"the pool"

One of the most entertaining and eye grabbing attractions that the Student Recreational Center complex provides is the pool. A pool has always been a great escape from reality, time spent in the pool seems to always be a good time. Whether it be for competition, exercise, or just to relax, the feeling of the water is just soothing and refreshing. The Student Recreational Centers pool provides many lanes for lap pool swimming, and as you work your way to the left from the side doors of the gym, it turns into more of the community pool feel where it's open and not to deep to where you can float around and partake in fun pool activities. The pool offers a small basketball hoop on one end so you can get your competitive juices flowing and still be in touch with the soothing feel of the water still. Although it's not the place of strong competition, the pool might provide the thing that doesn't take the most talent but uses simple human qualities to bring people of the Arizona State community closer and to make this a stronger community and for people to connect with people in a fun and safe way, with attempting to add something to the pool that is enjoyable for everyone who visit the pool area of the Student Recreational Center.

Pool

" the fields"

The other part to the Student Rec is the fields, where any sport that can be played outdoor is provided. Not only limited to sports, but events are held out there and they usually get hundreds of people involved in some sort of way to add some excitement to the Arizona State lifestyle. The fields are a multipurpose area and with the weather changing and not being ridiculously hot and not cold will become even more of a hot spot than it already was. Hosting many events like the flag football league that I actually took part in with real refs and many rules to give us football lovers about the closest take to something real. Also, Arizona State not having an actual school team for soccer, they have a club team that substitutes for that and the fields have been given the responsibility to host other schools on that field. Also, the fact that you can close down the fields, no matter the time of day, you can just go out and go for a run to get things off your mind, or even lay out and look at the stars to just have a nice relaxing night in the moon light and to just escape from reality for a little bit. The fields seem to give off the most use over other parts of the Student Recreational Center because it's open and can be used for your sports or even to walk a dog it's really your choice which is always good.

Recreational fields

"the gym"

My personal favorite of all the things the Student Recreational Center provides are the multiple gyms for basketball they have. All my life I played basketball and never second guessed if it was the right sport for me. I love the fact that even though I'm not playing for an actual team anymore, I can still get out and run up and down the court with people who know how to play the game and get a feel for what I love. The part that's hard is it feeling like it's not enough. I love the game so much and never want to steer away from it, but it seems the feeling I once had isn't the same as what I get from playing up there. Yes you can still get a victory and play and play and play all you want, but what is the real goal? true, there are the Intramural that you have a real season and play for a championship, but outside Arizona State who would know of my success? I'm coming from being a three peat region champion and a state championship throughout high school, now it feels like I'm settling and it doesn't sit with me well and I don't know exactly what to do to get the feeling I once had back because it seems like I'm at a lost for that feeling right now. Just having talk in the gym with other players and hearing the constant complaint that we all have the same idea of how we want it to go, but if we never all speak up as one, how will it ever change. Talking to older students who say it's just how it is almost makes me feel hopeless for it to ever change to how we know we want it but nobody will speak out to say it.

ASU Maroon Gym

"the weightroom"

The first place in the Student Recreational Center I'd like to talk about is the weight room. You can do all the work on the basketball court or football field, or whatever the sport may be you can practice it all day everyday. If you don't get in the weight room to do some type of strength building, it could almost be pointless. Throughout school, the thought of working out made me excited to be honest, i couldn't wait to go lift because I knew it would make a better athlete, player, and overall performer. Everyday the team would go straight to the weight room after school and would have reserved time slots to work out. Going to the weight room here is a little different, as big as it is, the one machine you need to get too could be being used and make you wait an hour or completely have to change the route you wanted to go. Also, on the other end, if you're using a machine or weight that another person needs, it seems they constantly hawk you or stare you down until you are complete. For me, it makes me want to rush to get done so I don't feel like I'm holding anyone up, but at the same time I don't get all I need to get out of my workout for myself. It's almost human nature that if you don't feel comfortable in a situation that you will veer away from it, and being at the gym and not liking the situation you're in can make you not want to go and to just give up because they don't want to work in the type of conditions the are presented.

ASU weightroom

Project 2 "SRC"

For project 2 I chose to do the Student Recreational Center, I believe that me being a former athlete, going to the gym or fields and participating in the sports that I once loved to play and was privileged to play because of making middle school, high school, and travel teams allowed me to grasp the full aspect I could at that time in life. The Student Recreational Center is a place of not only recreation and fitness, but also a place of connection and just to socialize with fellow Sun Devil students who want to escape from the scholar part of being in college and just want to relax and enjoy life. The Student Recreational Center not only includes a complex with multiple gyms to play basketball, racket ball courts, a huge community pool and lap pool, the weight room and conditioning units upstairs.  For me, it's a little different. Every time I step foot in the gym there's a part of me wanting to get back the feeling I once had in high school. Just wanting to hear people coming together to cheer on my team and I as we took on a rival school. It almost seems the feeling is lost when I take part in the sports here. My main focus for this project will be that I want to talk about the perspective of athletes who take place in sporting events at the Recreational Center. When I was with my team, it felt like we were a gang of brothers, and we were the strongest gang out there, but we weren't out to do any bad, just to take on any challenge on the court and come out successful. Now, going to play in the gym isn't the same, meeting new people is of course very important but when it comes to sports, you almost unknowingly create a family and you learn what there strengths and weakness are. Knowing your team or having "chemistry" is vital to be successful in sports because you need to make those five guys on the court work as one. As the motto my team stuck by " one team, one goal, one vision." Personally, I just don't think the feeling can really be brought back as it once was, it almost is like reliving a moment that seems impossible. I'm not sure if this is every one's view, but for me I don't have the same drive I did, in high school it was I "WILL" be going to the gym to play basketball or workout everyday, now it's "i might" go later or tomorrow because I don't get the same rush I once had. It makes me ponder the thought that it's not even due to the lack of competition, but to the fact that I don't know the people I'm with or feel the same pressure or drive because if I want I don't have to do all the things I did to play in high school. I'm a student at Arizona State, whenever I want to go play I can without anyone stopping me. I personally believe that is what makes the Student Recreational Center a huge benefit to the campus because I would rather be able to stay in touch with things I love to do even if it's not the full aspect I'm used too, than to have to forget about it completely and leave it alone. I'm not 100% sure everyone can relate to what I'm trying to say, but throughout this project I hope to be able to give you more understanding and real personal insight to this sense I deal with this myself.

The Student Recreational Center provides the Arizona State campus and students with a positive escape from reality. When you're happy, sad, or mad, you can always take a trip to the Student Recreational Center to relieve any stress or just go on a walk at the fields to just enjoy the beautiful Arizona weather. I've always believed the Student Recreational Center and fields provide one of the most essential and positive atmospheres to this campus, and with building of the new Student Recreational CenterI believe it will give even more students who don't like being in some what crowded areas a chance to enjoy themselves.

ASU SRC

Research sources: SRC

The proposed topic I chose for Project 2 was the Student Recreational Center. The reason behind wanting to explore this place is because it's somewhere I can relate too and a place I spend tons of time as it is, so I believe if I do a project on it then I'll force myself to become more engaged into what I'm doing for the project. I will evaluate the Student Recreational Center by visiting there many times and getting a even closer look at what it does for the Arizona State community.

The first source I used was the book "Sports and recreation V.16" by Harvey Jackson III. It is around 300 pages long and really focuses on what is done with leisure time in the south. Also put a strong emphasis on Mississippi State and North Carolina Universities, and what took place at those schools for leisure time. Having family from the south and constantly visiting down there, it's not a very exciting place to be for me and seems isn't much activity, so the book kind of hit home for me when looking over it.

The second source  for the project is a scholarly article called "Understanding Sense of Community From the Athlete's Perspective" by Stacy Warner of East Carolina University & Marlene A. Dixon of University of Texas. They discuss how relationships seem to just build easy and quickly when you're taking place in your sport or activity, as to where when you aren't taking place in a sport.

The last source was an online source written by Lori Murray, named " Rec Center Wars: Colleges Use State-of-the-Art Facilities to Woo Students." This article was interesting because it stated how the Rec was being used in a sense that athletes were given an opportunity to be seen and maybe even asked to take part in being on the school team based off performance in the rec. The article was only about a page long.

Evaluation

When I saw we needed something to evaluate, I wasn't 100% sure on what exactly I wanted to use to evaluate. When I first saw this, I was going to go with a movie, but it seems rather simple to say that the plot is going to be hard to keep up with so i wanted to go with something a little different. I'm going to go with how the video game NBA2k13 has been changed from its previous games. Now, a video game is suppose to be the virtual epidemic of a real life basketball game. The experiecne is suppose to be virtually the same, by adding little details hear and there to the game, it seems to add the full experience of a real life situational in the NBA. For me, and i'm sure tons of other people who enjoy video games love the reality of the game and constantly complain of what isn't exactly "real" in the game. This years version of the game seems to cover all aspects that people were not happy about. The glitching in the game seems to be almost unseen, the running into other players without penalty of falling or losing the ball is all not intact anymore. This game has been revolutionized to shape a real life experience of what actual NBA players can do and do in real life.

Nobody can expect the video game to be the exact real experience, but for there 60 dollars spent on the game, every buyer wants to recieve the most from there gamer experience and 2k13 has been able to reveil that in this years version of 2k13.