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Cole Lebourgeois

Along with the stadium being turfed, these fields will also get turfed so that the athletes can practice on them more often. When it usually rains or when it gets wet the fields get muddy so when you go play on it, it gets ruined for the rest of the year. "We will have three new turfed practice fields," Athletics Director Ricky Michel said.

In the spring of 2016, Stillwater High School is going to be adding on to the Pony Athletic Center.  They will be making many changes to the existing soccer fields and adding new features to the high school.

Stillwater has passed a $97.5 million bond that will allow the high school to upgrade and improve the quality of the sports fields.  They plan on doing this by replacing all the grass on the fields with artificial turf.  They will be moving the tennis courts and will be adding a new entrance to the Pony Stadium.  Not only will they be doing upgrades outside, they will be adding an indoor track as well.

The high school plans on moving the tennis courts to a new location so that they could build in the new Pony stadium entrance.

“They’re moving the tennis court,” said Matt Kiedroski, a social studies teacher and one of the committee members,  “They are going to add a plaza,” he said.

Along with moving the tennis courts, the tennis players will have a big benefit, better parking.

“Benefits for the tennis team is that they are going to have their 12 courts,” said Athletic Director Ricky Michel,  “They are just going to be able to have better parking.”

They plan also to have a newly turfed stadium, with newly turfed practice fields and the teams that will benefit the most will be soccer and lacrosse.

Facility Improvements

“We are going to have a new turfed field in the stadium,” said Michel,  “We will have three new turfed practice fields,” he added.

With the Pony Activity Center they plan on building a new gymnastics facility and they will move wrestling to the current gymnastic and wrestling gyms.

“In the Pony Activity Center there will be a gymnastic gym built,” Michel said, “We will move wrestling to cover both the current gymnastics and wrestling gyms.”

Along with the new gymnastics and wrestling facilities, they will be adding new basketball and volleyball courts to the Pony activity center.

“We will have four courts, basketball and volleyball courts,” Michel said.

With all these additions being made to the activity center, they will double in size and have eight gyms instead of four.  Also in the upstairs portion of the activity center they will be building an indoor track.

“We will double in size from four gyms to eight,” Michel said,”In the upstairs part of the Pony activity center we will have a running track.”

Not only will this affect the school sports, but the Physical education class will also benefit from the changes as well.

“Another great thing is that it is not just athletics, but it will also be used by the Phy Ed department too,” said Principal Rob Bach.

By all of the renovation that is going to happen, such as new gyms, a new track and a newly turfed fields this will increase the amount of practice space for athletes and even spectators.

“This will increase the ability for more sports to be practicing at the same time,” said Kiedroski.

Not only will the high school expand and improve the athletic portion, but they will have a new fitness room for people to use.  They also plan on building a new weight room as well.

“We will have fitness room that about three times the size of the little fitness room that we have,” said Michel.  “Then we will have a weight room that’s probably two and half times the size of the current one we have.”

Plans for Renovations

The high school plans to break ground in late March and will start the process of turfing the field and moving the tennis courts.

“We will break grounds to start the turf parts of it,” Michel said, “And the tennis court part of the project.”

However, baseball and softball will not be affected as much but they will be able to use the turf fields for their practices.  Their game fields will not be improved or changed.

“Baseball will probably not be affected,” Michel said, “They will be able to practice on the turf fields,” he added.

The Pony Stadium will also undergo renovations of itself by having buildings with restrooms and concessions and the Port-a-pots will be going away.

“Once the Pony activities center is done your going to have concession stands and restroom facilities that are going to be in the buildings,” said Michel,  “Instead of trailers and Port-a-pots.”

As a result of the Pony activities center being extended, the parking lot, is going to go away and instead they will extend the main parking lot and add a bus round-a-bout where the tennis courts used to be.

“The main parking lot is going to be expanded out towards Super America,” Michel said.  ” We are probably going to try 120 spaces there, where the tennis courts are currently that’s going to be a bus round-a-bout.”