Safety plan in place as Liberty welcomes athletes to Commonwealth Games for fifth straight year

With the COVID-19 pandemic shutting down many professional, collegiate, and scholastic sports across the United States, athletes and sports fans have been starving for chances to participate in and watch organized sports since early spring.

The Virginia Commonwealth Games at Liberty University, sponsored and hosted by Liberty for the fifth consecutive year, offer an oasis of opportunities for amateur athletes to participate in a wide range of competitions this summer and later in the year.

“People are ready to get out and play,” Virginia Amateur Sports President Dan Foutz said at Thursday’s press conference held in the Liberty Indoor Track Complex. “This is our 31st annual games and Virginians look forward to this. This has always affectionately been known as Virginia’s Olympics. This is a family vacation (destination) on an annual basis, and it is important that we keep that spirit alive. It is the spirit of the Games.”

The competition will be highlighted by the July 24-26 Main Games Weekend, with virtual Opening Ceremonies set for Friday and streamed from Williams Stadium. Approximately 20 sporting events are scheduled to take place in Liberty’s state-of-the-art athletics and recreation facilities as well as around the Lynchburg, Va., area over the weekend.

“We are honored to once again serve as the host for the Virginia Commonwealth Games,” Liberty Director of Athletics Ian McCaw said. “This is always a great event and something we look forward to each year as really just a wonderful opportunity to celebrate sport. We’re very blessed with a beautiful campus and some amazing facilities like this one and we love to be able to show them off to an outstanding group of athletes who compete and all the other guests who take part in the Games.”

Several of the competitions being held in campus facilities will be directed by Liberty Club Sports head coaches, including 3D archery, beach volleyball, disc golf, equestrian, racquetball, shooting sports, ski and snowboard, and Ultimate. Other events on campus include basketball (at the LaHaye Recreation & Fitness Center) field archery (on the soccer practice fields), indoor soccer (at the Thomas Indoor Soccer Center on Aug. 7-8), swimming (at the Liberty Natatorium in December), and the Liberty Mountain Trail Series race out of the Hydaway Outdoor Recreation Center in the fall.

When Phase 3 guidelines for reopening Virginia were announced June 23, Foutz and his staff assessed the best approach to putting on this year’s multi-sport festival.

“Due to COVID-19, some of our events were canceled and some have been postponed,” Foutz said. “Safety is and will always be the highest priority at Virginia Amateur Sports. We met with our medical committee at Virginia Amateur Sports, officials at Liberty University, the City of Lynchburg and the Virginia Health Department. We developed a general safety plan which mirrors the recommendations and protocols from the CDC and the Governor’s orders.”

Basketball, typically the largest-drawing competition at the Commonwealth Games, has been postponed to Dec. 19-20, the same weekend as the indoor track events, which have drawn 800-1,000 participants in recent years.

“We have developed individual plans for each sport, which include enhanced sport-specific measures,” Foutz added. The plans are outlined on the Commonwealth Games website.

Two competitions are set for this weekend on campus: pickleball, with 139 teams playing at the LaHaye Recreation & Fitness Center, and an All-Star High School Baseball Tournament at the Liberty Baseball Stadium.

After a drive-through tailgate party at the Liberty Indoor Track Complex, virtual Opening Ceremonies will start next Friday at 8 p.m. The event, hosted by retired WSET sports anchor Dennis Carter, will be streamed live on the Facebook pages for the Commonwealth Games, WSET, and City of Lynchburg. No athletes or spectators will be allowed to attend, but they can view a live fireworks show from various sites outside the stadium starting at 8:45.

“We have our leftover ordinances from last year (when weather threats moved the ceremonies into the Vines Center), so it’s going to be quite a spectacular fireworks show after seeing the lighting of the cauldron virtually,” Foutz said. “We need something like that as a celebration to lift us all up.”

Francena McCorory, a Hampton, Va., native who set the NCAA record in the 400 meters and won Summer Olympic Games gold medals as part of the Team USA 4×400-meter relay teams in 2012 in London and 2016 in Rio, will light the Olympic cauldron after newly crowned Miss Virginia Dot Kelly carries the torch onto the field. McCorory, who has qualified for the 2021 Summer Games in Tokyo, is the first Olympic guest to have competed in the Commonwealth Games growing up.

Registration is still open for many of this summer’s games and volunteers are needed to help run them.