Liz Copan / ecopan@summitdaily.com
BRECKENRIDGE — On Friday Summit High School Athletic & Activities Director Travis Avery elaborated on how the Colorado High School Activities Association’s suspension of high school sports through at least April 6 will affect Summit Tiger teams and players. The association is the state governing body for high school athletics.
On Thursday the association announced that due to concerns surrounding the COVID-19 coronavirus, all CHSAA-sanctioned state high school athletics games and practices were suspended through at least April 6, effective Friday, March 13.
Avery said though the decision prevents Tiger teams from convening for practices or games with Summit coaches, electronic communication between Tiger coaches and their players is permitted through April 6.
“I talked to all our coaches using our existing communication platforms,” Avery said, “and most teams are on some sort of texting platform, communication platform, they can give kids workouts and be in communication checking in with them.
“The kids can work out on their own,” Avery continued. “I met with teams at their final practices (Thursday), with the exception of track and field, who were at their meet. We reviewed expectations, made sure we were clear.”
Avery added that at those practices Thursday there were questions from some older Tiger athletes about if it would be OK for them to organize meetups without coaches and with fellow athletes during the season suspension.
Avery said he reiterated to the Tiger athletes that CHSAA’s intent is to prevent the convening of large groups amid the coronavirus concerns and to respect that purpose.
COVID-19, which stands for coronavirus disease 2019, is caused by a type of coronavirus. The World Health Organization has declared the COVID-19 outbreak a global pandemic.
Avery continued to say that right now “there are a lot of questions without answers” in terms of how the season will resume and how the remainder of activity will be affected if and when athletics activity resume April 6, or possibly later.
“There are a lot of things to figure out,” Avery said. “The spring is always challenging. Everyone has a spring break. It falls into different places, there is end-of-year stuff with prom and graduation that adds to the scheduling piece. We’ll see what CHSAA comes up with and move forward.
“If we can play again and resume,” the athletics director continued, “what kind of season would that be? Would they run playoffs, hold to those dates at the end of season, or push that off a little bit? Baseball already goes into June — for teams who make the last weekend — which dominoes pushing over and how you build backward from that.”
On Thursday, Avery sent an email to school families outlining the impacts to SHS spring sports and activities. The email noted that along with suspension of all practices and games, other team activities, including any planned fundraising or strength and conditioning sessions, were prohibited. He further noted all speech & debate and band and choir activities are also suspended.