Blog #5

Blog #5

The topics I am most interested in after writing these blogs is the idea of team dynamics within an athletic facility versus a normal gym. I say this because while observing the teams working out in both environments, you can clearly see the differences when it comes to the attitude, the energy, the work ethic etc. Also factoring in the normal staff and students working out as well in the normal gym, I am able to include them into the discussion even though they are not athletes. I’ve chosen this idea over my previous one because it is able to start up multiple arguments over the topic and each side has valid reasons to rebuttal the opposing side. For example, when asking a normal student about athletic facilities and if they should be funded or scrapped, they said “less funding for athletics and more to the school’s community.” They can argue this point by explaining the decline of success athletics has had in previous years. Why would you continue to fund a losing team?  

It makes sense, but however that argument can be fired right back upon. If all athletic teams were supposed to lift in one tiny gym, how much good work would actually be done? Would it just bring down the work ethic of athletes and make them worse? That is why I chose this topic. If done right, I think this could be set up right for a research topic and argument piece. By going more in depth with the observations by branching out to other schools to find similar findings and asking more questions, a more concise understanding of why athletic facilities are important to a colleges athletics.

Blog #4

Blog #4

My last observations are with the female athletes here at Pace. Just like the male athletes, female athletes have exclusive access to the athletic facilities on campus as well. Since each athletic team has different mandatory lift times, I had to observe a female athletic team when it was there schedule lift. So I went for a short while to watch Pace’s women's soccer and basketball. First thing I automatically picked up on was the girls are more open to talking while exercising, while retaining good discipline and work ethic. This is a huge difference between the males and females because when us guys start to lose discipline by talking to much we tend to mess up in our workouts, main reason why our coach is always watching us. But for the women the coach was a little less strict and let the girls talk a bit more.

Besides that aspect, the females were almost like the males when it came to working out. While talking, they were serious about the task they were performing at hand, and the energy wasn’t as rambunctious as the males, but they were still cheering teammates on whenever they completes a really heavy set of weight. For basketball, the girls focused on a lot of more all-around workouts, as for soccer they focused on more leg and core strengthening. The language wasn’t different at all either. For example, when cheering their teammates on, one of the girls was screaming “Move the weight!” On the football team, we say that every time before we lift, setting into our minds that we are here to lift to get better. I asked a junior on the basketball team, Jackie Dellisanti, if she think she gets a better workout inside of Goldstein, the school’s open gym or inside here in the field house. She said “Well in Goldstein you are free to work on whatever you want, but I believe you don’t work as hard cause you aren’t working with your team. In here everyone is working hard so you do not want to fall behind everyone and bring the team down.” With her words, I was able to put these observations more towards why athletic facilities are important to a schools athletic program.

Weight room inside the field house

Blog #3

Blog #3

My second group I decided to observe was athletes next. Instead of just observing them within the athletic building, I observed them within the gym that is open for everyone as well to see a difference. I also observed the difference between male and female teams within the athletic space, to find a difference between the two. The field house is an athletic facility strictly for athletes as stated before, so I am able to observe how athletes are able to workout and interact with each other. Being apart of the football team, I was able to make my first observation easily, since I am already involved with working out.

Watching my fellow teammates lift and workout helped me make some key observations. Firstly, the field house weight room is under supervision by our strength and conditioning coach. This puts the idea of surveillance in your head, that the coach is always watching you. So everyone wasn’t goofing off at all, conversations were being made but only briefly. While lifting, you can see everyone is working hard. The coach is pushing you to go hard and stay focused on your technique. The players are pushing each other by screaming words of encouragement and jumping around as someone completes a really heavy set, and bombarde the athlete and they all start jumping around screaming together.

Now going to Goldstein with a few of my fellow teammates, the energy is kinds of different. Here it is more lackadaisical than being in the field house weight room, and mainly it is like that because it isn’t an organized lift. There are no eyes watching or anyone there to ridicule you if you do an exercise wrong. It’s just you and your teammates getting extra work in. While in the gym, I noticed that conversations were flowing a lot more freely, even in the middle of the exercises. Since we are not stuck to a certain workout, they were able to do their own workouts as well. We also had our phones as well, but for music purposes. Normal students that recognized the few of us came up and said hello, starting short conversations before doing their own workouts.  Comparing both environments, I can see that a good amount of work is being done. However, in the field house it is more high-intensity energy and little distractions. In the open gym the intensity isn’t as high and there are more distractions from the crowded area, the phones, and the lack of surveillance present. These observations shows that the male athletes get a lot more done in the athletic facility, showing a prime reason why it is needed for them.

Football athletes lifting in the field house

Blog #2

Blog #2

The first group I decided to observe was normal students and staff. Normal students and staff don’t have access to certain buildings on campus. For example, there is a building called the Ianello Field House. That building is strictly for athletes and coaches only, plus the training staff that uses the building too. They don’t have access to the older field house either right by the baseball field. Basically normal students are limited to an extent. Students and staff have access to a whole other building too, which is the Goldstein fitness center, the school’s gym. Here everyone can go here to do what they like, from working out to swimming to playing games on the courts.

When I went to go observe this social space, I asked one student what they think of buildings being exclusive for only athletes. The student, who wanted to stay anonymous, gave an intriguing answer. “Well sports are a huge part of a school’s community, so athletes need no distractions if they want to be good and win. If the whole football team had to come everyday to Goldstein to workout, it wouldn’t produce good results.” I can see why they said that, because inside the gym there was a good amount of people. Observing, I see that the equipment from here and the field house are totally different, where the equipment is meant for all kinds of uses. While in there, the people working out all had different kinds of energy and tempo. People in little groups interacted with each other very minimally, other people just stayed on their phone, while other people just was working out solo. Some people had to wait for machines cause they were occupied as well.

Goldstein Fitness Center

Pool

Blog #1

Blog #1

The space I have decided to observe is the athletic facilities on college campuses. In my opinion I feel like as an athlete the type of facilities available to you are important and can sometimes make or break if you decide to go to that university. Athletic facilities most of the time are strictly for athletes and that is for a number of reasons. One reason is it allows athletes to workout away from regular students, letting them build up their bodies for the upcoming season. For athletes this is an asset that they use frequently. But for non-athletes, it comes as a little annoying for some. While there is an open gym on campus, and it has a good array of workout equipment, everyone can go there. People on and off campus, athletes and staff, it can become crowded at times.

In the eyes of some students, additional buildings for just athletes seems unfair and should be pulled and changed for some students. Listening to the different opinions and sides from each group I question, I hear different answers. It intrigues me to learn what the student body thinks about certain aspects of athletics. In college, the cultural relationship between students and athletes are strong in most parts. But there are some unspoken problems between the two groups that are not as apparent. Finding out what it is drives me to do more research about it, talk about it with other people, and coming to an overall conclusion.

The main thing I am planning to observe for my studies is the work ethic and drive of normal students, male athletes, and female athletes inside a normal gym environment versus them training inside the athletic facilities. Things I am looking for would be the energy in the room obviously, the condition of the rooms from the equipment to the amount of people occupying the room at once. Also I am looking to see the differences of team dynamics between male and female athletes. Observing each group closely I am sure to figure out some answers to my questions.

One of Pace's Athletic Facilities 

Football Field