Florida Football Passes ‘The Gauntlet’ Ahead of Spring Practice
One week out from the start of spring practice, Florida football passed “The Gauntlet.”
“The Gauntlet” is a high-intensity conditioning drill designed to simulate the physical and mental stress of a long football drive. Gators strength and conditioning coach and former Green Beret Rusty Whitt has put his teams through “The Gauntlet” since he adopted the idea at Army while coaching under Jeff Monken.
“I really liked it a lot,” Whitt said. “I thought it was just awesome for preparing a team to grow together and face adversity, and then I took the idea from him and added some time penalties and made it even a little more difficult.”
The program consists of a six-station conditioning circuit where players rotate through each station for timed rounds, starting at 2 1/2 minutes per station and decreasing each round, with short breaks in between. The entire workout must be completed within an hour, and every mistake costs the team three seconds off their total time, emphasizing both conditioning and precision, according to offensive line coach Phil Trautwein.
Whitt had seen “The Gauntlet” passed four times before Wednesday, twice at Troy and twice at Tulane. If the Gators were unable to pass the gauntlet Wednesday or Friday, coach Jon Sumrall threatened to push spring camp back a week until “The Gauntlet” was complete.
By conquering “The Gauntlet,” Sumrall will allow his players to wear the gator logo, something they had not earned the privilege of doing according to Sumrall.
“We haven’t earned a damn thing,” Sumrall said in January. “All we’ve got is our name. To wear the Florida Gator logo, to wear the Gators across your helmet in script, or wear the gator head. You’ve got to earn that.”
The Gators begin spring practice on schedule on Tuesday.
Category: Feature Sports News, Gators Football
