McMaster's baseball diamonds will be “frost-free” this year and faculty and staff who work out at the Pulse will exercise in a new treadmill gallery thanks to funding provided through the McMaster University Futures Fund (MUFF).

The funding, allocated earlier this year, is being used to support a number of improvements in facilities used by employees for recreational purposes:

• $55,000 to purchase new treadmills and new lockers for the Ivor Wynne Centre.

  The new treadmills will go into the refurbished fitness gallery over the squash courts located in the south side of the athletic centre, said Therese Quigley, director of athletics & recreation. Pulse members will be able to use the new aerobic treadmill gallery and specific hours will be reserved for faculty and staff.

  The new lockers will replace baskets used in the fitness centre's change rooms, Quigley said.

• $38,000 is set aside to buy fitness equipment and to renovate a fitness area in Henderson Hospital.

  Fitness instructor and lab technologist Janice Rischke said she'd like to purchase a treadmill, a stepper, a cross-trainer and a stationary bike for employees' use once they have renovated a room in the hospital for the equipment.

• $8,000 towards the maintenance of the campus softball fields.

  The volunteer-run Graduate Students' Association softball league has purchased a specially designed drag to keep the diamonds in good shape, said softball commissioner Andy Duncan.

  In the past, the three campus infields were conditioned daily by a home-made device made out of two-by-fours and an old frost fence pulled behind a golf cart. The new drag will keep the infield from hardening up, said Duncan.

  There are 30 teams in the softball league, made up of faculty members, staff and graduate students.

MUFF funding comes from the interest earned by the University on money that could not go into the University's pension plan because of restrictions enforced by Revenue Canada.