Loveland, Ohio – Summer will be here before you know it, which means football season is right around the corner! Many LHS athletes have been working hard during the Stay At Home Order so that they are prepared when competition starts up again. Coach Andy Cruse and his football players are one of the Tiger teams that have made sure that they are staying in shape for the 2020 upcoming season!
Coach Cruise told us that his players have not only been working hard but they have also been very creative with their workouts.
“One of the things we have tried to do as a football program to make sure we continue to make progress in the off-season is using the Team Buildr App. This app is great for bodyweight workouts and it also includes videos that show the proper technique for each exercise,” Cruse explained, “The app also has both dumbbell workouts and home gym workouts. We also created a 3k push-up challenge for the month of April, in which each player completes 100 push-ups a day. Many of our players are doing it with family members and often record themselves doing it to have a little fun with it. They are doing this on top of their regular workouts,” Cruse said.
Andy Cruse when he was introduced as the Tiger Head Coach in February of 2019 (File Photo)
Coach Cruse said that twice a week he is holding Zoom meetings with his players in order to get to know them better and discuss football.
“The Zoom meetings have been very positive. I think the players are really enjoying having interaction with their teammates and coaches during this time,” Cruse said, “We have encouraged our players to do position-specific drills as well. As a program, we are retweeting our players working out and spreading positivity as much as possible during this time,” Cruse added.
Due to all of the gyms being closed and of course, LHS athletes are not able to use any of the LHS facilities, Tiger athletes have been forced to get creative with how they are staying in shape. A few Tiger football players shared with us what they have been doing at home during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Gabe Ogdan was a Captain of the 2019 team. (File Photo)
Gabe Ogdan said, “I’m lucky enough to have my own home gym, but still have had to get creative for certain things! It’s been interesting but with not as much school I’ve been able to devote more time to speed and agility training as well as weight lifting and bulking.”
Max Huddleston said, “My home gym is minimal, and for some exercises, I may not have the right equipment. For example for pull-ups, since I don’t have a pull-up bar, I’ll do them on a steel beam in my basement.”
Mason Moore said, “I don’t have a home gym and the heaviest dumbbells I have are eight pounds, so I have to do my best to get my workouts in with what I can make do. I use paper plates as ab sliders, I do pull-ups on a metal beam on my ceiling, and I do lots of cardio along with the bodyweight workouts our coaches have us do.”
My dad is a landscaper so he had some stuff I could get creative with. I used bricks and stones to do various things and made a bench out of stones and a board and used a tube and metal bars to make a bar. – Weston Manske
Zach DeWitt said, “I am thankful to have many opportunities to maintain and build upon what we have been building this offseason. The absence of a field, however, has made me turn the front yard and driveway into everything I need for speed and agility training.”
Luca Aquilino said, “Since I only have a couple of things of workout equipment I’ve been sticking to lots of bodyweight workouts from our TeamBuildr app. I’ve had to use wooden shelving in my garage to do pull-ups and I have had to put bands around trees and around my basketball hoop to add a little bit of weight to workouts.”
Weston Manske said, “My dad got a bench this past weekend so now I can use that but before I had to get creative. My dad is a landscaper so he had some stuff I could get creative with. I used bricks and stones to do various things and made a bench out of stones and a board and used a tube and metal bars to make a bar. At my mom’s, I have resistance bands and then I found cinderblocks in my shed I use. I’ve also found basketball hoops are good for pull-ups.”
Loveland, Ohio – With May arriving in just a few days, many LHS students are still trying to process that they will not be stepping foot back into their schools for the remainder of the academic year. LHS student-athletes also received some devastating news last week confirming that they would not be competing in their designated Spring sport for the remainder of the school year. With all of the unfortunate news, LHS coaches have been trying to place a positive spin on everything by providing their athletes with workouts that they can do at home as well as a variety of other motivational tools!
LHS’s Head Women’s Volleyball Coach, Brian Baugh, is one of the LHS Coaches that has really been dedicating a lot of his time during the Stay At Home Order to his team in order to keep them both motivated and dedicated to their craft.
“For Women’s volleyball, the Spring and Summer are extremely important for getting the girls ready for the season. Typically we would hold open gyms and lift throughout the week,” Baugh said, “Many of the girls would be participating in club season as well, but like every team, we have had to adapt. We are fortunate that at Loveland we have Strength and Conditioning Coach, Derek Berry, on staff. He puts together workouts that are pushed out to our players through the Team Buildr app. It’s a great way for the athletes to work out at home and for me to track their workouts.”
Coach Baugh told us that many of his players have gotten very creative with their volleyball training, creating things around the house to help them work on their skills. Many of the team’s siblings and parents are helping them at home with their skill sets as well!
LHS’s Head Women’s Volleyball Coach, Brian Baugh
“To me, the most important thing is to come together as a team, so that whenever we get back on that court, we are building each other up and have each other’s backs when things get tough,” Baugh explained, “We are fortunate that our future seniors are really leading the charge. We have great leaders in Maya Jepson, Diana Clark, Abbie Miller, Alex Miller, Faith Meece, and Ellie Egan. They are high character girls. They have created different competitions for the team to complete during the quarantine. For example, they did a baking competition where they baked and decorated cakes and then put them on Twitter to have fans vote for the best. They also created a virtual pepper video that they put on Twitter. We have been sharing baby pictures of each player and are having fans guess which player or coach is featured in the picture. We also have been holding Google Meets weekly to check-in on one another.”
Coach Baugh says he has been challenging his players weekly. One of the ways Coach Baugh has been challenging his team during the isolation period is by asking them once a week how they have improved as a player and a person. After the player comes up with their answer Coach Baugh has them share their response with the team.
“It has certainly been a challenge not being on the court, but I am so impressed with how the players have responded during this time off,” Coach Baugh said with pride, “I cannot wait to see how they go for that fourth straight ECC title this coming season!”
For more LHS sports updates stay tuned to the Loveland Sports 411 With Cassie Mattia!
Loveland, Ohio – Loveland High School is staying “Loveland Strong” by keeping both their students and athletes motivated through virtual classes and workouts! This year during these unfamiliar times, LHS coaches are dedicating a lot of their time to making sure their athletes are staying in shape.
This week we chatted with LHS’s Women’s Soccer Coach, Todd Kelly, to see just what his team is doing to stay in competition shape during the COVID-19 Stay At Home Order! Coach Kelly told us that in late February the coaching staff designed a series of workouts that are released to the team every couple weeks.
LHS’s Women’s Soccer Coach, Todd Kelly (Loveland Magazine file photo)
“These workouts are specific to what we do as a program so they focus on things we believe are inherent to the success of the women’s soccer program,” Kelly explained, “Anyone that has been in the program knows this and passes on the importance of the workouts to our incoming freshmen. Each day the girls can choose between a beginning workout, intermediate workout, or an advanced workout…so they have three choices each day depending on how they feel.”
Coach Kelly said that in order to encourage unity within the team, the coaching staff asked the 9 returning varsity juniors and seniors to be group leaders. The group leaders are responsible for following up with 6 to 7 players every day about how their individual workout went.
Maria Bashardoust during the 2019 season. Maria has committed to play for Cleveland State this Fall. (Loveland Magazine file photo)
“Each individual player in their respective group sends a snapshot of themselves after the workout each day, also indicating how they feel and which workout they completed,” Kelly said, “As you can imagine, the snapshots have continued to get more creative with text, emojis’, etc. They have even come up with taglines on their snapshots and also on twitter like #Beastssss, #LetsGetIt, and #WinTheOffseason to name just a few. The 9 leaders are assigned to one of the varsity coaches who they connect with every day by sending their group’s snapshots. These snapshots are compiled every two weeks and sent out to the players and parents in a video for them to watch so they can know what each of their teammates is doing. This has also created a little bit of a rivalry on which group or individual can come up with the best snapshots,” Kelly added.
The LHS Women’s Soccer coaching staff provided the women’s team with shirts in early March to keep them motivated to keep pushing themselves. Kelly said most of the team wear the shirts during each of their workouts.
The shirts above are the workout shirts the LHS Women’s Soccer Team has been wearing during the COVID-19 outbreak to stay motivated!
“In addition, the leaders have gone to the houses of their group members and left chalk messages on the driveway to help support and motivate them. We have the coaches and girls answering 12-15 questions about themselves on a slide with pictures, designs, etc. that represent them, kind of a “Get to Know” them or an “In the Spotlight” feature so they can learn more about their teammates while we are away from each other,” Kelly said, “We will put all these together into a slide show that we will send out each week with 7-10 new entries. We also have former players including some as far back as 2010 (and earlier) and some from our State Championship team that reached out and sent a 1-2 minute video message we are sending the current players to encourage them. These former players know the importance of what we do in the workouts and they wanted to encourage the current players during this difficult time to make sure they are staying focus and doing what needs to be done. They all view each other as one big family regardless of when you graduate…once a Tiger, always a Tiger,” Kelly said.
The 2017 State Champion Ring (Loveland Magazine file photo)
Coach Kelly really wanted to focus on the team connecting during these tough times so the coaches decided to hold a Zoom call every 2 weeks with all the team leaders and their groups. This has allowed each player in the Women’s Soccer program to get an idea of what is going on and has allowed the coaches to see how each player is doing, if they have any struggles, and how they can help support each player.
LHS’s Women’s Soccer Coach, Todd Kelly (Loveland Magazine file photo)
“As a result, we are connecting with either our leaders or our players each week on a video call. Since the leaders have access to a coaching staff member, we are interacting each day to ensure they have what they need to get through these unchartered times,” Kelly explained, “These are just a few of things we as a staff and program are doing to stay connected with our players and encourage them. It is important we all stay connected and supported and we want the girls to continue working out for their physical and mental health…and ours too.”
Thank you to all the LHS staff, coaches, administrators, and parents for keeping the students motivated and dedicated to bettering themselves as students and athletes! Here at Loveland Magazine, we will continue to bring the latest updates on COVID-19 and the effects it’s having on the community of Loveland as well as the latest LHS news!
Stayed tuned for the next “What are LHS Athletes Doing to Stay in Shape” segment!
Loveland, Ohio – Ohio is starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel and so are LHS’s coaches and athletes! Over the past couple of months, athletes and coaches have been in limbo waiting to see if their season will continue. During the COVID-19 outbreak, LHS’s Coaches have been hard at work with their athletes trying to keep them motivated and doing workouts even though they aren’t in school or competing. This week we spoke with LHS’s Men’s Tennis Coach, Thomas Sharpless, to see just what his athletes have been doing to stay in shape.
LHS’s Men’s Tennis Coach, Thomas Sharpless
Coach Sharpless gave a lot of credit to LHS’s Strength Coach for keeping his athletes in shape, but he also didn’t fail to recognize how dedicated his athletes have been during this time.
“Most of my athletes play tennis year-round at the club; however since the tennis clubs have been closed per the governor’s directions along with most of the local public courts, my players, like all Ohio athletes, are indeed having to find other means to stay fit,” Sharpless explained, “Luckily, we have an awesome weight coach at LHS and he has put together a nice list of dumbbell and free weight exercises for our players. I’ve shared this valuable resource with my players in the hopes that, if they have the equipment, they will utilize this information to stay in shape,” Sharpless added.
Sharpless had an unbelievable 2019 season leading his team to an ECC Championship! The Men’s Tennis team ended 2019 with a perfect 6-0 record and a 14-3 record overall.
We are excited to hopefully be seeing some Tiger competition very soon! Stay tuned to read more about what LHS coaches and athletes are doing to prepare for their potential seasons!
When: Currently we are here Monday-Friday 11:00-5:00 and Saturday 11:00-2:00 to answer calls, assist customers with ordering and curbside pick up.
Where: 370 Loveland-Madeira Rd. (This is NOT the retail store. It’s the door to the left of the store entrance.)
Why: Our retail store is currently closed but we are still filling online orders, custom orders, yard signs, banners, and decals.
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Loveland, Ohio – The community of Loveland has proven time and time again that it can get through anything! The inspiration from the community has trickled down to the youth of Loveland especially the LHS athletes as they are continuing to put in as much work as they can to prepare for their potential sports seasons. The LHS coaching staff along with the Athletic Director has gathered around and taken time to not only prepare workouts for the athletes but has also made them easily accessible for the athletes through the new workout app Teambuildr!
LHS’s Women’s Track Coach, Herbert Laughman, is one of the many LHS coaches that has dedicated a lot of time and effort into helping his athletes succeed during the COVID-19 outbreak.
“This has been a very difficult time for all of us. It’s tough to keep things in perspective. Our staff and athletes have done a great job of this. We know the community and the health of the community comes first,” Laughman explained, “That being said, we are very creative in how we are staying in contact with the girls. We have a spring track group and I have put suggested workouts on there.”
Coach Laughman also created some fun challenges for his athletes!
“We have also done fun things like the Camera roll challenge. In this challenge, you pick the 5th picture on camera roll and post. Another fun activity we have done is having the athletes select their top 5 movies of all time,” Coach Laughman said, “My personal favorite activity has been having the athletes post pictures after their optional workout. The girls flooded me with pictures! These girls are still working hard and still want to be pushed. I am so honored and blessed to be a part of this group. I pray for the safety of all of those around us and hope that we can continue on with our spring season,” Coach Laughman added.
LHS’s Women’s Track captains’ weighed in as well on how COVID-19 is affecting them and how they are motivating themselves to keep working out.
“As a three-year varsity athlete, it’s scary to think that I may not get my fourth year,” LHS Women’s Track Captain, Sophia Horrigan, said, “Despite the setbacks, I have been working hard to stay in shape for a season that still may be. From lifting weights in my basement to running on the bike trail, I am doing whatever it takes to stay ahead of future competition. I see this as a reason to work harder, rather than giving up in the face of adversity. The season isn’t over yet!”
LHS’s Megan Korniak, who is also a Captain for the Women’s Track team said she is still working hard and that the team has made so much progress over the last few months.
“Now there is a lot more individual accountability to stay in shape,” Korniak added, “I personally have been doing home workouts and going on runs in public parks to stay active. We are still close as a team and love to send timer pictures of our workouts to keep spirits high!”
We would like to encourage the Loveland community to stay active and stay safe! If you aren’t sure what activities you can do to stay active check out our weekly “What are LHS Athletes Doing to Stay in Shape?” for tips! Stay tuned!
Fastpitch Head Coach Mike Rapp explaining the ground rules to the ump before the start of the Senior Night Game in 2017
by Cassie Mattia
Loveland, Ohio – As the COVID-19 outbreak continues students and teachers will now not be returning back to school until May 4th. So what does that mean for LHS’s athletes?
Here at Loveland Magazine, we have made it our mission to talk to both LHS’s coaches and athletes to see just what they are doing to stay in shape in order to prepare for their potential seasons! This week we chatted with LHS’s Head Women’s Softball Coach, Michael Rapp, and LHS’s Strength Coach, Derek Berry, to see just what their athletes are up to.
Coach Rapp said that although it’s been tough for all of the LHS athletic programs, Strength Coach Derek Barry has really come through with some excellent workouts for the athletes.
Photo of Derek Berry from IGNITION ATHLETIC PERFORMANCE GROUP, LLC
“Our strength coach, Derek Berry, has created some training programs for our athletes,” Rapp said, “He just rolled out an App for the athletes to use on their phones from home!”
Coach Rapp added that although the new workout App that Berry rolled out has been primarily what the Women’s Softball Team has been using to stay in shape, Rapp has also been giving his Lady Tigers a few softball related workouts of his own.
“I told my softball players they could do 100 reps a day (3,000) for April including swings, and band work or our ab routines to stay in shape. Some are throwing with family members and some are doing the program that our Coach Berry sent out. I even promised them that I would do 100 reps a day plus walk the local park,” Rapp added.
Derek Berry, who is the Director of Sports Performance, is head of the LHS weight room. Berry stated that during these times he has been forced to get a little creative, but has received a lot of great feedback on the new workout app he has launched with LHS’s Athletic Director, Brian Conaster.
LHS Fastpitch Softball Coach, Mike Rapp recieved the prestigious 2019 Southwest District; Sportsmanship, Ethic & Integrity Coaches Award.
“We have partnered with a company called Teambuildr that provides an online Athlete Management System. Once the athletes register with their teams, they have full access to any workouts I put on there,” Berry explained, “Some features of the app include videos for all the exercises, a leaderboard for kids to compete with each other, and options to either check off the exercise as completed or how many reps you did. Coaches can then have a master account which shows them the progress of their team. On the app, I have only been releasing bodyweight workouts for the time being, but outside of that, I have been sending coaches two other options for athletes that may have a more advanced setup, which is a dumbbell workout, and a home gym workout,” Berry added.
Strength Coach Berry is apart of a contracted sports performance company called Ignition APG. Ignition APG was ultimately responsible for the partnership with Teambuildr. Ignition APG also offers a similar app to Teambuildr to the public for a small monthly fee.
Berry has also been releasing informative videos on social media that display creative ways to exercise.
“On @lovelandstrength I have been releasing informative videos on how to get creative with limited exercise options, and we’ve been having the kids post time-lapses of their workouts,” Berry explained, “I have also begun a wall sit competition for the month of April. Whoever can hold a wall sit for the longest time receives a prize!”
Thank you to the coaches and athletes that have been sharing their at-home workouts with Loveland Magazine and all of our readers! Stay tuned for the next “What are LHS’s Athletes Doing to Stay in Shape?” segment!
by Cassie Mattia
Team Buildr App. This app is great for bodyweight workouts and it also includes videos that show the proper technique for each exercise,” Cruse explained, “The app also has both dumbbell workouts and home gym workouts. We also created a 3k push-up challenge for the month of April, in which each player completes 100 push-ups a day. Many of our players are doing it with family members and often record themselves doing it to have a little fun with it. They are doing this on top of their regular workouts,” Cruse said.
Be sure to tune in to Loveland Sports 411 With Cassie Mattia for Loveland’s latest sports news and updates!
LHS Fastpitch Softball Coach, Mike Rapp recieved the prestigious 2019 Southwest District; Sportsmanship, Ethic & Integrity Coaches Award.
