A normal day in the life of an athlete doesn’t involve getting special treatments from teachers or receiving free Starbucks, although we all wish that did happen.
A normal day goes more like this: wake up early, 5 a.m. to be exact; throw on some team issued clothes, because that’s all you own; grab something quick to eat to avoid passing out while practicing; and make it to the arena on time without waking up your roommate.
There are some things you should know about Hamline athletes.
Our team gear is the only clothes we own:
Yes, you can probably tell who is an athlete on campus by what they are wearing. We don’t purposely wear the same clothes every day, but we barely have enough time to shower let alone try to look nice. So, if you see us with our hair wet and athletic apparel on, just know we’re just trying to make it to class on time.
Our bodies hurt all the time:
If we’re not at practice, you can find us in the training room. We have amazing trainers here at Hamline University, and they are basically our second mothers. At the training room, we have many machines that help treat and prevent injuries. We also have student trainers who work in the training room and at our practices. They are incredibly helpful with setting up machines or giving us water when we need it.
We get stressed out easily:
Being involved in an extracurricular activity comes with stress. Balancing schoolwork and athletics may be harder than you think. Most likely, we are stressed about a big test and a big game at the same time. To relieve our stress, we do yoga, take naps and make each other laugh as much as possible.
We’re always in season, even if we’re actually not:
Yes, in season is a grind trying to balance school and athletics, but it never really ends. When we aren’t in season, we can be found in the weight room at 6 a.m. or practicing with our teammates. In 2012, Jason Verdugo became Hamline’s new athletic director and has been focused on raising a name for all Hamline athletics. We are a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division three league, but all of us practice and play like NCAA Division one athletes.
We need to eat all the time:
Our bodies need fuel in order to play our sports every day, so you can say we eat A LOT. On campus, we have The Bishop’s Bistro.and Leo’s Corner.Another place you see athletes at constantly is Subway. The Subway on campus is located right next to our weight room, so it is almost instinct for us to go there once we are done working out.
Being a college athlete is a lot of work, but in the end definitely worth it. Once you score your first goal and experience the rush you get, you’ll never want to look back.