The Hurricanes water polo teams will be diving into different pools in the next few weeks while the Innisfail Aquatic Centre closes for annual maintenance.
Rashelle Wagers, coach of the U12 atom and U14 bantam teams said she coaches a drop-in team in Olds Thursday and Sunday evenings.
“The kids from Innisfail are strongly encouraged to come to that for extra practice and some one-on-one time,” she explained in an email.
The water polo season started up earlier this fall. Over the first weekend in December, both teams hosted and played in their first tourney of the season. Wagers wants to keep their skills strong and said she’s also looking into setting up a weekend of scrimmage games with the Spruce Grove team sometime soon.
Shelley Gagnon, director of community services said nothing out of the ordinary is being done to the pool during its annual shutdown Dec. 5 to Dec. 26.
“You want a chance to replace things like decking, ceramic tile,” she said, adding pump work and lots of cleaning are fairly standard.
Programs, mostly swim lessons, are tailored to finish up around this time of year she said, adding that school vacation falls nicely in with the pool closure.
“For us it’s a good time and we plan all lessons to wrap up in time for shutdown and everybody is sort of aware of it well in advance.”
Staffing levels are cut back during the three weeks, as most work is contracted out. She said because a lot of the staff is part time and students, they typically don’t mind the extra hours off during the holidays.
“… so that’s a good thing for us.”
