St. Albert and Sturgeon County gyms, rec centres and sports leagues scrambled to cancel games and classes Nov. 13 after the province announced a two-week ban on indoor group fitness classes, team sport activities and group performances in the region the previous day.
The ban applies to the St. Albert and Sturgeon County regions and other parts of the province and is in effect from Nov. 13 to 27. Outdoor, school-based, junior, collegiate, university, professional and individual sports and activities or non-aerobic activities in groups of up to five people are exempt from the ban.
The ban was part of a package of measures announced by Premier Jason Kenney and Chief Medical Officer of Health Deena Hinshaw Nov. 12 in response to record-breaking numbers of COVID-19 cases throughout Alberta.
Kenney said the province had focused on indoor physical activity and sports as they involved many people breathing heavily while in close quarters, both factors that heightened the risk of disease transmission. Several outbreaks in recent months had been linked to team sports and group fitness.
Gyms, teams change tactics
About 1,800 players and 600 coaches with the St. Albert Minor Hockey Association would be benched these two weeks as the club suspends all in-person activities, said executive director Michael Tymko. Most are just a few games into the season, as the minor hockey season just started earlier this month.
The ban puts games for about 200 adult indoor soccer players with the St. Albert Soccer Association on hold for its duration, said Chris Spaidal, the association’s executive director. Some 1,300 youths had been set to start indoor play on the Nov. 14 weekend, but they would now have to wait until Nov 28, with two weeks added to the end of the youth indoor season to make up for lost time.
The ban affects about 300 members of the Sturgeon Valley Athletic Club who would ordinarily take part in group fitness classes, said general manager Danielle Smith. The club’s gymnasium and other facilities are still open, as is one-on-one training, and many classes would continue online.
“We’ve done this before when it was a full closure,” Smith said, referring to the start of the pandemic, that she is glad the province has avoided another full closure.
Smith said the club has been open for in-person exercise since June 12. Staff have removed the club’s fans, spaced all equipment at least three metres apart and sanitized rooms between workouts in accordance with provincial pandemic guidelines. Most fitness classes have been running at half capacity, and a few (such as boxing) are still suspended.
Spaidal and Tymko urged athletes to continue to follow all provincial health guidelines around COVID-19.
“If we don’t follow proper procedure, we might lose our sport,” Tymko said.
Schools and fitness centres
All indoor group fitness classes and team sports at the Morinville Leisure Centre are suspended from Nov. 13 to 27, said Iain Bushell, the town’s general manager of community and infrastructure services. The hockey rink was closed, but pretty much everything else is open for individual or one-on-one activities.
“You can walk the track and you can use the fitness equipment. You just can’t do anything in a group or a team,” Bushell said.
Town officials said the MLC would be closed Nov. 15 to 16 and Nov. 22 to 23 and otherwise open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. from Nov. 13 to 28. Guests must prebook time-slots at the centre and wear face coverings whenever not eating or exercising. Showers and change rooms are still off limits.
City of St. Albert spokesperson Crystal Kessler said in an email the city has cancelled all registered or drop-in fitness, recreation and aquatic programs at its facilities from Nov. 13 to 27 in response to the ban. Group, team, arena, fieldhouse, gymnasium and personal training activities are also off-limits for this period. Guests could still use the fitness centre and track at Servus Place and do drop-in or lane swimming at the city’s indoor pools.
Phys-ed classes at St. Albert Public Schools would be held outside during these two weeks where possible and feature individual instead of team activities, said spokesperson Paula Power. Group singing (also part of the two-week ban) is on hold, as is on-ice and group sports in the school’s sports academies. Greater St. Albert Catholic Schools has taken similar steps.
Sports academies would spend the next two weeks on school grounds as most of the facilities they would normally visit are closed by the ban, said GSACRD deputy superintendent Rhonda Nixon.
“We’re part of a larger context where there is risk,” she said of these changes, and even though schools are exempt from the ban, St. Albert schools want to minimize that risk.
Nine St. Albert- and Sturgeon-area schools were under watch or outbreak status as of Nov. 13. The most recent addition was Vital Grandin Catholic, which reported eight people diagnosed with COVID-19 on Nov. 11.
Nixon said that outbreak sent two classes and several staff members into isolation. Isolated persons would be able to return to school in around Nov. 20 if they are free of symptoms.
See www.alberta.ca/enhanced-public-health-measures.aspx for the full list of current health measures.
