- April 24, 2024
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Deanna Newkirk, owner of the Volusia Sports Center. Photo by Michele Meyers
The Volusia Sports Center ribbon cutting ceremony will be held March 31 at 4:00 p.m. and the grand opening celebration will be April 1 from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Photo by Michele Meyers
The Volusia Sports Center ribbon cutting ceremony will be held March 31 at 4:00 p.m. and the grand opening celebration will be April 1 from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Photo by Michele Meyers
Deanna Newkirk, owner of the Volusia Sports Center and father Roy Johnson, Holly Hill Commissioner, District 4. Photo by Michele Meyers
The Volusia Sports Center has a viewing room where clients can watch the activities, play games and watch television. Photo by Michele Meyers
Volusia Sports Center batting tunnels. Photo by Michele Meyers
The Volusia Sports Center has an outdoor field for sports activities, training and practice. Photo by Michele Meyers
Deanna Newkirk runs through the reservation system with clients Kelvin De La Cruz and Manaury Velasquez at the Volusia Sports Center. Photo by Michele Meyers
The Volusia Sports Center has batting tunnels with retractable nets that can be pushed back to open the space for a variety of sports training and practice. Photo by Michele Meyers
Deanna Newkirk, owner of the Volusia Sports Center, pulls the retractable netting used for the HitTrax tunnel. Photo by Michele Meyers
Deanna Newkirk, owner of the Volusia Sports Center, explains how the pitching machine works. Photo by Michele Meyers
Deanna Newkirk is a self-professed perfectionist.
“I have OCD,” she laughed. “But I like to say I have CDO, because it’s in alphabetical order.”
The Ormond Beach resident’s drive to create an indoor space for athletes, sports teams and their families led to her recent opening of the Volusia Sports Center at 1137 Nova Road in Holly Hill.
The 7,000-square-foot facility was converted from an automotive repair center to an indoor sports facility a little over a year after a groundbreaking ceremony was held in February 2022.
VSC houses seven “tunnels” with retractable netting: Four are used as baseball batting cages, one for softball and another for Oculus Virtual Reality games. Tunnel one is reserved for HitTrax, a baseball simulator. The system analyzes data as the bat hits the ball, giving players and coaches invaluable information about exit ball velocity, distance, pitching speed and strike zone metrics before they step out on the field.
It’s a perfect place for baseball players of all ages to develop their skills. - Colin Lombardoni, Seabreeze JV baseball coach
Retractable netting is expensive, so few batting cage businesses buy it. The netting at VSC cost $82,000, and Newkirk, a Seabreeze High School alumna, did not qualify for a Small Business Administration loan because there was nothing comparable in the area.
“There’s absolutely nothing to compare this to in Jacksonville, Orlando or anywhere,” she said. “It doesn’t exist. Nobody has all the sports. They focus on being a batting cage facility and just have baseball and softball. Maybe they have a birthday room. Maybe they have a retail shop. They don’t have all of this under one roof, and outside space too.”
Holly Hill District 4 Commissioner Roy Johnson is Newkirk’s father and the owner of the VSC property. Her son Dallas will inherit the property when he turns 18. Johnson and Newkirk had a family discussion about what they should do with the property to increase its value.
“During COVID, I had a heart-to-heart with my dad,” She said. “I had been trying to help Dad clean the place up. I told him that I love him, but I didn’t want to be an owner of a junkyard.”
She knew the community needed a large indoor sports facility because she had helped Fly the W Hitting — a small indoor batting space — reach new clients, but it could only accommodate a small number of teams when practices were rained out.
“People were fighting to get in there,” she said. “Every time it rained, there was only room for one team at a time. Only three hours of the night, and one at a time. There are six baseball teams in just Ormond. First come, first served, so what do all the other teams do? Where do they go? They don’t. They cancel practice.”
At first, Johnson and Newkirk’s husband, Harry Newkirk — owner of Newkirk Engineering — could not envision Deanna Newkirk’s concept for the VSC, and decided to file plans with the city of Holly Hill to start a covered RV storage facility at the site.
They abandoned the project after determining that it would not be profitable, and started over.
Harry Newkirk then designed the new site for the sports center, and they resubmitted the plans to the city of Holly Hill.
The center also includes a birthday room, child care area, space for strength training and conditioning, a second floor viewing room with televisions, and a combination air hockey, pool and ping pong table.
Athletes can also reserve training sessions with professional coaches and trainers.
Seabreeze junior varsity baseball coach and Scorpions travel program coach Colin Lombardoni has been involved from the beginning. He offers personal training and camps at VSC.
“It’s a perfect place for baseball players of all ages to develop their skills,” he said.
Newkirk is looking forward to the VSC’s ribbon cutting ceremony at 4 p.m. on March 31.
There will also be a grand opening celebration from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on April 1, when the community will get a chance to tour the facility, meet their vendors and win prizes.
