Fulfilling Our Potential
Half of our middle- and high-school students participate in soccer, track and field, and/or cross-country, yet our school has lacked facilities for these sports for at least five years. All our students deserve to have the best and safest practice and game facilities to reach their full potential.
The Need
In 2019, the Ridgway boys soccer team won the Colorado Class 2A state championship. Since then, the field behind our secondary school has been unusable, because of problems with irrigation and drainage. Both our boys and girls teams have to travel to the opposite end of town to share a soccer field with a community youth soccer program that has more than 150 kids.
Despite a strong tradition in track and field, there is no track in Ouray County, and no publicly available track in five counties, an area larger than Connecticut. High school track and field athletes in Ridgway, Ouray, Silverton, Telluride, Norwood, and the West End, with more than 1,800 students, drive between two and three hours to access a track. The current situation is also harmful for the athletes’ health. In 2022, the boys track team won the Colorado 2A state championship in two relays. The following year, they didn’t even field a team, because three of the four relay members sustained hamstring tears or stress fractures. Training on concrete paths undoubtedly contributed to these injuries. In addition, there’s no safe space to practice long jump, high jump, or hurdle events. Middle school hurdlers and long jumpers train in a school hallway.
Half of our middle- and high-school students participate in soccer, track and field, and/or cross-country, yet our school has lacked facilities for these sports for at least five years. All our students deserve to have the best and safest practice and game facilities to reach their full potential.
Our Response
The Cimarron Athletic Field at RSS campaign is raising $3.6M to turn our empty field into a vibrant recreational hub that will serve four counties, six school districts, and thousands of young people in an under-resourced part of southwest Colorado. On the site of the defunct grass field, we plan to build a synthetic turf soccer field with environmentally friendly materials and an all-weather eight-lane track, with areas for high jump, long jump, triple jump, discus, shotput, and pole vault. Next to the field, we will have a large climbing dome centering a play/fitness area and a community gathering space with shaded benches and tables. The facility will be open to the public year-round when not in use for school sporting events.
Construction of the Cimarron Athletic Field will expand youth access and lower barriers to sports in multiple communities around the San Juan region, including Ridgway, Ouray, Silverton, Telluride, Norwood, and the West End, with a total population of more than 13,000 people. In many of these towns, soccer and running are the only outdoor sports available to students, but the lack of facilities has discouraged participation.
Our goal is to finish fundraising for the Cimarron Athletic Field by January 2025. We plan to break ground in the spring and complete construction by September 2025, in time to have our first home soccer game in six years and the first track meet in the history of Ouray, San Miguel, and San Juan counties.
