Saying goodbye to my last days at the gym

My last days at the gym were a sigh of relief for me.  I am really over going to the gym every day because it gets old going by yourself every day.  At least at the gym today I went to the gym with my step brother and he did my workout.  He said it was the hardest thing he has ever done in his life.  He said the single leg squats were the most rediculous things he has ever done in his life. 

He was struggling even on the second set.  Im not going to even get started with the core workouts.  He couldn’t get the Iron Crosses for more than 30 seconds.  I started at one minute and ended at one minute thirty seconds.  It was funny watching him stuggle for sure.  He was going to be working out with me for the rest of the year before he leaves for Vegas again.  This is good news for me because I am always lonely doing my workouts so at least I have a friend to talk to. 

I am pretty sure I won’t be missing this gym because I am getting a new membership at 24 Hour Fitness with Jake Webb and Michael Swanner.  I am planning on teaching them the core workouts that will benefit them immensly for baseball.  Even the single leg squats well mess them up for sure.

With the ending of football season it is crutial that I keep going along with my workouts to get bigger and stronger during the off season.  It is turning to the main part of the recruiting season.  For kickers the recruiting starts up in late December/January so it will be fun for me to see all of the coaches come strolling in to town.

If you don’t know who Bob Stoops is then you should probably kill your self.  Im kidding but he is the Coach for Oklahoma and he was at my school.  He was here to talk to our wide receiver Kenny Stills but it was still cool to see a coach of a caliber such as the great Bob Stoops.  He talked to the team about how much of an honor it was to be at our school and all that other b.s. However it got interesting when he started talking to us about his program that he had built.  He showed us pictures of their 70 million dollar renovation to their stadium that he had the boosters put in.  Also he showed us pictures of the new locker room what was 50 times bigger than my house.  Each athlete had their own room to get changed in.  I won’t forget to mention that each player had their own flat screen tv. This just goes to show how much power these coaches have in the world of sports.  I guess it makes sense though because for the past 11 years, Oklahoma, along with other big programs, have sold out every one of their home games.  This shows that all of the money that the school makes is from the football team. 

I wanted to go right up to him and introduce myself but he took the right away and did it for me.  My heart almost skipped a beat because of the state of shock that I was in.  It took me a couple of seconds to process it but I eventually talked to the man.  He was super friendly and heard that I was an amazing kicker.  It was funny because how could a coach of that high standard know about a random San Diego kicker like me.  I guess it was cool to see that at least my name was out there right. 

I am glad that this happened to show that throughout the next few months that tons and tons of college coaches are going to be coming to my school.  I am excited to say the least to see what comes in the near future with my kicking career.

Ya that is what im going to be looking like after im done.  Just kidding but I am looking to be stronger in certain ways and believe me he can get me stronger all over.  He actually worked out with us today because he knew it was my last day for the experiment.  We started off with a smooth 3 mile jog through a busy town, then we got to the treadmills.  He is so good at doing the side step and moving around on that thing there is no wonder he has the best balance I have ever seen in my life.  You should have seen when we had a big workout ball rolling around on the ground.  Chuck ran up to it like it was nothing and just hopped right up on and balanced on it.  My mind was blown. 

After my legs were shot even from the warmup jog.  We then met a former USC catcher who Chuck had trained in years past, and we proceeded to workout with him.  He looked more ripped then chuck until we actually got to working out.  Me and Phil could do more wieght then he could on certain things.  He is a 24 year old first round draft pick and me and phil can lift more than him. Give me a break.  It was the best when Chuck taught his fighting moves.  There is this one where he can make your arm go completly limp with two swipes of his hand.  He is the man and I am glad to have him as a personal coach.

Fat kids Michael and Aaron

Today was a good day considering that I didn’t have to wake up at seven a.m. on Sundays.  Even though I was still going to kick on Sunday’s I am going to just do it at eleven instead.  This gives me more time to rest in the morning after a long two nights in a row.  My kicks were pretty good the last few days considering all my injuries and everything.  I needed to give it a final stand if I wanted to show the college coaches what I am relly made of. 

Today I am going to kick heavier than usual to make sure that I have all my mechanics down for the semi-finals this week.  I am pumped that this experiment is going to be over too because I am really tired of coming home after every game and every Saturday and Sunday night to write about how my day was.  Anyway, my kicks during the game have definatly been gaining more hang time at least it seems that way because the ball is exploding off my foot when I strike the ball. 

All this is fine and dandy during warm ups but I want this to happen when it really matters.  During the last game I was perfect in the endzone, and a punt of 41 yards that the snapper Matt Kaiser rolled to me.  He is my buddy so I didn’t get that mad at him.  However if I would have gotten yelled at for it, then I would be hateing his guts.  It all worked out in the end because we won that game 28-7 with one of the sloppiest games that we have played this year. 

Seth is for sure going to be back next week and so is Michael so we are looking to put up some big numbers against Vista.

This is where we are gonna get in two weeks

The day after the big game left us with our hearts set on the Q bowl.  I call it this because after the interview that Mission Bay wide reciever Dillon Baxter gave to PPR on how they were gonna “Merk on SFC first, then I hope that Valley Center wins so we can merk on them in the Q bowl.”  This was the funniest thing that I have ever heard in my life.  We call it the “Q” which is bad enough but the Q bowl, that is pushing it. 

We were stoked on the win but I had to get my workout done.  I went down to Athletes Edge again with Phil and we got our workouts on.  We finished with nothing left to give.  Either it was the squat jumps or the side step bungies, we were absolutely done after.  Chuck pushed us to the limit for sure.  When he said he was going to break us down mentally but I think he did it more physically.  He made us run when our legs wouldn’t work anymore.  He kept pushing a button on the tred mill to make it go faster and we would be laying down in the harness which means that we had already fallen.  We basically failed miserably today but we were looking forward from here and all of the work outs to come. 

Chuck said that I should be getting a call from the Miami Coach pretty soon so that is promising.  As far as the recruiting part of the experiment, I haven’t received anything but I did go down to USD with a couple of our stud athletes and watch the game.  It was cool to see how a smaller school like that  and how the football was played.  All in all it was a good trip but I am waiting for something more in the future.

Me doing the Iron Cross

I don’t know what is getting into me but my workouts this week have been hurting really bad.  My core this morning is feeling like crap.  I think I might have torn an abdominal muscle or something but I can barely bend over and touch my toes.  My workout last night was really intense but it was nothing that I haven’t done before.  I think it might have been that extra set of Iron Crosses that pushed me over the top. 

My legs to are in extreme amounts of pain.  The single leg squats every week seem to be haunting me the day after.  I don’t know because I swear I have good form but it always hurts the day after.  I think it is because I have never actually used my lower back muscles except for like bending down to get something.  These workouts have been stifling the past few days for sure. 

I can see that my kicking toward the end of the week has decreased a little bit too.  I am losing a little bit of hang time on my punts and kickoffs because of my sore legs and core.  My punts consist of me extending my leg all the way up toward my chest region.  I am having a hard time doing this because of this reason.  I think that I am going to take the next workout easier because I don’t want to be too sore for the game this Friday.  I understand the requirments for the experiment but if it is going to keep me from performing my best than I am going to have to put this behind me.  I am going to take tomorrow off and do my interviews and let my body recover for the big game this friday

My intense workouts at their finest

Well since it is Thanksgiving my family did come into town from Washington.  It just made my life ten times more difficult because I didn’t get to sleep in my own bed.  I did get some help from the family because they always here from my dad that I am a superstar kicker and what not, so they decided to help me shag balls during practice.  This was nice because I didn’t have to fetch my balls and waste time doing all of that other stuff so I can get all my best kicks in during special teams. 

It was kind of funny because all my little cousins that are four and five were running around all of the offensive linemen.  They were practically giants in front of them.  Justin Dire was standing tall at a smooth 6’7 next to my little cousin who was four years old.  He was pretty intimidated to say the least.  He looked up at him and immediatly ran away to my parents. 

My kicks were solid today.  I am firmly convinced that the key to kicking the ball further comes down to technique rather than raw power.  I have been doing my workout routines down to the crunch and I think that if I didn’t change my technique then I would have never got to the position I am in today.  I figure I still need the stregnth but in order to gain massive amounts of yardage at a time I needed to master the art of kicking a football. 

My workouts are doing a lot too.  I am way more flexible within my core region, and just realized that I am gaining a little bit of pure muscle weight.  I started the experiment at 168 and now I am 176.  That is good for me because I can put my whole weight behind the ball without kicking my hardest.

Kicker Sebastian Janikowski for the Okland Raiders

As far as I am concerned the team is digging this “Fly Around” mentality it seems to be making a strong impact on our attitude this week.  We look strong as ever with a few minor miscues.  Michael and Seth are officially going to be out for the game which means we are going to have to switch up our offense completely.  Seth is our leading rusher coming into the playoffs with 900 something yards and Michael is part of our “Great Wall.”  This is the right side of our offensive line.  It consists of Cory Lamb 6’2, 270, Justin Dire 6’7 270, and Michael Connelly 6’4, 265.  This one of the beefier offensive line in the county.  Without Michael I am nothing because he blocks for me on my field goals.  During practice I went a miserable 1 for 8 on field goals with 4 blocked.  This got me fired up because I started to get chippy.  Each block got me more and more pissed. 

I started to yell at my coaches to try and find someone who actually wanted to be on the team and help me out.  We found a kid but he is pretty scary because it is his first year on varsity.  He is used to little JV kids and bossing them around but I guarantee that he will get is butt kicked on Varsity. 

My kicks after practice were solid.  Five for five on field goals, punts all over 40 yards, and kickoffs all out the back of the end zone.  I think I am actually buying into the fact that technique comes before raw power.  You take a look at NFL kicker Sebastian Janikowski.  He can bomb field goals over 70 yards but is less than 70% from inside of 50.  This goes to show you that you can have all the power in the world but if you can’t control it, there is no point to have it in the first place.

This week the motto during practice was to fly around.  We figured that if we had a solid week of practice then we could take it out to the field on Friday.  Since we are playing Torrey Pines again we needed to start playoffs with a bang.  We were the number one seed and everyone is looking to up set us.  Of course we wont let it happen because our team is way to good.  It will be intresting because we only beat them by 10 points last game and the paper only predicted us to win by 4.  Either way we are going to show them what we are made of.

My practice today was most unusual.  I actually got to kick for more than 15 min with the team because my coach decided that during the playoffs the games might actually come down to special teams.  I am pumped because this means more time on the field for me.  I am expecting big things from myself this week.  Even last year I stepped up my game during the playoffs.  I don’t know what it was but my kicks automatically started to gain distance.  Either way I am expecting big things from myself this week. 

During my workout at the gym I did my core and leg stregnth again to build it up during the week.  I needed to gain as much advantage as I could to out perform my opponents kicker.  He out kicked me last week according to the coaches.  He made all of his kicks and I didn’t.  I still earned First team All league again so I am obviously better than him.  However at that one game he beat me according to my standards too.  I only averaged 7 yards deep with two misses.  This will change though with a good week of practice coming up.

More workin out

Chuck was in OC all today so he had to cancel the workout.  I just went to the local gym again and did my workouts by myself.  I did 30 crunches, turtles, and crosses for sets of three.  Then I did 10 single leg RDL’s and single leg squats each with 30 pound dumb bells.  I just remembered that the last time I did single leg squats my back completely gave out on me.  Hopefully this week with the proper amount of rest it will be able to get stronger rather than get weaker. 

There was nobody at the gym so I lifted in solitude.  I feel like that is all I ever do. I practice by myself and I even lift by myself.  I am hoping that I can get someone who is willing to come with me next time so I won’t be that lonely. 

Anyways I am looking foward to this week coming up becuase we have no school.  I am planning on catching up on my sleep and resting for the big game coming up next Friday against Torrey Pines again.  Since it is Playoffs we have to play them again becuase they were the lower seed.  They are the next team in our way to the Q.  We have to come out with a bang in order to take them again.  Their coach was saying how they were going to take us because it was only a ten point game last time.  Even the paper only had us winning by four points.  This was complete garbage if you ask me becuase we are a way better team if you ask me.  We will beat them way worse than that if you ask me.  Even with seth and Michael out for the next game, our offense and defense are way too good to not win the first round of playoffs.