TVC's sport courts have put in a lot of work supporting our athletes over the years--pun intended. Last fall as an administration, we began discussing the idea of possibly looking to purchase new courts. After a bit of research, Operations Manager, Mike Varn, discovered that sport court stopped producing the tiles with a round dot in the center in 1994. That meant, with the exception of court 1, our courts were old enough to vote and drink and possibly even have lower car insurance rates. Thus, finding new, affordable, facility appropriate floors became a priority.

Thanks some saavy budgeting and a great first Annual Side Out Night Out Reverse Raffle and Fundraiser in June, we were able to make the move this summer. Director, Michelle Hills, found a great opportunity to purchase Taraflex Rec 60 flooring from Gerflor used once this summer in an international handball tournament--the blue outer court flooring is from the handball tournament while the inner "Canadian Maple" floor of our courts is brand new. This was the perfect fit for our gym, affordable for our budget, and great for our sport. To finish off the new court look, we opted to paint the concrete surround a soft gray in 'orange peel' finish to give it a slight texture which limits slippage. 

Taraflex has served as the Olympic Court flooring for the last 10 Olympics! Its also used by many colleges including Nebraska, Marquette, and Washington as well as on the championship courts at AAU Nationals in Orlando, Florida. It provides 27-33% absorption and with a solid surface finish, is gentler on our athletes when they go to the floor. You can read more about Taraflex here or view the full brochure here.

Our New Floor Story

July 29 - It was not an easy road to getting our new floors in and started with some seriously underestimated labor on our part. At 1pm(ish), Mike Varn - Ops, Sydney Antonio -Associate Director, and myself, Leeanne Gleim, Associate Director started out thinking an easy 4 hours or so would get us down to bare concrete. Pictured above is my happy post as lines started to come up... did I mention it was also like 95 degrees this day!? Poor planning.

We quickly called in reinforcements (and refreshments) and thankfully the entire Antonio clan--all three of Sydney's siblings and their significant others--came in to save us at about 5pm. About two hours later we were down to decision time and pictured above is a break moment where we decided to push through and get court 2 up as well (you can see some of us resting on court 1 at the left of the picture).

Meanwhile, we had 14 other 'helping' hands running around in the heat. Here they are pictured above enjoying a much needed popsicle break. Gleim children, Maddox & Annabelle on the left and 5 of the 6 Antonio posse, Hudson, Thatcher, Sloan, Lu, and Remi on the right.

August 5-8 - Varn worked hard after a few last lesson appointments and got court 1 up all on his own! Pictured above are the floors being prepped on August 8th for the Teraflex install. the concrete sealant was sanded and any cracks or bumps filled for continuity.

August 11 - Court one is layed down. It was so great to see the dust layer cleared out of TVC and the new floor begin to emerge. We were all really excited as this process went pretty quickly.

August 15 - Our new courts were quickly taking shape as the rolls were laid out and seams heat sealed together. During this process we held our first annual staff retreat on Farwell Lake. It was a great day to review 2016 and plan for 2017. We enjoyed some break time unwinding on a boat ride around the lake--rough life.

August 22 - Our Fall League Combine was our first official event held on our new courts (pictured right)! We received lots of compliments on the how much lighter the courts made the gym look. The painted concrete and court lines completed our floor transformation on August 25th.