Warm up creates difficulty starting spring sports season

By Patrick Browne
Although the recent warm weather has the Forest Park and West Iron high school teams excited to get outside and begin their practices, the snow melt has caused a delay. Large puddles, standing water and slush led to all games being canceled this past week and are keeping our high school teams practicing indoors.
In her second year as the Forest Park softball coach, Kimberly Pekarek took her team to play in a softball tournament at the Superior Dome prior during Spring Break hoping the experience would offer the team an opportunity to get a jump start on her competition. 
Unfortunately, with the higher-than-normal temperatures, the Runkel Lake softball field which operates as the Forest Park homefield was quickly made unplayable when the temperatures soared into the 70s almost overnight and melted the snow but left a considerable ice sheet. The opening of the season had to be delayed until the fields could drain.
“Our team has been practicing indoors, but there’s only so much you can do,” stated Pekarek, “the girls can’t really take full swings and the balls we use indoors are much different.”
On Wednesday, March 12 the varsity girls’ softball team decided to help Mother Nature and spent their practice shoveling the slush off their playing field at Runkel Park.
“The entire team went out for about two hours to shovel and try to remove some of the remaining ice and water. We even dug a few trenches so water could drain off the field,” stated Pekarek.
“We are hopeful to have our opener next Thursday, but with temperatures predicted to dip back to the 40’s, we may have another delay.”