Getting with the program
Probiotics, fasting, sleeping habits and body scans all part of team’s wellness strategy
Down the lowest concrete concourse of NRG Stadium, just before a left turn leads to a tunnel toward the field, there are double doors to the team’s cafeteria. Open them on a weekday morning during the season, say at 7:45 a.m., and there’ll be a horde of Texans coaches and players beginning their days with their first meals.
Most of them, anyway. If it’s a Tuesday, Jon Weeks is still fasting. The longtime long snapper’s routine usually has him eating dinner Monday at 7 p.m., calling it a night, then not eating again until 11 a.m. He decided on weekly 16-hour fasts with Ladd Harris, the franchise’s director of team wellness, the nutrition buff tasked with producing a plan for each player’s unique physique.
“We were just talking about ways to lean out, stay in shape, maintain more lean mass,” says Weeks, a 5-10, 242-pound 36year-old who’s fasted in five seasons. “He just asked how I did my eating, I gave him my routine, and he said, ‘Why don’t we try fasting for a little bit?’ I tried it, and it was something I really liked.”
Weeks insists he isn’t hungry. He spends half his fasts sleeping. Of course, if Tuesday was a heavy practice day like Wednesday or Thursday, he’d be eating a little more like Brevin Jordan so that his digestive system can supply him with the high level of energy he needs.
Jordan, a 6-3, 245-pound second-year tight end, supplements his large breakfast with, well, supplements: fish oil, organic juice and a scoop of green powder called Athletic Greens. He dumps the green powder into bottled water. The dense blend of vitamins, probiotics and plant extracts dissolves. The taste is not pleasant. This is a drink that’s forcefully chugged, Jordan says, not sipped.
“Hold your nose and down it,” tight end Teagan Quitoriano says.
Cheers. Health is worth toasting in this hall. Those who dine here know how important it is that they’re in pristine condition when they hang that left down the tunnel. But it wasn’t until Harris arrived in 2018 and secured confidence and funding from late owner Bob McNair that the franchise fostered a player’s health and diet in such a meticulous manner.
It’s not historically uncommon for elite athletes to individually pursue personal dietitians, chefs and trainers that they place on their own payroll. Right tackle Tytus Howard employs a personal chef Harris recommended. Tom Brady famously published his TB12 Method in 2017, a health and wellness book based on personal habits the seven-time Super Bowl champion quarterback built with longtime trainer Alex Guerrero. But such pursuits can carry both immense personal expense and a complicated independence from organizations that can lead to conflicting theories on health.
NFL teams are increasingly building out their own wellness programs. Over half the league now has a director of performance nutrition, a title Harris held before the Texans expanded their subprogram in 2020 to encompass factors beyond food. It’s yet another underground effort by the rebuilding franchise, like its investment in an applied sports science team, to cultivate its next competitive era as more draft picks and free agents arrive.
“We talk a lot about routine with the Texans,” Harris says. “How can we build that routine that encompasses all of those things a player is going to need to keep himself healthy, keep himself available to the team and doing what he loves?”
Jordan’s meal routine with Harris — a steady rotation that includes rice, broccoli, fish, steak and carrots — has helped him shed the “baby fat” a fullbody DEXA scan revealed when he first arrived at rookie minicamp. Imagine laying down on an X-ray table while a large scanning arm passes overhead. Harris scans everyone with the machine at least once a month to measure their body fat, muscle mass and bone health, then he adjusts personalized plans to hit specific benchmarks in 3-to-4week windows.
And remember, a routine is more than just about food. Ladd begins each personal evaluation by establishing someone’s sleep schedule to meet the recommended 8-10 hours. That can be difficult to meet even when a player goes to bed on time. Jordan has an energetic personality, an imaginative brain that he says is “always on the move.” He liked to play Call of Duty and Fortnite to wind down after long days, but found he was still having trouble sleeping.
“I’m just a twitchy guy, bro,” Jordan says. “I don’t sleep through the night and wake up like sunshine and butterflies. I wake up at 3 a.m. Boom, go to sleep. Wake up at 4:30. Boom, go to sleep again. I’ve got to go to the bathroom at 6:30, and I’ve got to be up at 7, so at 6:30, I might as well stay up till then.”
Harris advised Jordan to cut out the video games. He was overstimulating his brain. Instead, Jordan now gives himself a 30-minute window to relax, lay down, read and stay away from his phone before he ultimately drifts off into a deeper and more productive sleep.
“It’s really a more holistic approach from not only nutrition but how a guy sleeps, to how he eats, to how he hydrates, to how he recovers,” Harris says. “There are different pillars within that framework that we really try to drive. I would say the foundation of that becomes, ‘OK, well how do we create the habits behind that to make sure that a guy is doing the specific things that he needs to take care of his body?”
Harris himself is a wiry 41year-old, a performance dietitian who spent five years at Fort Bragg in North Carolina helping soldiers in the Army’s Special Operations Command prepare their bodies for extreme environments. He followed his former director, Joe Gomes, to work for former Raiders coach Jack Del Rio in 2017, and after Del Rio was fired a season later, Harris interviewed to lead a Texans nutrition department he’d eventually expand.
Harris overhauled the franchise’s food supply, which included too many artificial colors and ingredients, and led the 2018 renovation of the cafeteria. He stocked the kitchen with organic produce and higher quality cuts of meat. The McNair family authorized Harris to bolster his immediate staff, and he’s since hired a team of distinguished chefs. Chris Bednorz previously worked for renowned chef Chris Shephard, Mike Potowski was the executive chef at Benjy’s, and Matt Staph was the executive chef at Brennan’s of Houston.
Weeks says he eats at the facility 90 percent of the time. He’s not alone. Coaches and team staffers who also commit themselves to the NFL lifestyle’s unforgiving hours, submit themselves to the scans — “that thing is humbling,” special teams coordinator Frank Ross says — and meal plans in an effort to maintain better health during the demands of the season.
“Now that you mention it,” says Lovie Smith, a health-conscious head coach at 64, “after Christmas, it’s going to take a few days. Believe me, Ladd looked at me too the first time we came back from the break. A lot of our weights are a little bit up right now.”
Of course, even the most precise plan can’t account for the random nature of certain injuries. Jordan missed three games with an ankle injury. But Harris and his wellness team can cut down on damages that are preventable, reduce chronic cramping and help athletes transition to new positions when a change is warranted. Troy Hairston never had to turn on the gas stove in his townhome while bulking up from 220 to 240 pounds in the undrafted rookie’s training camp move from linebacker to fullback, filling up on food brought home from the team’s facility.
Houston’s humid climate creates an interesting hurdle for Harris. It’s not uncommon for some players to lose as many as 10-15 pounds in a single training camp practice, when temperatures regularly climb into the upper 90s.
“It feels crazy, truthfully,” Jordan says. “But your body gets used to it. For me, I just sweat so much. At practice, literally 8-10 pounds is no problem. That’s why Ladd and them, they’re so helpful. We’ve got to refill. We’ve got to put pretty much that 10 pounds back on, what, it’d be 16 to 17 hours before you have to go back out and perform again.”
Starting right guard A.J. Cann says he still sees such weight fluctuation during the season. The 6-3, 315-pound 31year-old sweats profusely, and Harris must ensure Cann is hydrated appropriately to make up for the body water that’s lost. He’ll have a mixed assortment of beverages prepared for Cann when he arrives at the facility. He’ll tell him how much he must drink during practice. Then, he’ll check Cann’s weight before the guard goes home at the end of the day to make sure he’s on pace to gain the majority of the weight back.
Every athlete has a customized plan. Cornerback Tremon Smith, 26, is the team’s best “allaround athlete,” according to Ross, and the 5-11, 190-pound special teams savant hasn’t changed his routine all that much in his five-year career. Every athlete has their own playful back-and-forth with Harris, too. Jordan knows he can sneak an extra scoop of ice cream every now and then.
“The problem with me is I need sweets, right? I’ve got a sweet tooth, right?” second-year defensive tackle Roy Lopez says. “I needed some suggestions. (Harris) would always laugh and joke with me to stay away. I stayed away. But protein bars, protein shakes are better options. You can still eat what you want but better options.”
Ross, 35, says that he’s (somewhat) joked to Harris about how there should be pasta or some sort of bread product four days a week instead of the one day they get currently. He also knows it’s probably not going to happen.
“He does a good job of keeping people like me, who like to overindulge on the things we shouldn’t too often,” Ross says.
So, how’s that most recent DEXA scan?
“Gotta get better,” Ross laughs. “It’s about what I can do tomorrow.”