More reason for hope

Maybe a 70-degree sunny day is positively impacting my disposition. Maybe it’s seeing the number of active Covid cases dropping by 7 in one day – from 149 to 142 (still high but not as high). Maybe it’s the announcement that vaccines will be made available to Marist students ON CAMPUS starting next Tuesday. Maybe it’s getting pictures of vaccine cards from our student-athletes who have been eager to get vaccinated since anyone over the age of 16 is now eligible in New York. But man, I think things are looking UP around here. Can the prevalence of vaccines help us salvage an outdoor track season? Last week, I wasn’t so sure. This week, I have great optimism that might exactly be the case.

Hear me out, all ye naysayers. There’s “vaccinated” and there’s “fully vaccinated.” We will not have a “fully vaccinated” team, or campus, anytime soon – probably not till early May at the earliest. But! One dose of vaccine, any of them, greatly reduces the risk of a positive Covid case, somewhere in the neighborhood of 60 percent effectiveness in blunting infection. Feel free to fact check me on that. I might not have the numbers exactly correct. But one dose of vaccine raises the reduction of risk from 0 percent to something significantly higher than 0 percent, something in the neighborhood of “way better than the flu shot every year.” Yeah, wow, now I’m really straying from good science. While I might be a bit scattershot with this, I do not think it’s bad science. I do think that the more sore arms we have – on our team, on our campus – as a result of vaccinations, the more we will see a reduction in spread and a reduction in numbers. Oh yeah, 70-degree sunny days help too! More time outside, less time inside. In-person classes resume on Monday, April 12. We are very hopeful that athletic team practices will also resume on that date.  

As a result? Sunday, April 18 is now circled on our calendar, in big fat black Sharpie marker. It’s the date of the Monmouth University Spring Invitational – and we’re invited to the party! Maybe, just maybe, we’ll be able to RSVP to this invitational with some actual entries of Marist athletes in an actual track and field meet. Now, that would be one of the neatest things to happen around here in quite a while. Stay positive. Test negative. Stay tuned, track fans.