To my community athletes:
Our friends at UVa kindly reached out to me yesterday for my thoughts and feedback regarding the possible temporary closure of the Lannigan Field track. After a thorough and thoughtful conversation with them, I was fully supportive of temporarily closing the gates, despite the obvious inconvenience to those of us who use it on regular basis, as it’s in the best interest of the health of our community.
You all have already been great about following the new norm of social distancing but some folks within our community are not practicing these safe measures and keeping the gates open to the general public could lead to social clustering. The university has closed down all of the other fitness and recreation centers, including all of their indoor pools, in an effort to slow the growth of this virus, so it only made sense to me that we also play a role, no matter how small it may be, in supporting this call for universal safety measures within our community by respecting this tough decision to close this beautiful outdoor track.
I know this will be a big sacrifice for many of us but, in the overall picture of what many of our neighbors are personally giving up, this is the least we can do in saying “we’re all in this together”. Our friends at UVa have been very generous to us in so many ways over the years, including opening the gates to a lit track at 5:30 every morning, so supporting this thoughtful decision is just one small way of showing how grateful we are.
Thanks for understanding and for your unending support, my friends and athletes.
Be safe and keep moving!
Coach Mark
434-962-1694 (text)
Our friends at UVa kindly reached out to me yesterday for my thoughts and feedback regarding the possible temporary closure of the Lannigan Field track. After a thorough and thoughtful conversation with them, I was fully supportive of temporarily closing the gates, despite the obvious inconvenience to those of us who use it on regular basis, as it’s in the best interest of the health of our community.
You all have already been great about following the new norm of social distancing but some folks within our community are not practicing these safe measures and keeping the gates open to the general public could lead to social clustering. The university has closed down all of the other fitness and recreation centers, including all of their indoor pools, in an effort to slow the growth of this virus, so it only made sense to me that we also play a role, no matter how small it may be, in supporting this call for universal safety measures within our community by respecting this tough decision to close this beautiful outdoor track.
I know this will be a big sacrifice for many of us but, in the overall picture of what many of our neighbors are personally giving up, this is the least we can do in saying “we’re all in this together”. Our friends at UVa have been very generous to us in so many ways over the years, including opening the gates to a lit track at 5:30 every morning, so supporting this thoughtful decision is just one small way of showing how grateful we are.
Thanks for understanding and for your unending support, my friends and athletes.
Be safe and keep moving!
Coach Mark
434-962-1694 (text)