NATCHEZ — The Lady Green Wave softball players aren’t the only Cathedral athletes getting something new.

After three years of work, the school has finished revamping its weight room. The weight room consists of nine brand new power stations, one leg press machine, two glute machines and two leg extension stations. The dumbbell area also has three new benches.

Each new bench sports a Cathedral Green Wave logo and each station has a wood finish base with the Green Wave logo as well.

“The kids are really excited about it and they’re proud of it,” Cathedral athletic director Craig Beesley said. “It’s a very nice facility, especially for us being one of the smaller schools.”

Since 1997, this is the first upgrades Cathedral has made towards their weight room facility. Cathedral paid for the upgrades, with a little say-so from principal Pat Sanguinetti.

“Our principal has allowed us to upgrade the facility through our athletic budget and some funds came from an annual appeal,” Beesley said. “We’ve been upgrading it for almost three years now.”

With all this new equipment, head football coach Ron Rushing is excited about the opportunities the Green Wave sports program now has.

“The facility will be available for all athletics, year-round lifting,” Rushing said. “We want to get every athlete in here at least twice a week. It doesn’t do any good to have all this equipment if it’s not being used.”

The nine versatile power machines allow for multiple exercises, reducing the amount of time athletes transition from machine to machine.

“These machines allow you to do bench press, incline, power clean, dead lift and squat,” Rushing said. “You can basically do anything on them. It will also cut down the time the kids go from machine to machine to do different exercises. I can work out 36 kids on the nine stations and have everyone out in an hour.”

Cathedral also has equipped the facility with five pound bars instead of the traditional 35 or 45 pound bars.

“We’ve brought in five pound bars so kids can put the weight on the bar, which allows the junior high kids and girls to work out and actually see the weight they have on the bar,” Rushing said.

Rushing has multiple programs throughout the school year, as well as going into the summer, that will have athletes working out in the new facility.

“Our junior high works out everyday from 9-11 and I have about 20 kids come in when school gets out at 3:05,” Rushing said. “Over the summer, our football team will be in here four days a week. Our in-season players workout twice a week to maintain.”

With the new weights in place, Rushing feels that the additions will help Green Wave athletics.

“Our kids are excited and proud of the new equipment,” Rushing said. “It should translate on the field.”