The weight room, Clover Hill’s most underutilized feature out of all the athletic facilities.  Students rally for increased access to Clover Hill’s weight room, and the school is in desperate need of a strength and conditioning coach, as that is the limiting factor for heightened utilization of the school’s athletic facilities.

Clover Hill’s weight room facility is not currently used as much as it could be, due to lack of adult supervision outside of school hours.  Prior to the pandemic, there was an active weightlifting club, sponsored by Coach Jeremy Fox, however due to lack of participation, along with Coach Fox’s recent success with the wrestling team, the club dwindled.

Baseball Coach Brett Mooney explains why the weight room has not been used: “There weren’t many kids that were involved in it. With the weight room open to the entire school you would only have 3 or 4 kids show up,” said  Mooney, “So that really became a challenge.”

With the lack of a school weightlifting club, it is extremely difficult for non-athletes, or even athletes during off-seasons, to obtain access and utilize the facility.   

“Unfortunately if your team isn’t doing any off-season conditioning, students that don’t have a team that’s working don’t have access” said Mooney.

Many Clover Hill students who do not participate in sports are still active in the gym. Without adult supervision, a significant challenge for the school, access to the athletic facilities is restricted.

“What would be nice is to have a strength coach for the entire athletic department,” Mooney said, “Where they would be allowed to be in charge of the weight room for all sports, which would take some load off of the head coaches.”

Clover Hill students have voiced their opinion on the subject, and discuss the benefits they believe a weightlifting club would have on the student population.

Junior Will Lohr believes the gym is a place for self improvement for teens. “It’s always good to get people active in the gym and teach people how to better themselves,” said Lohr.  

Senior Henry Shields has been an avid lifter for many years, and agrees that weightlifting positively affects teens, “I think a weightlifting club would benefit the students because it would create an environment where we can help build our students at Clover Hill, both physically and mentally,” Shields said.

These students also emphasize the positive effects that weightlifting has had on their lives, along with the beneficial experiences they have had using the school’s weight room.

“It was really a good experience. I enjoyed it because I could focus and the equipment was great,” Lohr said. 

“Weightlifting has affected my life by helping to motivate and strengthen me both mentally and physically, and also help me to overcome challenges in and out [of] the weight room,” said Shields.

An athletic facility overlooked by many, and even unknown to some, Clover Hill’s weight room utilization needs to be increased, and a revival of the weightlifting club should be heavily considered, as students are interested, and athletes would benefit significantly with the addition of a strength and conditioning coach.