Summer programs benefit student athletes now and later
When it comes to commitment and sacrifice, many of our local high school student athletes excel at both. But it’s not always when the lights are on and the stands are full of cheering fans. In many cases, it’s not even during the school year. The kind of commitment and sacrifice I’m referring to occurs when school is out and most of their classmates are sleeping in, relaxing at home or hanging out at the beach.
That’s because thousands of high school student athletes across the Rio Grande Valley choose to participate in summer conditioning programs and sport specific training as a way of keeping in shape and improving their skills over the summer months. And as Mission Veterans Patriots’ head football coach and athletic coordinator David Gilpin shared, the number of student athletes that participated in his school’s summer conditioning program this year reached an all-time high.
“This is what we do with our football players,” Gilpin said. “If we get out of school on a Thursday or Friday, the following Monday we start our summer conditioning program. Every morning from 8:30 to about 10:30, that’s out on the field doing sprint work, doing ab work, doing station work, we’re working on everything out there. We’re working on speed, balance, coordination, change of direction, mental toughness and explosiveness. All the things that athletes need are what we work on.”
“That’s not everybody, but I’m starting with football,” Gilpin added. “Football goes through that from 8:30 to let’s say 10:15. At that point, they come inside and we have open weight room until 12 o’clock. At that point, they’ll go home, take a break, come back in the afternoon from 4 to 5 and do what they call football sport specific training. That’s something that the UIL implemented during COVID time because so many schools fell behind with missing practices that we can now coach our kids four days a week for an hour. That’s every day from the beginning of summer to the start of your season.”
For the football players participating in 7 on 7, they also go in on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays from 6 to approximately 8 p.m. during the entire month of June. But the conditioning and training does not end in June.
“7 on 7 ends in June so when we move into July, we continue with the summer conditioning program in the morning, continue with open weight room and continue with football sport specific training,” Gilpin said. “The summer conditioning program, which is the morning part, is a six week program. This year we did five weeks straight, we took a week off for the 4th of July week, so everybody could re-energize, and then we came back and did one final week to finish it up in mid-July.”
Even after the summer conditioning program ended for football, there was an open weight room from 8 – 11:30 and sport specific training in the afternoon from 4 – 5. But it’s the month of June that’s the killer according to Gilpin.
“June is the most hectic month and the most time consuming month because we have so much going on,” Gilpin said. “And this does not include the Saturday 7 on 7 tournaments. We played in three 7 on 7 tournaments in June on Saturdays. So the kids that participate on 7 on 7 basically only get Friday off and Sunday off.”
As Gilpin went on to explain, it’s not only the big, tough football players who give up a good portion of their summers to participate in these conditioning programs and specialized training, it’s pretty much all student athletes.
“Nothing else goes on between 8:30 and 10: 30 at Mission Veterans Memorial,” Gilpin said. “This allows all of our athletes to participate in our summer conditioning program. So it benefits all athletes, male and female. So volleyball does the 8:30 – 10:15 summer conditioning program and then they move inside to volleyball sport specific training for an hour, and then they have open gym which concludes at 12 o’clock. So volleyball is here from 8:30 – 12. During volleyball sport specific training, the coaches can actually coach and run drills, and then open gym, because you can only do that for an hour.”
While the UIL does limit how long coaches can coach and run drills each day, open gym allows the volleyball and basketball players to play on their own. The same thing applies to open field for soccer players and open batting cages for baseball and softball players.
The fact that most volleyball players also participate in league play, which like the 7 on 7 football players, they do on their own, means that they also have evening games to play in.
“So you’ve got league play for football with 7 on 7, volleyball, boys and girls basketball, baseball…all of these are playing in leagues in the evenings during the summer,” Gilpin said. “Then you’ve got your travel squads. Travel volleyball, travel basketball…some of those kids are doing that outside of our school stuff where they travel in select teams and they travel across the state or the nation, but obviously that’s optional and not school related.”
The summer conditioning program at Mission Veterans is open to incoming seventh through 12th graders. This summer, there were as many as 328 athletes that attended one of the conditioning sessions at Mission Veterans. Their previous high was 302. The numbers continued in the 300s for the first couple of weeks and stayed in the 200s through the final week. They even had 55 athletes and two coaches that did not miss a single day of the entire six week program. They each were given a special “iron man” t-shirt as a reward for their commitment and sacrifice.
What makes these numbers even more impressive is the fact that these conditioning programs, and sport specific training sessions, are completely voluntary.
“None of this is mandatory,” Gilpin explained. “Not summer conditioning, not open weight room, not open facilities, not sport specific training. As per UIL rules, you cannot make it mandatory. So the message you’re going to send to your kids is, while it’s not mandatory…you’re not kicked out of the program if you don’t show up or something…somebody that’s here is working harder than you and they’re moving up while you’re staying stagnant or moving backwards. So understanding the law of competition, the way it works is if you don’t want to fall behind, you need to be here.”
“The summer conditioning program is the bell cow of everything we do,” Gilpin added. “That’s the centerpiece. And that’s why there’s nothing else that goes on in our school between 8:30 and 10:30, so that everybody has that opportunity.”
Gilpin went on to explain that multi-sports athletes have to choose which sports specific training they’re going to participate in. For example, they can’t do an hour of football and then go do an hour of basketball. That’s because the UIL does not want the kids to get burned out.
While most Texas high school student athletes have to abide by the same UIL rules, cross-country runners have their own rules to follow.
“Cross country runners practice Monday through Thursday all summer long.” Gilpin said. “They’re usually out there running by the time I pull in, before seven o’clock. So they’re usually in by 6:30 or so, to get their run in. They’ll get a lift in on some days, they’ll come in get the weight room done and some will choose to go outside.”
So what is it about these student athletes that make them willing to make such a commitment and sacrifice to their sport?
“A student athlete is different,” Gilpin said. “Here’s the way I explain it to my kids. We’re not any more special than a student who is not an athlete, not any better and need to be treated any differently than any student who’s not an athlete, but we are definitely different. Athletes are built different. It’s a tremendous commitment to what we’re doing. But if you want to win championships, or you want to be a starter, or you want to be an All-district or an All-state player, that level of commitment is what’s needed.”
“These kids are putting their blood, sweat and tears into it,” Gilpin added. “That’s not an exaggeration. I wish people realized the work that these kids put in. I wish people realized the work that these coaches put in. I’m so proud of our coaching staff. I mean they’re here. Our coaches don’t just talk the talk, they walk the walk. They’re here on a daily basis for our kids.”
So while these student athletes’ commitment and sacrifice does help them excel at their sport, there is almost always something else they get out of it that they might not even realize until they’re beyond their high school years.
“It’s going to benefit them in the long run,” Gilpin said. “They learn the value of a work ethic. They learn the value of getting up and going to your job on a daily basis. Even when you might not feel like you want to on that day. Everything we talk to them about out there is character driven and character based. Work ethic, character, discipline, accountability and responsibility, they hear about it for six weeks. For six weeks it’s driven into their heads. That’s another benefit that we don’t talk about much.”
So the next time you’re at a local high school sporting event and you’re disappointed at the result of a play or the outcome of a game, think about the commitment and the sacrifice each of those student athletes have made just to make it onto the team. Then just maybe you’ll cheer them on and show them how much you appreciate all they’ve done over those countless hours when nobody was watching.