Sharing Field with Track Team???

[midwestlax]

I have the good fortune of coaching at a midwest high school with a brand new building and state of the art outdoor facilities. I have an awesome stadium complex, Field Turf infield, and a huge Olympic track around it.

Problem is the Track coach is suddenly afraid that errant balls will either hit or distract his runners, therefore he's making a stick with the AD demanding that we not share the facility--hence I have to move our practice time, which totals screws up my work and family life (most likely will have to quit).

My solution was to put up a netting backstop system to protect the track runners off the endline, which is the most dangerous area and call it safe enough to practice at the same time.

How do other teams/school deal with this sort of problem? Suggestions?
Thanks

[czechinthepipes]

my team has to play at 6:30 -8:00 since we are a club. so basically the tack guys get priority over us. it kinda sucks but ohwell.

[roycegracie47]

Does this school have an indoor track as well? Practice Fields? If there is more than one space available for practice, no one should have to compromise their time. Moving the lax practices later won't just screw with your personal life, but your players as well. You can bet that most (not all but most) parent will not be happy about they're children lose time at home with the family (ie dinner etc) or study time (granted they could use the time in between school and practice) but enough could raise a fuss in your favor. Further more, I think there could also be a problem with getting the kids to stay on campus vs going home before practice and having attendence problems as a result of the time change. Check the county's rules about this as well concerning what is acceptable for practice times and keeping the kids at school. A good AD should favor no one sport over another (though it happens and with Lax, it sometimes tends to be on the losing end) but make just as much a stink including a proposed budget for the backstops. Heck, throw in something about how much extra it will cost in the elcetricity bill to keep the lights turned on each night since your boys will be losing precious daylight.

[patlax22]

the way our school solves it is that track gets the field until 5 then after its lax...

Edit: backstops are great ideas, western reserver has backstops on their field and i think every team should look into them

[Irishlax22]

Dont do any thing Different. Let them shoot. Tell the kids if they shoot and see thats its going to miss yell something like

HEADS UP!
WATCH YOUR FEET!

They will get out of the way

[isuckatlax]

I am running track this year, the lacrosse team at my school has their own practice field, but it is not full sized. occasionally they practice in the stadium, and there have never been any issues.

[tiplax]

the same thing happened to my team. talk with the your players and tell them to be more careful, if none of the runners have been hit it should not be a problem and if the ball distracts them, it's their problem

[jmilf]

Track is retarded. We have a state of the art stadium that seats 6,000 and 10 lane track as well. With the fake turf all the colleges have now. We get to play like 1 or 2 games on the damn thing because of 'conflicts'. Its just a bunch of HS political BS.

[isuckatlax]

Yes, track is retarded.

[roxlax]

that reminds me freshman year when we played a team during pregame their schoosl track team was still out practicing and we were taking shots on goal and a few times whent he ball missed we hit a few of the kids running.

but I'd say go with the netting that'd be pretty safe and if the track coach complains more, tell him to stick it

[tomahawks11]

dont u have a thread on this in the coaching forum as well???

[Kerosene]

We have the track going around during our scimmage yesterday. But thankfully, they left and went to practice on field hockey's field.

[lacrosse88]

That stinks......I play on a club team because my school doesnt want a lacrosse team right now so after school our team just walks to the YMCA which isnt even like a mile from the school so its not that big of a deal

[WestIslipLax38]

We play at a middle school and we share with the baseball team...and i know your saying how does baseball interfere with lacrosse but the field is next to the baseball field but anyways....we have only had practice for a couple days but we let them have it one day and then we switch off

[PearlJam9]

dude i know exactly how you feel we cant warm up on our game field untilll track is gone so before games we have to warm up acrosse tehe street its definatly not cool

[pclax41]

At my old school (tottenville high school, staten island, ny) before i even started playing i guess i was in 8th grade..some girl got hit in the head with a lacrosse ball and had to go the ER she had a concussion or something...(u can imagine getting hit in the head without a helmet) and then instead of the lacrosse team moving..the track kids moved...haha lacrosse was in favor because we were the best in our league winning championships that year and my 10th grade year...but yea you can see why having both teams on the same field is a problem
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
last year (our first year of lacrosse at port charlotte highschool) we couldnt even practice at the school! we had to travel to a football/soccer park but this year we practice on the soccer field while track runs around the football field...maybe that can work for you... practice at the soccer field

[TNlaxFRHSmid]

At my school, we have two fields, But one is occupied by the lacrosse team and one is for soccer. So it sucks because varsity only gets half and JV gets the other. Then on some days the track team comes and we have to move over to the other field and the soccer team has to go down to the main soccer field. Bottom line, we need more space. And it does really suck. And the only suggestion i guess i would have is to try and talk to your school board and that track coach, but that netting around the ends of the field sounds like a good idea to me.