Time For Spring Ball

It's that time of year! Time for spring football! I think I speak for
all of my teammates when I say that it's going to feel great to finally
get back to playing football rather than just conditioning. Players are
excited and ready to go. Many of us (including me) are sporting new
tattoos, new goals, new outlooks and a renewed enthusiasm. I can't
wait to hit the field and help build off of what we accomplished last
season and begin to help correct what we didn't do well this offseason. I want to be a leader on this team and I will do my very best to lead by example.

"WE'VE GOTTA RUN HOW MANY HUNDREDS!?"
Sixteen. That's how many hundreds we had to run on both Tuesday and
Thursday. I know you may not think that sounds very tough; that's what
I was thinking as well. But it turned out to be one of the hardest
workouts we've had since I've been here at IU.

On Tuesday, head strength coach, Mark Wateska, and his assistant, Andy
Campbell, broke us in after returning from spring break. We
received short rest times after every four sprints. That took a small
amount of heat off of us, but the workout was still difficult. The times
for each group were fast. I had no problems making the times, but
everyone was sprinting all out for each one, making us that much more
tired. I'd say 99% of the time I have a quick recovery from our
workouts, but after this one...I was DONE! When Coach Lynch was
speaking to us after the workout I was so tired I had trouble keeping
my head up to see him. After we broke it down, I went over to the
sidelines to lie down for a few minutes to get my wits about me.

On Thursday we ran the same workout, only with faster times and no
rest. I actually felt much better on Thursday than I did on Tuesday. We were able to run outside due to the good weather, which
was nice. I noticed some of my teammates throwing up after the workout,
which was all the more reason for me to consider last week’s workouts
one of the hardest weeks we've had.

Mark Wateska and his staff have done an excellent job getting us all
ready to go this spring. They worked our core (abs and back muscles)
exceptionally hard this winter.

Later today my teammates and I will let it loose at practice for the first time since the Insight Bowl. It's going to be great!