With COVID-19 limiting not only everyday life but Bison teams' off-season training, we're catching up with our student-athletes to see how they're handling social distancing. Here's what football's Des Catellier has been up to ahead of his final season with the Bisons.
 
What has been your daily routine these past few weeks?
 
Catellier: So when we first heard the news that the combine was cancelled, myself and Macho [Bockru] went down to Vancouver for a little bit and we did some training, because of the weather here. So we were able to get outside on a field, we were out there for a couple weeks. And then we both came back to Winnipeg and exam time has been really hitting us. So basically, my routine has been getting up, getting some homework done throughout the day, then a little workout. We got a bar with some weights and a couple dumbbells and a bunch of bands in our basement, so I usually hit those like every second day to work out. We've been able to get in our backyard and throw some balls, every second day usually. And just try to stay involved, stay active. But also, like school's been heavy of late. So I've just been doing a lot of studying, a little bit of video games and watching TV and then making sure I'm staying active and focused on my football stuff right now.
 
With more free time, what hobbies have you picked up or rediscovered?
 
Catellier: I've been playing a little bit more video games, I usually don't play a lot of video games so I picked up the video games a little bit more, like Madden and 2K mostly — just a couple sports games. I like playing Madden. It kind of keeps me in football mode honestly. Sometimes I'll make a player and I'll pretend that it's me out there or something [laughs]. But I've been doing a little bit of reading too. There's a couple of good books that I've been kind of holding off on so I'm getting started on one good one at least right now. I think after school's done, that's when I really have to start finding a couple things. I'm going to have to start finding some stuff to keep myself busy because as of now, anytime I have free time, I say I should be spending my time on homework and stuff.

How have you dealt with transitioning to online classes?
 
Catellier: I actually got lucky because this semester I took all my classes online from the start. So it wasn't that big of a transition. There's little things, I mean we were going to have our exam in-person. So, all of our exams kind of got changed to online, but as for the learning material I feel like I'm the lucky one in that sense where I was already learning it online and my classes were already set up to be online. I know there's a lot of people, like Macho's a guy that I've been spending time with who had to switch all his classes to Zoom. It's a whole another way of learning so that definitely interrupted his process. But I kind of got lucky that it happened in that case for school, it didn't really affect much for me.
 
How are your handling communicating with you and your teammates?

Catellier: Well I so I live with Birhanu Yitna and Riley Harrison, so two of my receivers and then, me and Macho were in Vancouver together so he's been the other guy that I've been seeing — those three guys, all three of them receivers. It's been good in that sense, and we have a decent sized backyard so I've been throwing to receivers that I might be throwing to when we go into the season. So I'm still dealing with these guys, but as some of the other guys I've been texting and Snapchat and other things to keep in contact, but there's not much we can do on a training aspect together at least. We can talk about what we're doing right now on our own, but there's nothing we can really do to get together. You can't go meet up at a field and do whatever, so I'm just making sure everyone's keeping good and focused and not too down on everything that's going on.
 
Have you thought about your season not starting on time?
 
Catellier: Oh, yeah I thought about it. I don't really know, it's very unknown as of now. I really hope that's not the case but it's not out of the question. This is my draft year so that's what my focus was until now, with the draft on April 30. I just don't know whether the CFL camps are going to be delayed, whether U SPORTS camps will be delayed, or will there be a U SPORTS season — there's a lot of questions right now. And it's hard to speculate on anything that's going to happen because you don't really know what the whole virus will look like in two weeks realistically. I mean I'm just hoping for the best — I can get into a camp in the CFL and still be able to play out last season with Manitoba. I can't really speculate as there's a lot of unknowns.
 
There's a possibility about playing without fans, what do you think of that?
 
Catellier: It'd be weird. You do hear those fans that we get. It's a little bit of extra motivation, it's just like we play almost like a performer when you're playing. Because we all know the guys and how we practise and how we play football, but everybody changes on game day and it's different — now you're performing in front of people. Everything you do is being put on watch. The CFL season, if you play without fans it'd be a lot different as they got full stadiums. It'd be a weird atmosphere but I think once you strap the pads on and you're on the field it just turns into football. All these guys practise. We do team, we do skelly, we're playing against each other and it doesn't really change the intensity of how we're playing. I think if you get into a game, and you get a situation where those games are meaning something like you're in the regular season fight for a playoff spot, I don't think it changes the level of football. I do think it changes the atmosphere. I still think people will come out and want to play. Just because there's not anybody watching doesn't mean that something still isn't on the line and that you're trying to accomplish something. Our team has been trying to accomplish a Vanier Cup win, a Hardy Cup win. And that doesn't change if there's no fans there. I think at the end of the day, the reason why all these players are playing are beyond the fans. People will be able to do it. It will just be very weird and it's something that you don't want to do, I'd way rather play in front of fans and have people watch and have my family be there and all that, but I think if that's the way we have to adapt people will be able to do it.
 
What are you most looking forward to doing again once life returns to normal?
 
Catellier: Oh, going to the IGF gym. Not even a question. IGF gym, chilling in that facility, watching film, being there with all the guys and all my friends. All my family really, it's weird being away from them in Winnipeg because when I go back to Calgary, I have my friends there and my family there but here I basically have those guys. That's my family and why I'm here. I'm just really excited to go back to the stadium and catch up with everybody and start rolling toward football again with those guys.