REMINISCES OF A STRENGTH COACH #1

At 5:09 my alarm rang. I was going up to USC to see Coach Carlisle. Coach C is the head strength and conditioning coach at the #1 ranked football program for the last three years. I am fortunate enough to be able to talk with him and see the players first hand. At 6:55 players were hustling out to Howard Jones field, the outdoor practice facility that is adjacent to the baseball field and swimming stadium. The players sign up for different times, and we were seeing the first group. About 30 plus football players, a girls basketball player, and possibly others were there.
Their workout started off with a dynamic warmup which combined active movements followed by a specific stretch. For example, they may do a 40 yard sprint, not at maximum speed, followed by a hamstring stretch. Then another 40 yard sprint followed by a different stretch. Then this is followed by some ground based hip oriented work. This is work you may have seen in aerobics classes and scoffed at, but now see as an excellent way of improving and maintaining hip flexibility.
Eventually the group is broken into three sub groups that are roughly lineman, secondary/wr, and lb/fb. By the way, Heisman Trophy winner Matt Leinart was there, performing physical therapy band drills. Winston Justice and other starters were there. It is an awe inspiring site to see. These smaller groups rotated around three stations. The first station was a form running drill that focused on feet and hands and the delivery and absorption of force. Some of the secondary/wr were very good. The lineman did a combination of bags and ladders. They worked hard where other players would have easily lost their cookies. The third group was doing a series of medicine ball balance/stability drills supervised by Coach Brian Bailey. Coach Bailey was previously at Nebraska, and is a very nice addition to the staff.
After each group rotated through the various drills at each station, the entire team went into the weightroom. I watched the lineman perform power snatches from the hang, power cleans, one legged lunges (with the back leg elevated) and a variety of other lower body work. Toward the tail end of the workout I went into the other room, and saw a skill player that was awesome. He was doing one legged squats with a vest on and weight in each hand. That was impressive. I'm sure he will excel regardless of the position he plays.
The session was ended with 40's. The had to run sub 5.5 to 6.0. They did ten ten. This is a sprint under a time dependent on their position with a 25 second rest. This was repeated ten times followed by a 2 minute rest. After the 2 minute rest, they would repeat the process of ten reps. Oh, by the way, if they didn't start behind the line, they would repeat the sprint. This did occur once. The discipline is excellent. Coach Carlisle has an excellent staff of Jamie Yanchar (best stare in the business), Charr Gahagan (looks like he can still make all pro), Gary Uribe (worked hard to be part of an important part of a great staff), and Leslie Cordova (don't let her deceive you she knows), and Brian Bailey. It is always educational and awe inspiring to be allowed to see them all in action. THANK YOU ALL!
When I was returning to Fountain Valley HS for our afternoon workout, I was brought back to earth. Their is a hill adjacent to the school, that crosses the 405 freeway. There was a personal trainer, I don't want to know him, who had two of his athletes running sprints. Running up a slight embankment is great, but on a hard surface, on a smoggy day, next to a heavily traveled street, didn't make sense to me. What about those athletes lungs sucking in all that dirty air. Especially on a smoggy day. Did you know their is a green belt that runs through FV and HB, that has lots of grass you can run on. This park system is in areas that are not adjacent to heavily traveled streets! Dah! Then I walked into the weight room to help coach the freshman. I realized that the Wizard of Oz (USC) was far away, and I was back into reality!
For questions about any part of this journey I can be contacted at acudave@yahoo.com