You always hear of girls getting
the “Freshman 15” when they go to college.
Well it happens to guys as well. Or at least it happened to me.
I
entered UVA weighing 172 lbs. By the second
semester of my first year I was up to 192 lbs.
So, I got the “Freshman 20.” I would like to believe that most of it was
muscle, but at 14.5% body fat, I knew that wasn’t the case.
I went from a ‘microwave for every meal’ kid to a cafeteria that
provided me with a buffet all day long.
However, it didn’t take long for me to drop weight and gain muscle
when we started our “Winter Workouts.” Our
strength coach John Gamble, was big and strong and a bit intimidating, but the
reality was he was just one of the nicest men you’d ever want to meet.
However, his ‘Winter Workouts’ were not so nice.
Three times a week we had to get up early, go to U-Hall, and
work our way through the conditioning stations in the "Cage." These were workouts that would make you puke that
wonderful ‘buffet’ dinner from the night before.
But the Winter Workouts worked. I had 0.0 vertical before our
Winter Workouts, and by the end of our training, I could dunk. OK…it was a tennis
ball, but at least I could dunk.
As we started getting closer to Spring Football I was getting
excited. I had an opportunity to be the starter
for the next four years. Things were looking good. Then, I decided to play some
indoor soccer at an all-night intramural tournament. I missed playing soccer and when the opportunity
presented its self I thought “why not”.
I would soon realize “why not.”
During our third game of the night I rolled my ankle badly. Not good.
It wasn't so bad when I went to bed, but in the morning, it hurt like a mutha
(you get the idea).
I went into the training room the next morning and told them
that I twisted it while jumping out of the top bunk in the middle of the night with
books on the floor. That didn't go over so well.
Spring Ball didn't go as expected. I had sprained my right ankle.
This severely hindered my ability to kick the ball. As a result, I came out of Spring
Ball as the number two kicker.
I spent that summer at home where I did some training and worked
as a lifeguard at Buckroe Beach. It was
probably one of my best summers ever for goofing off. But not for football.
I kicked maybe a handful of times that summer. I had a lot to learn about proper training to
be a successful kicker.
So I entered my second year (but "red shirt freshman"
season) as one of the back-ups.
I admit the starting kicker Jake was better on field goals, but
I was stronger on kickoffs. And there
was another kicker on the roster as well.
One day, the week before the first game of the season, our special
teams coach told us that at the end of practice, we were going to have a "Kick
Off" to determine the back-up kicker for the season. This meant I was going to get about eight field
goal attempts that would determine my fate for the season, and perhaps for my career.
We had two kickers, one holder and one snapper. The funny thing
was the long snapper just happened to be in the same fraternity of the other kicker.
