Train

It seems we’ve entered an age where every summer we hear about a football player who has been hospitalized or died from heat exhaustion. Why has dealing with theheat become such an issue? Thirty, forty, and fifty years ago, football players practiced all day in the heat with little to no water and yet they didn’t die. Ihave to believe it’s our way of life.

Back in the day, kids spent their summer outside either playing or working. Today, kids only go outside when they haveto. They don’t play pickup games in the yard or ride their bikes to a different neighborhood to go play with friends. Once again, why has dealing with the heatbecome such an issue? Our bodies are accustomed to being inside with the air conditioning cranked. Now, we ask our bodies to adjust to extreme heat and they don’tknow how to respond. This is how I prepare my football players for summer practice in the south during the month of August.

My plan for summer workouts is to getmy athletes outside has much as possible. They aren’t going to go outside on their own, so it’s my job to make sure they’re accustomed to the heat. Our summerroutine follows a five-day work schedule. Mondays and Fridays are spent in the weight room. Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays are spent outside. In the weightroom, our team has been following the 5/3/1 program for almost two years now. We have seen great successes with it. On Mondays, we deadlift and military press withsupplemental lifts and upper body conditioning (I’ll describe this later). On Fridays, we squat and bench and perform supplemental lifts and upper body conditioning.