Works Cited

Works Cited

 

Colceri, Bryce. Personal Interview. 15 Nov, 2011.

Edward, Schauder. "8 Practical Considerations in Organizing Nostalgic Athletes Revenue Generating 
           Enterprises." In the News [New York] 11 2011, n. pag. Web. 21 Oct. 2012.

May, Jerry. Sport Psychology The Psychological Health of the Athlete. New York: PMA Publishing    Company, 1987. Print.

Warner , Stacy, and Marlene Dixon. "Understanding Sense of Community from the Athlete's Perpective." . Journal of Sport Management, n.d. Web. 16 Oct 2012.

Annotation 4

In my final location with in the student recreation center I chose the upstairs cardio area.  The second level of the rec center is mostly an area for people who want to stay in shape but not by lifting weights, but instead by running or biking.  There are treadmills, ellipticals, and cycling machines that allow for people to stay in good cardio shape.  This area always reminds me of the early conditioning practices that we would have for football practice and how those made us closer as a team.  Upstairs however, in resemblance to the weight room, it is mostly individuals working out on their own. Every now and then there are are a small group of the cycling machines together but nothing that compares to the large group of a team doing a workout together.  "The one thing that I hated were the morning workouts, but I loved them at the same time because it brought us all together as a team" (Colceri).  Even though there are small groups maybe running together and talking it does not compare to the bind that is made as a team when everyone is suffering in the heat all doing the same thing and having to make it through together, that is what made sports so fun.  Everyone suffering and at the end everyone rejoicing because we had made it past the toughest parts of the week.  With the equipment upstairs it is difficult to reach that same pinnacle because it is indoors and on a machine.  The only way that there is to capture the whole team setting when it comes to running and conditioning is to take it outside the rec center and on to the fields, and with a team of people everyone suffer through the same conditioning workout it will bring them all together.  And after it is all said and done celebrate with one another, but do not make it a one week event make it a daily event and form a bond that is comparable to that of a team.

 Cardio machines on the second floor of the SRC[Jackson Harley]

Annotation 3

When it comes to the weight room there is absolutely no team environment that is evident at all.  Every where with in the weight room one can observe people lifting all on their own.  This is an awkward setting especially for someone is who used to the structured lifting environment that they were used to with a team.  Lifting with a team everything was scheduled out on what we were supposed to do as a team and what we were supposed to do on out own.  But when it comes to lifting on your own outside of the team atmosphere, as May and Asken state is their book Sport Psychology, "players that are so accustomed to a team environment can feel isolated outside the game" (May Asken 250).  It seems like such a foreign place when you go there and lift and everyone in there is doing their own thing it is just different.  When you walk in you pretty much have to stake your spot because the weight room is always busy and if you do not stake your claim then someone else will. Which is completely different to the system that I was used to where you walk in and everyone had their stations and no one took your place.  The only way that a team atmosphere can be captured in the weight room is by going their daily with the same people and do the same workouts together, and designating certain lifts to certain days like teams do.  That is what I feel like is missing when I go to the weight room the closeness that was present in other weight rooms that I have been apart of and what I miss.  I believe that May and Asken really hit is the nail on the head when they said that former athletes feel isolated because it is completely true.  Sports took up a lot of time and now with all the free time some do not know how to kill it and it makes us feel isolated from the normal flow of things.

Weight room within the SRC[Jackson Harley]

Annotation 2

The west field outside of the student recreation center is a place where pick-up games and club practices are held.  On the field one can see random groups of people coming together to play in a non-formal setting just to exercise. This is just another example of the no team aspect that is present at the student recreation center.  The reason that there is no team environment on this specific field is because the pick-up games that are played there are just as it says, pick-up, they have no formal setting and not planned.  The teams that are made to play these games is simply a group of people who are present that are willing to play just for pure enjoyment.  There is no actual team environment because the randomness of people that make up the team which is unfortunate because in the eyes of a former athlete the feeling of being on a team is what makes sports enjoyable.  When I interviewed a man named Bryce Colceri he said that the thing that he misses most about not continuing sports is the "regret of not being able to play with the same team again" (Colceri).  The closest relationship to a team that is evident at the recreation center is the rugby team and their practices that they hold on the west field.  This is really nice to see because it is a true team environment, the whole team suffers when some one screws up, they all run and warm up together, and they all do their team break downs at the end of practice.  All of these are in my eyes what makes a team, one suffers they all suffer, and they all break it down when they make it through a tough practice a true team environment and it is a pleasure to see.

 Pick up game of soccer on the east field.[Jackson Harley]

Project 2 Student Recreation Center

The student recreation center is a location on campus that is accessible to all the students of Arizona State University who are willing to use it.  But in my eyes the recreation center is bad because it lacks the one thing that former athletes, such as me, were once so accustomed to, and that is the "sense of community" (Dixon Warner 1).  This map demonstrates the lack of community or team environment that the student recreation center possesses. A good recreation center would possess the team environment that is the focus of this project.  There would be fields outside the recreation center where only organized teams play.  Then there would be another field only for teams who sign up to play each week that provides a team atmosphere.  Another criteria to fit a team feel is team organized team workouts in a weight room or gym area.  And a final criteria for a team community is a the closeness that an environment brings for a team.  It is hard to explain it through quantitative evaluation but instead it is easier to portray through qualitative observations and what is seen at the recreation center and the rec center fields.  It is impossible to replicate the same team atmosphere that one had in high school or other team sports that they played outside of school but there is always an alternative.  The easiest way that one could replicate the team society is bring together a tight knit group of friends who they are familiar with; that brings back the brother/sisterhood of the team environment that one will most likely familiar with.

View Student Recreation Center in a larger map  

On my map I mark out four specific locations within the recreation center and outside the recreation center.  My first location is the west field outside the rec center.  The west field is an area that has the potential to be the team field to fit the criteria because the rugby and ultimate frisbee teams hold practices there everyday.  But the field also allows for pickup games of soccer, football, and games of catch with a  baseball  The only sport that has the team environment that I mentioned earlier is the rugby teams because they are organized sports teams on the campus.  The other sports that are played on the west field lack the team environment because they are just pickup games or simple games of catch that do not supply the team feeling to the sport activities.


The second location on my map outside of the recreation center is the east field which comes to life at night with the intramural football games. The east field does to an extent fit the criteria for a good recreation center because the intramural games are relateable to signing up to play on the fields, and the games are weekly with the same teammates. This has a more team like feel because everyone has to be on a team in order to play, however the lack of team atmosphere is still present.  For example even though teams are present on the field that feeling of team is just not there.  The teams are made  of some random people put together to make a team and then some people that know each other to some extent.  The closest example to a team that is present at the field is when the fraternities and sororities have their games, because most of the members of the team have been in their respective houses with each other for a couple of years so they are familiar with each other.  But I still feel like the close knit team community is still lacking even in these situations.


My third location is the weight room with in the student recreation center.  The weight room is a place that allows people to keep up with whatever workouts they want to by using the free weights or the weight machines.  There are rows of free weights that always are being used and it is nearly impossible to find the weights that one needs because they are always being used.  The weight machines are a more modern way that people have been lifting and takes them away from the free weights.  But I find it very hard to lift within the weight room because I am accustomed to the team weight workouts that became the norm for me.  It is a change up from the structured workouts that my high school football team to now a more chaotic lifting environment where it is first come first serve for everything that is there.


And my fourth location is the upstairs cardio area where there are treadmills, bicycle machines, and ellipticals that allow for people to increase their conditioning by doing long lasting workouts.  But these are individual workouts that again lack that team aspect that I am focusing on.  All the workouts that are accessible on the second floor are mostly individual workout stations as opposed to the weight room where it is possible to workout with at least a group of people, which could represent the team part of the recreation center.  The only thing that could make the second floor a team environment is working out in a large group like we did in my high school.  We had team conditioning everyday over the summer that made us all closer together and that is another hard thing to access in the recreation center with in the student recreation center.

Annotation 1

The east field on the student recreation center is home to intramural football games on Monday to Thursday nights.  From the perspective of a former athlete this is the closest representation of team that is present in or around the recreation center.  Sitting out there watching the games or even playing in them it made me think that the four year high school sport career that I had ended way too quickly.  Watching the games triggers memories about all the games that my teammates and I played in and how we can not those moments back.  The family environment that we all had with each other is no longer as strong as it once was because we all went our separate ways.  As stated in the news article written by Edward Schauder "after the players have gone their separate ways they seldom have a chance to interact with each other" (Schauder 1).  The team is what made sports so memorable and that is what I observe, being a former athlete, that the rec center lacks.  Now I know it is hard for a group of random people who are playing on a team together to bring together a sense of family, or what Warner and Dixon from East Carolina University and The University of Texas at Austin call a ""sense of community"" (Warner Dixon 1).  But there are ways to bring about that sense of team and community simply by getting to know the guys that are on the team.  Just playing together once a week does not fit the bill of being a team; there needs to be more chemistry built between the players.   A solution that I saw while at the fields multiple times are teams going out with each other after their games, other teams running mini practices with each other before their games, and then teams having meetings after their games.  All of these tactics do work to bring a team together but it still does not have the same affect that a four-year bond once had for a group of people throughout high school.

 Teams Warming up for an intramural game [Jackson Harley]