No way to beat August heat, but issue becomes tempered
COLLEGE STATION — Texas A&M left tackle Koda Martin glanced down at his phone in the hours prior to a camp practice this summer and shook his head. “It said it felt like 109 (degrees),” Martin said.
The revelation prompted a one-word response from Martin: “Man.” Man, indeed, and mountainous men like Martin scoff at the idea men were somehow tougher in decades past, when they practiced in the heat of the day at the hottest time of the year. And sometimes two or three times a day.
“We’re still out there being physical,” said Martin, a former Manvel High standout. “I wouldn’t say we’re any less tough than we would be if we were practicing in the middle of the day.”
The thinking has evolved on that front — safety concerns and teaching have overcome the old-school approach of intense heat making guys tougher, although as then-A&M coach R.C. Slocum said 16 years ago, “You still can’t make it cool in College Station in August.”
Six years later, A&M managed with the opening of its massive indoor complex in 2007. The Aggies have used the air-conditioned indoor building only once this camp, however, while most of their practices have been in temperatures in the 90s on the (not so) Coolidge practice fields, with coach Kevin Sumlin starting the practices around 6 p.m. most nights to lessen the intensity of the heat.
Blocking it out
Regardless, A&M safety Armani Watts insisted heat is a state of mind.
“It’s all the same when you’re out there running,” Watts said. “The weather just goes out the window. … Games are (also) throughout the whole day, and you never know what time you’ll be playing.”
The Aggies know the times of their first three games, with the first one in particular a case study in camp heat vs. camp cool(er). The Aggies open at UCLA on Sept. 3, with the temperatures projected in the 70s in Pasadena, Calif., and perhaps even dropping into the 60s a couple of quarters into the 6:30 p.m. CDT start at the Rose Bowl.
Right now the Bruins are typically practicing in temperatures in the 70s and 80s in preparation for the opener. Last year, UCLA coach Jim Mora Jr. took his team to the heat of San Bernardino, Calif., and its 100-degree offerings for a portion of camp in preparation for playing at Kyle Field in the middle of the day (he’d also moved camp to San Bernardino in previous seasons).
The Aggies prevailed 31-24 in overtime, on what turned out to be a milder-than-expected afternoon on the A&M campus with temperatures in the high 80s. UCLA linebacker Kenny Young told reporters this summer he appreciated Mora keeping camp in Los Angeles because, “San Bernardino is not something you enjoy.”
Outside of schemes and talent determining the outcome, the opener will be a study in which team is better conditioned based on its summer conditions. A&M receiver Christian Kirk, who grew up near Phoenix, said new strength and conditioning coach Mark Hocke had the Aggies outside in the peak of Southeast Texas heat this summer, prior to camp.
Mind over matter
“We did all of our afternoon conditioning at around 3 in the afternoon,” Kirk said. “The hottest part of the day. It was hot. When you’re out there, coach Hocke is really trying to push you mentally. Because there’s always that human nature telling you in the back of your head, to just quit and lay down. Your body is aching, you’re hot and you’re sweating, and it’s hard to breathe.
“Just little things like that.”
Said Hocke, hired in large part to help alter the Aggies’ November swoons of the past three seasons following solid starts, “It’s not about whether it’s cold or whether it’s hot, it’s about a job needing to get done.”
Camp itself, a month in preparation for a three-month season, has changed drastically over the decades, including the NCAA’s elimination of two-a-day practices this year. Sumlin played linebacker at Purdue in the mid-1980s and recalled a different time.
“There were threea-days,” he said. “Two practices, and then seven-on-seven at night. Linemen did other things during that time. … It’s just different, and with everything that’s gone on scientifically and medically, things have changed over the course of the last 20 years.”
Sumlin and most others will contend it’s all for the better, with safety at the forefront. Besides, most players are on campus almost year-round, and show up to camp nearly conditioned for the season.
“We’re still getting plenty of work,” Martin said. “The (coaches) are doing everything they can to make sure that we’re training hard when we’re training, and recovering when we’re supposed to be recovering.”