ROELAND PARK, Kan. — Heat indexes continue to reach the triple digits in Kansas City as the region continues to push through an extreme heat wave making its way through the Midwest. The high temperatures and intense humidity are causing high schools to modify team practices in an effort to keep students safe.
Among those high schools is Bishop Miege High School, located in Roeland Park, Kansas. Earlier this week, the school's athletic trainer determined it was simply too hot for teams to have after-school practice leading football, cross country and boys soccer to have morning practice instead.
"We have our trainers here full-time and he's monitoring that weather and wet bulb for us and notifies me when we get up into different zones and when we need to take water breaks and how long those water breaks have to be," Bishop Miege head football coach Jon Holmes explained.
The Kansas State High School Activities Association listed recommendations for member schools to follow to help prevent, recognize and treat heat illness. Among those recommendations is having routine water stations as athletic practices and reducing gear worn on the field to prevent heat strokes.
"We've been watching forecasts for quite a while," Bishop Miege Cross Country Coach Joann Heap said. "With long distance, you heat up and you have to tell the kids to take breaks."
The National Center for Catastrophic Sports Injury Research reports that 28 high school football players died of exertional heatstroke between 2008 and 2017.
"The humidity — you can definitely feel that — you sweat a lot," said Dominic Werner, football athlete at Bishop Miege. "All you can do is stay in the AC, pound the water, stretch and get some sleep."
It's unclear how long morning practice will last, but the high school says if temperatures continue to reach triple digits, morning practice will take place for the remainder of week.
"I feel like it's better practicing in the morning, it's just hard to wake up," Azael Gamboa with Bishop Miege Soccer said.
