Senior athletes at Bellevue East earn recognition as 12-sport athletes participating in one sport each season for all four years of high school.

“They contribute a lot, they are typically some of the best students/athletes in the building and they help make several programs stronger because of their participation,” Activities Director Chad Holz said.

Class of 2019’s 12-sport athletes include Michael Palmquist, Hannah Maddison and Gabbie Estep. Each of these students participated in three sports each year all four years of their high school careers. Some played the sports, but they can also get credit for managing and, in Gabbie Estep’s case, assisting athletic trainer Rick Nelson during home games as an athletic training student aid.

“I played volleyball, swam, and did tennis my sophomore and freshman year and then my junior year I was an [athletic training student aid] for the football,wrestling and basketball teams and then I did tennis, and then this year I was the [athletic training student aid] for the football team, I swam again and then I played tennis,” Estep said

When pursuing the 12-sport athlete award, it is not required to play the same sport all four years. Michael Palmquist engaged in wrestling, football and track while Hannah Maddison played in and out of seasons or sat out one season to later engage a new sport.

“I did softball freshman through junior year, and then I did golf my senior year for the fall and then basketball and soccer,” Madison said.

All of these athletes have  engaged in sports since they were little, some like Palmquist, playing for the BJSA program and others playing on club teams.

“My parents just got me involved in everything when I was a kid, like club soccer and club softball,” Madison said, while Estep had a different story of how she got involved with sports. Her story began with wanting to be able to go down a slide at the pool when she was younger.

“There’s day camps that you could sign up for over the summer, and we actually went to one at Dowding Pool. I really wanted to go down the blue slide and it looked like a lot of fun, but you see, I couldn’t swim, and I absolutely failed the swim test,” Estep said, “so I went home and I cried to my mom. I was like seven, and I told her that I really wanted to learn how to swim so I can go down the blue slide. So then she put me on the swim team for club and so then I got stuck doing club swim and then somehow I got signed up for volleyball and then it just kind trickled down from there.”

There are many reasons that students may decide to join high school sports, even if they have played sports since they were young. One reason that some may be involved in sports is simply because they enjoy staying occupied.

“I’ve always just kind of been involved in sports; I just like to stay busy and through staying here after school with sports everyday it’s just something that I found really fun. I don’t like going home and being bored and just sitting there so I have always just been involved and I feel like sports is the way I did it,” Estep said.

Many student athletes think playing sports throughout the school year is an overall beneficial to their health. Athletic Trainer Rick Nelson stressed the importance of not overworking one’s body and how these athletes have an advantage.

“I like students that play multiple sports better than students who play one sport year round; we actually see much fewer injuries in people that play multiple sports because their bodies get a break each sport kind of has their own intercase,” Nelson said, “so if you’re a pitcher and you’re throwing year round you have shoulder problems, but if we go to basketball, to baseball, and to football, different parts of your bodies are getting distressed and it kind of gets spread out so I actually like it better when they are multiple sport athletes”

Balancing school and sports is something that all three of these athletes have had to do. They all handled the task very differently, but note that it is very difficult for them to adapt.

“Honestly, it’s kind of hard, but that’s when I use my GPS time to do my homework and stuff because usually when I go home I don’t have time to do anything, so if I do have stuff at home I usually stay up till 11 at the latest,” Madison said.

Estep noted that sometimes it was necessary for her to keep balanced by not always doing her homework. While it did mean she fell behind on her school work, she said that the weekends were the time she really was able to catch up on all her late or missing work.

“Sometimes I don’t [do my homework]; honestly, sometimes I just kind of slack off on school, but then on my weekends that’s when I kind of really just catch up and I think you just need to be determined that you’re a student athlete and not just an athlete and by taking advanced courses it is hard, but I know that in the future it really is beneficial,” Estep said.

Staying on top of homework was a problem for Palmquist, also. He mentions that at sometimes it was more difficult, but it did get easier over the years for him.

“It’s kind of hard, but you get kind of in the routine especially since now it’s year four. It was a little hard sophomore and junior year, but you just get used to it after a while,” Palmquist said.

Something in common is that their determination stemmed from not wanting to just sit around and do nothing, and instead found sports that they enjoyed and kept them engaged.

“I would say my determination probably stems from just not settling for anything less; just being someone that’s unique and finding something that I belong to and being involved. I have all these different families throughout the school,” Estep said.

Each of these students have a shown level of athletic determination seemingly unmatched by the rest of the class of 2019 and athletic director Chad Holz commended them for their hard work.

“I think 12-sport athletes bring a desire to compete to the school. These students are very involved and typically are very hard workers. What sets them apart is their work ethic and competitive nature. These students also are great at time management which a important lifelong skill,” Holz said.