Is This Heaven?

No, but its close, this is Iowa. I happen to love living in the Midwest but weather seems to always play a gigantic factor when planning any event outdoors. Last year during our football season we played in sleet, freezing cold, monsoon rains and blazing heat. So why should this year start off any different?
The Iowa Thunder players don’t receive special circumstance just because we’re female athletes. In fact, we’ve been practicing outside since the first weekend in February. Frost bite is always a concern but we’ve learned little tricks along the way. Wearing a plastic grocery bag between socks to keep water out, bringing multiple pairs of hand warmers, and knowing that you can never wear too many layers are just a few. So what happens when Mother Nature decides to dump six beautiful inches of glistening white onto our field……the shovels come out! These pictures were taken just this past weekend and now the weather is in the mid 50’s.
Our competition is still practicing inside!

All hands on deck for clearing the field before practice

We are all anxiously preparing for the upcoming weekend. This Saturday we will be traveling to our first pre season game, funny how the nerves never seem to go away. While we will prepare for this weekend as though it were a league game, we’ve actually been afforded the opportunity of a controlled scrimmage. Each team will have the opportunity to stop play when needed to correct things before the season gets underway. After Saturday’s matchup, the Thunder will travel back home and prepare for team pictures the following day. Lots of exciting news still to come as this season starts to get moving!