In Fairfax County, Two Sports in Jeopardy

"Because [gymnastics] is not in every school, not everyone supports it," said W.T. Woodson Coach Mike Cooper, whose teams have won more than two dozen local and state boys' and girls' titles in his 25-year career. "Because some schools don't have a team, it's easy to say, 'Yes, let's cut it.' The schools that have it and support the program see that it's beneficial."

About 2,500 students participate in indoor track, which has long served as a catch-all sport for athletes looking for a way to train during the offseason.

"All of the sudden you are sending 2,500 kids out into traffic, out into the streets with nothing to do," Sherry said.

Since the boys' indoor track and field state meet became an official VHSL championship event in 1950, Northern Region teams have won 18 state titles. The girls' teams have combined for 14 of 27 titles since the girls' meet became official in 1982. In February, the Fairfax County Park Authority entertained several proposals that called for a 250,000-square-foot indoor track facility at Laurel Hill Park, the site of the former Lorton Penitentiary. "We had a lot of discussion, but ultimately, with no funding, there was no plan," Curran said.

Fairfax County schools must travel to meets all over the East Coast, and run a majority of their indoor meets at the Prince George's Sports & Learning Complex, an 80-acre facility adjacent to FedEx Field in Landover. Travel costs to the county were $92,000 last year, Curran said.

"We don't have a facility that supports it," Curran said.

Centreville Principal Mike Campbell, chairman of the Northern Region Council, a group of athletic directors and principals, said that Fairfax schools are considering running indoor meets outdoors this season and weighing several other "creative solutions," Campbell said.

Losing Fairfax County's 25 indoor track teams would make the "Northern Region championship very interesting, between four or five schools," said T.C. Williams Principal Bill Clendaniel, whose school is located in Alexandria.

Washington-Lee, Wakefield and Yorktown (all located in Arlington), T.C. Williams and Loudoun's Stone Bridge compete in the Northern Region but are funded separately.

Curran said that future cuts in the county sports program would not target any individual sports but would be made by trimming a "little bit from everywhere," such as reducing the number of games at the non-varsity level.

Swimming, which has often been a candidate for cuts in the past, was not an option during the evaluation process because Curran said the sport had not seen a decline in participation.

This is not the first time high school sports in the area have felt the bottom line. When facing a budget shortfall in 1991, Fairfax cut the number of sporting events for every team, other than varsity football and boys' and girls' basketball, by one to four games. Other events, many on the sub-varsity level, were dropped, but no sports were eliminated.