or he just gets rebounds,” he says of his daily routine with Carino.

The backyard court isn’t quite big enough for a 3-on-3 competition but there has been talk of an expansion.

“Absolutely, it’s better than no gym at all,” said Carino, 24. “This gets him to practise his form shooting, dribbling and we do agility ladders here. So he gets physically active. We stay on the concrete most of the time and when he feels like shooting farther, he goes out all the way out there.”

With the high school season cut short prior to the provincial championships and the next month’s provincial team tryouts in jeopardy, dela Cruz is looking for any edge he can get.

“I have to work hard and I want to play at university and I want to play basketball when I’m old,” he says. “I’d like to play and earn money at the same time.”

Crusaders head coach Jeff Laping sees a bright future for dela Cruz.

“I think his potential is really good,” says Laping. “One of the things you look at, particularly with the athletes that go to the next level, is that explosiveness, that athleticism, which Lorence really does have.”

Dela Cruz was St. Paul’s only tournament all-star at the Father Barry Classic in Sacramento, Calif., and played against some top schools from across the state during the Christmas break.

“For Lorence, it’s going to be just how well how well he’s going to be able to keep his skill level progressing with his athletic ability. Because, he’s a pretty good shooter but he’s not a knock-down shooter right now. And I think over the course of this year, there were some games — a lot of our big wins — Lorence played really, really well…

“Then he’s also had games were he kinda looked like a Grade 10 kid, where he ends up with three or four points and kinda struggles all game. That consistency is something he’ll definitely improve on.”

mike.sawatzky@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @sawa14