Co-founder and vice president Kimi Chen calmly poured water into a big Gatorade jug during a track and field meet. Unaware that the spout had a lock and unlock position, Chen added the water while it was unlocked. After leaving the room to wait for the jug to fill, Chen was shocked to see the entire room flooded when she returned. Volunteering at sports games is one of the many activities members of Sports Medicine are part of.

Club member Junior Audrey Luo explains how the club began and why it was formed in the first place.

“The reason we wanted to generally start it is because there are a lot of athletes at our school,” Luo said. “A lot of them didn’t even know what foam rolling, [which helps loosen tight muscles, is], which is [one of] the basic things that you learn as an athlete. So we decided to make a club to spread awareness but also so people could know more about the career paths it leads into.”

Chen learned to guide athletes to relieve tension by using a foam roller during sports games. Chen works closely with athletic trainer Javier Margarito, mainly in track and field events, to help athletes perform at their optimal level.

“Javier just sets up a booth in the middle grassfield in the track,” Chen said. “As volunteers, we would go in there and a lot of people after their track events, they come out to us and they say ‘I need to be rolled, I am tight here.’ That’s where we come in because Javier can’t attend to everyone at once.”

In addition to having active involvement in the community through volunteer events, Sports Medicine has interactive activities for its club members during their member meetings. Each meeting is unique, with some explaining how to use heat and ice packs, and others explaining central practices of Sports Medicine. Luo explains club member presentations at meetings.

“We split up the members of the club so each of them has a topic,” Luo said. “They research it and present it to the rest of the club, so that way, we are all learning new things, but we also get a chance to research it ourselves.”

Treasurer Andrew Liu explains that Sports Medicine has not only taught him about the field, but taught him important lessons in other parts of his life.

“Sports Medicine just taught me a lot about taking care of my body because as an athlete myself, sometimes I have to skip a lot of warmup and warm down myself,” Liu said. “When I [was in] swim club, I used to ignore a lot of stuff, but now I quit club and learned to take care of my body since I am more aware of exercises to relieve tension.”