Fall Back into Fitness features sports and service

Fall Back into Fitness gave students opportunities to experience a variety of activities and sports in an event from 10 p.m. to midnight on Friday, Sept. 27.

Formerly known as Midnight Madness, Fall Back into Fitness is an annual event put on by BYU Student Wellness. This year, the event offered many activities for students to participate in, including a cannonball contest, a rock climbing wall, spikeball, high fitness, yoga and more.

Some of the new activities offered this year included black light pickleball, wheelchair basketball and a service project. Organizers also provided fall snacks such as doughnuts and apple cider. There were also places for people to chat and mingle around fires.

Amanda Giraldi is a student administrator for the BYU Wellness Committee and helped put on the event. She explained that Fall Back into Fitness was a big opener for Student Wellness to show off all that they offer.

“We want to show people what facilities are available to them as BYU students and show them kind of what they can do with student wellness because I think a lot of people don’t know how much is available to them. And then we also just want them to have fun, be social, get to know people and have a good time,” Giraldi said.

Heather Siaki, a course administrator in Student Wellness who oversees all of the Student Wellness classes at BYU, said that they “really hope that (students) can have fun and enjoy themselves with all the many activities that we’re offering.”

The event was also used to show students, especially freshmen, the classes that Student Wellness offers.

“We offer over 150 sections, and it spans anywhere from basketball, volleyball, swimming, cycling, pickleball, scuba diving, ice skating … we have a lot of different options for all of our students,” Siaki said.

Valeria Valentini, a BYU senior studying psychology and minoring in global women’s studies and business, heard about Fall Back into Fitness through Instagram. She was one of the contestants in the cannonball contest, and she took home the third place prize: an Owala water bottle.

“It was so, so, so fun! I loved it,” Valentini said.

She had entered the contest with a friend and said she was glad that they both participated.

One of the events that took place on Friday was wheelchair basketball. Sam Blake, an experience design and management major, was one of the volunteers running the wheelchair games.

“The reason why we want to do this event is just to spread awareness and help students realize that these are real things and that there is people out there that. . .can’t play regular ability sports,” Blake said.

Blake said that with the Paralympics and other events becoming more common, it creates an opportunity for people to participate who would not be able to otherwise and simultaneously allows for able-bodied students to gain greater empathy for others.

“This gives them an opportunity to learn about that. And for people who might have disabilities, are paralyzed or quadriplegic or whatever, can participate in sports,” Blake said.

Lindsay Knight, a freshman psychology major and attendee at the event, was able to play a round of wheelchair basketball on Friday.

“I did the wheelchair basketball, and I think that was actually really awesome because my cousin’s actually quadriplegic. So it was awesome to see an experience of what he feels like,” Knight said.

Knight further explained that her cousin has played wheelchair basketball before, so the opportunity helped her understand his experience.

One of the night’s other activities was a service project headed by Siaki.

“We have a couple different things that we’re working on. One of them is writing on index cards the phrase ‘you are loved’ and decorating them however the students like. Those cards are getting sent to refugees in countries in the Middle East. And our second project is putting together activity books for the children as well for these refugees,” Siaki explained.

“We’re just really happy to be able to serve in this way,” she said.

The event had multiple different objectives and impacted the various attendees differently.

“We want them to feel uplifted. . .whether that’s physically, spiritually (or) mentally,” Siaki said.