Summer Workouts Resume for Leopard Athletes

La Grange High School athletes were able to return to voluntary workouts Monday.

Sixty-five high school players showed up Monday.

It was the first organized school athletics for La Grange in about three months, dating back to when coronavirus precautions halted all school activities back in early March.

“It’s been great being around them, interacting with them,” said La Grange athletic director Matt Kates, who spent a lot of time during the workouts making sure the athletes were spaced out properly to comply with social distancing guidelines as they ran and did stretches on the football field. “They need us, we need them. Just having some sense of normalcy is really exciting, It’s a first step. They haven’t done much in three months, so this is just about getting them to sweat a little bit. Get them a little tired, not too tired because we’ve got to be smart.

“Something’s better than nothing.”

Kates said the athletes returned in varying states of fitness.

“It’s all across the board, some better than others,” Kates said of the players. “We lost three months of the biggest part of offseason. The only positive thing is we are all in the same boat statewide. We talk about handling and adapting to different situations all the time on Friday nights so this is a pretty good crash course on that.”