Ice Cream with Athletes — A Spotlight on Future Olympian Sarah Chase
For elite athletes, you might be surprised at how much they love ice cream, but for Sarah Chase, she is no exception.
Decisions, decisions as we enter Salt & Straw in San Francisco, and try all of the special flavors of the month, all delicious of course. Single scoop, or double, Cone or Cup? Once all of the hard decisions were made, I sat down with Chase, and was able to get the inside scoop about what it is like to be playing at such a high level.
Sarah Chase is a native of Campbell River, British Columbia, which is about 5 hours away from Seattle. She started playing volleyball when she was 11, and hasn’t been able to stop. She played for a number of school and club teams before getting recruited to play for Saint Mary’s College, where she is a senior, on the cusp of graduation.
During her senior year here at SMC as an Outside hitter she has racked up a total of 204 kills, 24 service aces, and a .205 hitting percentage. Mind you, this is all indoors, she makes the transition every spring to the sand courts, where it becomes a totally different game. Playing beach forces a player to be very dynamic, and adaptable, and develop their skills.
About what she loves most about volleyball.
“Everything, Oh my gosh,” Chase said. “ I love how you have to be good at a lot of different skills, and the skill level, when it gets to be much higher, can be so much fun, as well as the friendships that come out of it.”
After her first year here at SMC, Chase tried out to be a member of the Canadian Women’s National team, which she made.
“ Yeah, its the full real deal national team” Chase said. “We train at the old Olympic track facility in Richmond, BC; we are a team on the rise”.
The Canadian ladies play in the The North, Central America and Caribbean Volleyball Confederation, (NORCECA), where they have 6 qualifying tournaments in order to try to to qualify for the upcoming 2020 olympics.
“There was this one time that I was so physically exhausted that I was literally crawling up the stairs, because I was so tired” Chase said about the training regime. “It’s definitely worth it though. It sucks if you lose, because winning is the goal, but when you do win, its awesome”.
Lindsey Calvin is Chase’s roommate, and she talked about what it’s like living with her.
“Living together and playing together can be a lot, but I love Sarah, she’s my best friend,” Calvin said. “We have been roommates all 4 years, its awesome to have someone to come home to laugh to after a really long tough day, can be really hard playing all day. We have learned how to push each other on the court and still be cool, and we like to do fun things, like get ice cream.”
Chase will be finishing up this season of beach volleyball for the Gaels before graduation in May, and then will go back home to Canada where the Lady Maple Leafs will be making a run at an Olympic bid.
