By Matthew Rocco
Red Bank Regional High School has introduced a new after-school activity: pumping iron.
The Buccaneers opened a new 2,700 square-foot fitness center this school year, providing students with a range of weightlifting and conditioning equipment. The facility can accommodate up to 70 students at a time, and school officials have seen roughly 60 to 70 students working out in the afternoon. Physical education classes use the fitness center during the school day. Teachers are drawing up lesson plans for the 2016-17 school curriculum.
The Red Bank Regional board has also set aside funding for a strength and conditioning coach who will work with students from 2:45-5:30 p.m. starting next year.
The school said the BUC Backer Foundation and BUC Backer booster club raised $75,000 of the $1.15 million needed to construct the fitness center. The remaining cost was covered by the district’s capital improvement fund. Red Bank Regional is seeking more donations to add equipment and increase the fitness center’s capacity to about 100 people.
“As the saying goes, ‘It takes a village to raise a child.’ It definitely took our community to build this facility,” Red Bank Regional Athletic Director Del Dal Pra said in a statement. “Our kids will grow to be stronger athletes and better citizens when they leave [Red Bank Regional] because they will understand how to work out and lead healthier lives.
“We need for our kids to buy into the idea of being physically fit and follow a nutritional diet. Providing a facility like this hopefully will get this generation and future ones to become healthy by working out the correct way.”
Red Bank Regional’s sports teams have experienced the benefits of having a dedicated fitness center in the school. Assistant girls basketball coach Jack Provine, a certified strength and conditioning coach, worked with the Lady Buccaneers before and during the winter season. The football team also made heavy use of the workout equipment once it became available midway through last season. Red Bank Regional football players were previously confined to a cramped training space that was less than half the size of the new gym.
“We had the benefit of it at the middle of our season, and I think it motivated everyone to even work harder,” senior defensive tackle Righteon Johnson said.
Head football coach Nick Giglio also applauded the addition of a modern fitness center. He noted that male and female athletes from all sports, in addition to non-athletes at Red Bank Regional, are taking a greater interest in working out.
“I believe this helped [Red Bank Regional] obtain something great that has been talked about long before I came to the program,” Giglio said. “This tremendous facility will benefit our entire student population for many years to come.”