A bag of rocks, a little bro and a gift from a SEAL: How Bulldogs stay in shape

It was 2016, long before coronavirus was disrupting daily life, and not a good year for Fresno State football. But before any of that, between spring practice and fall camp, the Bulldogs had a group of players take part in a Navy SEAL training exercise.

There were about 30 of them there – Kyle Riddering, KeeSean Johnson, Jamire Jordan, Nate Madsen, Trent Soechting, Aaron Peck among them.

George Helmuth, who at that time was making his way from walk-on to one of the Bulldogs’ most productive players in 2017 and ‘18, was there, too.

They hit the high points – teamwork, leadership and, yes, the critical physical training. They camped out, then were woken it the middle of the night at high volume and from there on they went about it, non-stop.

“For 12 hours straight we trained like Navy SEALs,” said Helmuth, who started 24 games at linebacker over his last two seasons and was a team captain as a senior in 2018 when the Bulldogs went 12-2 and won a Mountain West Conference championship.

“It was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done.”

As part of that training, they lugged around a log, a bunch of them at a time. They did crunches with it, pressed it. And afterward the SEALs, some retired and some active duty, cut that log into pieces for the Bulldogs as a memento.

They signed it, just like Helmuth or Johnson or Riddering or Jordan might autograph a football for a young fan.

“It has been with me ever since,” Helmuth said. “It’s like one of those things you keep forever. That log definitely has a lot of sentimental value.”

With the Bulldogs trying to successfully navigate the coronavirus pandemic, that chunk of wood also is a bridge from Bulldogs past to present.

Weight training: creating resistance in new ways

With spring practices on hold and all team activities shut down, Steven Comstock went looking for something heavy to incorporate into his workouts and came across that log.

It has some heft – 55, maybe 60 pounds, Helmuth guessed.

“Some guys have garage gyms or access to a place they can train,” said Ron McKeefery, the Bulldogs’ assistant athletics director for sports performance. “Then we have a bunch of guys who are in shelter in place and can’t really do anything. We have and app and we send out body weight workouts and challenges and different things besides the conditioning.

“Really, it’s whatever you can get your hands on that creates some resistance to try to make it a little harder.”

Offensive lineman Elijah Carson, McKeefery said, has been doing squats while carrying his younger brother.

For Comstock, who is making a position change to safety after playing quarterback the past two seasons, it’s that log.

“I was just sitting around wondering how I could use what I had to do something different,” he said. “It has been tough to be away from my teammates and coaches, but it also has been fun to find new ways to work out without all of the weight room equipment we have at the facilities.

“We started doing that workout last week and it’s good, a solid workout that uses your core, your legs and arms.”

Helmuth and Comstock, who share a house with former Bulldogs Nate Madsen and David Tangipa, did lunges with it that first day.

“We don’t have good weights for lunges so we improvise with the log and we do a little twist action,” Helmuth said.

“I saw (Tennessee Titans running back) Derrick Henry doing something similar on Instagram that day so we decided, ‘Hey, let’s do it with the log.’ It’s the perfect weight, perfect size. Everything worked with it.”

As the Bulldogs try to stay in shape, that is the new reality.

Comstock’s switch from QB to defense

They had just completed an eight-week strength and conditioning program and were about to start spring practices when team activities were shut down. Several players had strong sessions including Comstock, who in making the switch to defense from offense changed his strength training and his body, and could develop into a key player at safety.

“He’s getting bigger and stronger,” Helmuth said. “Obviously, the workouts you do as a quarterback are a lot different than the workouts you do at any other position, especially with the strength training.

“He has really gone all-in on strength training and he has gained so much muscle from January until now. We’ll use the log, sleds. We’ll do things like switching tempos with squats, lunges, do some single-leg stuff …”

“He doesn’t look like a quarterback anymore,” coach Kalen DeBoer said, at the end of winter conditioning. “You take into account what he is athletically and the speed that he brings, the mindset, too, he has that wrestler mindset, that tough, hard-nosed, gritty mindset.”

Staying focused

The longer the Bulldogs are off the practice field or unable to work together in the weight room the more challenging it will be to maintain the physical gains from the winter. They are trying to keep up by any means possible, but body-weight exercises can only take them so far and no one knows what will come next when it comes to getting back on the field.

“It’s as good as you can expect, given the circumstances,” McKeefery said. “You spend eight weeks grinding and building an engine and you’re excited to show it off and all of a sudden it gets taken away from you.

“We push workouts to them through an app where they can see the exercise description and all that and within the description we put various forms of external load that they can go and find. We’re getting pretty creative with how we’re throwing those body weight workouts out there, but ultimately you’d have to work out for three or four hours with body weight to get the volume that you need, that you’d normally get in a weight room.”