The Opelika Sportsplex and Aquatics Center will be turning five years old next week, and the facility is hosting a weeklong celebration to thank current members and welcome new ones.

Opelika Sportsplex members can look forward to an entire week of raffles, contests and giveaways leading up to a special celebration on Friday, Aug. 29.

“On Friday we are planning on just having a great time all day,” said Laura Leigh Chesser, public relations coordinator. “We are going to have a free parfait bar set up all day, we are going to be raffling things off every hour, we will have a couple contests going on, and we’re really just going to be going the extra mile to motivate and encourage our members.”

The Opelika Sportsplex will be providing workout tips, recipes and other health centered advice each day of the week leading up to Friday. Members and guests can pick these tips up from the membership table at the Sportsplex or they can find them on the Opelika Sportsplex Facebook page each day during the celebration.

“We have so many staff members here with so much knowledge that we want to share with our members,” said Chesser.

The Opelika Sportsplex will also have a special contest each day leading up to Friday, giving Sportsplex members a chance to win Sportsplex hats, T-shirts and other items.

“We want our members to have fun while they are here,” said Chesser. “So we have planned some traditional and non-traditional contests that all of our members can participate in. I don’t want to give any of them away; you will have to come in to see what they are.”

Chesser said the Opelika Sportsplex also wants to thank the members that have been there with them since opening in 2009 by giving them a commemorative “5 years” Sportsplex T-shirt. Charter members can claim their T-shirt by stopping by the membership table any time next week.

The Opelika Sportsplex also wants to encourage potential members to join the facility. By coming in for a tour of the Sportsplex, guests can earn up to five free guest passes to be used in August.

The beginning of this weeklong birthday celebration will also mark the return of the Sportsplex Football Frenzy, a contest that tracks the amount of hours members spend working out at the Sportsplex. The Football Frenzy will go through the end of football season.

“Our members and our community are the reason all of us get to get up and come in to work each day,” said Pierce. “So we want to honor them and thank them for providing us the opportunity to serve them on a daily basis. Without them we wouldn’t exist.”

The Opelika Sportsplex, a $32 million, 75,000-square-foot complex, is the largest project ever undertaken by the City of Opelika in its 155 year history, representing the first-ever public-private partnership, with businesses, corporations and private individuals.

The Opelika Sportsplex began as an idea taken from a community survey in the early 2000s. The citizens of Opelika wanted a “family-oriented” facility that would offer a wide variety of activities that everyone could enjoy doing together. On Aug. 31, 2009 – on schedule and on budget – Opelika’s new state-of-the-art Sportsplex and Aquatics Center opened its doors to the public.