Guts vs Glory Read Free

20 yards
as fast as we could.  Clearly, Mike had no problem with it, but when I was
done, I couldn’t breathe.  Without even getting a chance to catch my breath, it
was time for the second agility drill.  For that drill, we started at the same
place as before.  This time, we ran to the 10-yard line, turned back around and
ran back to the starting line, turned back around and ran to the 20-yard
line.   The back and forth running continued until we made it to the 50-yard
line.  In total, we ran 250 yards during that drill.  I think I’m still trying
to catch my breath.  But like before, that drill was made for Mike.
    After the speed drills, we were
ready to move on to the strength drills.  The first drill was to see how many
push-ups we could do.  After numerous attempts, we were finally able to do the
perfect push up.  Unfortunately, we were each only able to do one perfect
push-up.  Next were the sit-ups.  We struggled to figure out the right form for
those too, but eventually we were able to complete 10 of them.  Our last drill
was squats.  For that drill, we had to squat down as far as we could without
bending our back, and come back up with our knees locked.  After the 5th one,
neither of us could get back up.
    With the drills finally done, we
clearly didn’t need the coach to tell us what we needed to work on.  I needed
to work on my speed, while we both needed to work on our strength.  The coach
did tell us, though, that he was impressed with Mike’s natural speed and felt
that if I was strong enough, I could definitely use my large size to my
advantage.  He promised us success by the end of the season if we stuck with his
workout plan.  We quickly committed to the plan, but our degree of commitment
decreased the more the coach described what our workout would consist of.
    Since I would play as a lineman,
the coach wasn’t too worried about my speed.  He told me that I would get
faster once I maintained a healthy diet and worked on my cardiovascular system
a bit.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t use practice to work out on our own and we
couldn’t keep missing gym class.  That left us with the time before school to
utilize the school’s weight lifting room.  With a school day that started at
7:30, our sessions would have to start at 6AM.  For students going to bed after
midnight, 6AM seemed like a nightmare.  To stay on the football team, we would
have to go to bed early, wake up early, get to the gym early, make ourselves
lift weights and run on the treadmill, stay in school all day, then finish with
a three hour practice.  To make matters worse, the coach said that we would
have to raise our grade point average to stay on the team.  That meant we had
limited time after practice to work on homework and study.  It seemed to us
that what should’ve been a fun activity of running and hitting people was quickly
turning into a lifestyle similar to the military.

Chapter 7
    It wasn’t the workout routine that
bothered us.  In fact, it was a pretty easy routine to follow.  It was the
early mornings that bothered us most.  We tried going to bed early, but staying
up late was a hard habit to break.  After a half hour in the weight lifting
room, we showered and were ready for class.  Class dragged for the first few
hours as we struggled to stay awake, but the rest of the day went by quickly
once we started thinking about after school.  We were excited for our first day
of practice.
    Finally, it was here.  We put on our
practice jerseys for the first time and really felt like part of the team.  We
walked onto the practice field with pride as we were feeling like part of a
strong tradition.  Practice started off with a few minutes of exercising.  Some
of the drills we did were similar to the drills we completed with the coach the
previous day.  The drills, however, were slightly easier the second time.  I
thought it might be due to the morning of weight lifting, but I’m pretty