Why Kentucky is changing the way it measures temperature for high school sports

The heat hovered above the turf field at Pleasure Ridge Park on Tuesday afternoon.

Jefferson County Public Schools athletics director April Brooks wiped the sweat from her forehead as she met with a group of reporters to discuss athletics and heat.

To her left, a small orange device attached to a tripod calculated the environmental conditions and provided a temperature reading.

The number on the device — a wet bulb globe temperature monitor — continued to rise.

On Sunday, Brooks had emailed JCPS principals and athletic directors recommending they adjust practice times to either early morning or late evening.

It's a statewide trend as Kentuckians face extreme heat this week.

And it comes just days after the Kentucky High School Athletic Association released new policies meant to protect athletes during extreme heat.

For the first time in its history, the KHSAA will require schools to measure heat by a different standard — moving from heat index to the wet bulb globe temperature.

It's a measurement that states such as New Jersey, Georgia, South Carolina and Florida — who have all lost athletes to heat stroke deaths — already instituted.

It's a change The Courier Journal highlighted in its investigative series, Safer Sidelines .

"The series of articles jumpstarted or rekindled some people's interest in this," KHSAA commissioner Julian Tackett said this week.

"It’s been an accumulation of research over the last couple years. I think what (Safer Sidelines) did is it presented what another state used, as a checklist. What our (athletic directors) want — they want to know what they can do, when they can do it and what they can’t do, period."

The new heat policies were released Friday, exactly 16 years to the day of the death of Max Gilpin, the last Kentucky high school athlete to die from exertional heat stroke. He collapsed during football practice at Pleasure Ridge Park.

What Kentucky's new heat policy says and how it affects athletes

The new policies went into effect last week, just before the first official kickoffs of the season were about to get underway across the commonwealth.

At Central High School on Louisville's West End on Friday, a wet bulb globe temperature monitor stood near the sideline. A small wheel near its top whirled in a circle.

Kristen Pollock, Central's athletic trainer, pulled out her phone and snapped a photo of the device's display: 80.9 degrees Fahrenheit.

The new KHSAA rule requires schools to measure the heat a half-hour prior to the start of a football game and again at half-time.

That reading will now determine additional mandatory water breaks and equipment removal.

"By altering this procedure, which is in line with other states, it gives our Kentucky athletes what may be a high wet bulb globe temperature, but still gives them adequate breaks and hydration that they may need," said Kevin Brown, the president of the Kentucky Athletic Trainers' Society.

The KHSAA's sports medicine advisory committee, which is made up of doctors from the Kentucky Medical Association, released the requirements for football competitions on Thursday, in anticipation of the start of the season.

It is almost identical to a procedure University of Georgia professor Bud Cooper created , based on a six-year study he did for Georgia high schools and updated this spring.

"We updated the policy and regulations for competition because Atlanta City Schools decided to move their games from Friday night to Saturday ... so all the games went to noon kickoff," he said.

The new Kentucky requirements for football state:

• If the kick-off WBGT is 87 degrees or higher, there will be mandatory breaks near the 6-minute mark of each quarter, lasting three minutes. All football players have to remove their helmets, and coaches aren't permitted on the field (so it isn't a timeout; it's truly a rest).
• If a kick-off WBGT hits 90 degrees or more, two mandatory hydration breaks are required at the 4- and 8-minute mark with the same parameters.

"South Carolina did a similar thing," Cooper said. "They pretty much copied what we did, except they went one step further. They said if the WBGT went to 92 degrees, the game is canceled. No discussion."

A half-dozen Kentucky athletic trainers The Courier Journal spoke with last week were unclear on what to do if the WBGT got to 92 degrees.

The new policy also requires a medical timeout before the game to review procedures for heat exhaustion. A cold tub is also required to be ready for use on site if the WBGT is 86 degrees or above.

The KHSAA also released WBGT adaptation guidance for all outdoor sports , but for those, WBGTs are only "strongly recommended," not required. And middle schools have the option of using WBGT or the heat index.

Also, the new policy does not address practices.

"Ninety percent of all deaths occur in practice, they don’t occur in a game," Cooper said. "So, I applaud Kentucky for putting this policy together and having this in place, but it is not addressing the critical need and that is: What are you doing in practice?"

Cooper also questions whether using another state's policy is right for the commonwealth.

"If you want to use Georgia's policy, at least you're getting the conversation started," Cooper said. "Is it a good one? Absolutely. It's a good one for Georgia. And you can probably stretch that to say it's good for South Carolina, Alabama and Florida — because we're the southeast.

"Is it right for Iowa? Is it right for Kentucky or Oregon or California? No, it's not. Not in the least. It's not based on the climates in those areas."

The deadliest month in high school athletics

Almost every summer for the last 30 years, an athlete in the U.S. has died from heat exhaustion, including three Kentucky high school football players from 2006-09.

Sports medicine experts refer to August as the deadliest month when it comes to heat deaths in athletes.

This August, at least nine high school athletes collapsed and died in eight different states. While two died of traumatic brain injuries and the other of sudden cardiac arrest, the rest are still pending.

Retired University of Oklahoma athletic trainer Scott Anderson told The Courier Journal that based on 20-year averages, three football players die each year from exertional heat stroke. Anderson, who has been researching athlete deaths from heat for decades, teamed up with The Courier Journal to build the Deadly Games database , the first-of-its-kind public database of sudden death in athletes dating back to the early 1900s.

The last athlete to die of exertional heat stroke in Kentucky was University of Cumberlands wrestler Grant Brace in August 2020 . Brace begged his coaches for water and was denied, court documents alleged. The university settled with the family for $14.1 million .

What is a WBGT, and why is it the gold standard?

For the last 20 years, the KHSAA used the heat index to determine if a practice should be altered.

The heat index is the commonly known measure, thanks to the National Weather Service and local TV meteorologists, but it takes into account only air temperature and dew point.

Wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT) is a weighted temperature that measures not just the ambient air temperature but also includes air movement, humidity and radiant heat exchange, giving a measure of heat stress on an exerting body.

WBGT is also more accurate because a wet bulb globe thermometer allows athletic trainers to measure the conditions exactly where a team is practicing or competing.

While the new policy does require all 220 football-playing schools in the state to take the WBGT, there is no accountability or oversight on whether schools have the equipment or even log the readings.

"No, no," Tackett said. "You kind of knew that answer. There's a report form that they're going to keep, and I can tell you, we're being told boards of education and their legal counsel are going to ask for those to be kept local."

The price range for a WBGT monitor is about $150 to $600.

Stephanie Kuzydym is an enterprise and investigative sports reporter, with a focus on the health and safety of athletes. She can be reached at skuzydym@courier-journal.com . Follow her at @stephkuzy .

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Why Kentucky is changing the way it measures temperature for high school sports