White: Exam Time for Football Players

By Jeff White (jwhite@virginia.edu)

CHARLOTTESVILLE – Whoops and shouts of encouragement shattered the early-morning silence outside the McCue Center. Some groans were audible, too.

The occasion was the conditioning test for UVa football players, who have been training this summer under the direction of Brandon Hourigan and his staff. The Cavaliers gathered before dawn today on the practice field – NCAA rules prohibited Al Groh and his assistants from watching – for an exam that began at 6.

As the sun rose, the players ran, and ran, and then ran once more. And when the session ended, around 6:35 a.m., the players quickly dispersed.

“Going back to bed!” one Cavalier yelled to his teammates as he sprinted off the field.

The test consisted of a series of three shuttle runs, with each run covering 300 yards. Players had two minutes of rest between runs. The team was split into four groups: offensive linemen, defensive linemen, big skill (linebackers, tight ends, fullbacks and quarterbacks) and skill (tailbacks, defensive backs and wide receivers).

Each group had a standard to meet, with the offensive linemen given the most time to finish. Those who passed the test – save the true freshmen — are through with organized workouts until Aug. 7, when training camp opens.

The few players who failed have another date next Thursday with Hourigan, director of the team’s strength-and-conditioning program.

“This is basically the ticket into camp,” fifth-year senior Chris Cook said. “You have to pass this test before you can even start training camp.”

Cook, an all-ACC candidate at cornerback, passed. So did redshirt sophomore Nick Jenkins, the returning starter at nose tackle.

“The summer was great,” Jenkins said. “I feel like I’m in 10 times better shape than I was last summer. Coach Hourigan’s done a great job getting us ready to go for the season. This is the best shape I’ve ever been in my entire life.”

That’s good news for Virginia, of course, but the summer program is designed to do more than get the players ready for the grind of training camp.

At the start of the program, Groh said this afternoon, the coaching staff “emphasized to the players that the two primary goals were to develop the type of mental strength, individually and collectively, that we’ll need to face all the challenges that any season presents, and to develop the type of unity that creates a team rather than just a collection of individuals.”

Grueling workouts foster that sense of togetherness among the players.

“You have some people straggling,” Jenkins said, “and you have some people that are having a tough time making it, but everybody’s out there pushing each other and trying to get them to make it.”

Hourigan, who came to U.Va. in January from the University of Richmond, has seen the team’s personality begin to take shape in recent weeks, a process that will accelerate during training camp.

“You start to see other guys kind of get on other guys,” Hourigan said. “At the finish of that [300-yard] run, for instance, you start hearing guys say, ‘Hey, stand up. Get up. Don’t sit down.’

“For the first part of the summer, that was me saying that on a continuous basis. Now I’ve left my role to them. And what I tell them is, ‘Guys, I’m not playing. You are. This is your team. I’m just giving you the program. It’s up to you to decide what you want to do as a team.’

“So they’re the ones that have to be the generals of the thing, and they’re starting to come together in that fashion.”

This time last summer, Cook was out of school and out of the football program while serving an academic suspension.

“I missed it all,” Cook said, even the grueling pre-dawn workouts.

Of the summer workout regimens he’s followed since enrolling at U.Va. in 2005, “this might be my favorite one of all, because we concentrated on keeping our bodies together more,” Cook said. “We’re really not as beat up as we usually are around this time. I feel like everybody feels good about their body and everything going into camp.”

Hourigan wasn’t thrilled with the condition in which some of the incoming freshmen reported, but the class “did pretty well” this morning, he said. “I was happy with the shape that they’ve gotten themselves in since we’ve started.”

The first-year players, who have been training together since early this month, will continue to meet for 6 a.m. workouts with Hourigan until the start of training camp.

“Our principal objective with the rookies,” Groh said, “is to get their legs and their cardiovascular conditioning such that they have a chance to keep up in training camp. That is, we’re not going to get them to a college strength level in three-and-a-half weeks, but we want to narrow the gap” between the newcomers and the returning players.

One of those true freshmen, wideout Quintin Hunter, was heading back to bed as he left the locker room this morning. Bed is where the veterans will be tomorrow morning when Hunter and his classmates report for more conditioning.

“I’m looking forward to getting a chance to sleep in a little bit,” Jenkins said, smiling.

That’s fine with Hourigan, who liked most of what he saw from the players this morning.

“I thought they did great,” he said. “All in all, I think the guys wanted to get this thing done so they can just start prepping for football.”