Experience a workout with South Carolina coach Steve Spurrier (Video)
South Carolina head coach Steve Spurrier is in great shape for a man who turns 70 years old on Monday. Josh Kendall, the Gamecocks beat writer from The State, got an up close look at the Ol’ Ball Coach’s workout routine in the football team’s weight room.
The first thing you have to notice is that Spurrier wears a sweater vest (!!!) and a headband while he works out. The man means serious business. He also goes through an impressive variety of exercises.
Kendall gave us an idea of what the average Spurrier session looks like:
He does two sets of shoulder presses with barbells. Fifty with 15-pounders and 40 with 10-pounders. He does 200 shoulder shrugs with 30-pound barbells, two long sets of curls, 50 tricep extensions with a 25-pound barbell (I think it was 25 pounds; oxygen depletion may have affected my memory.) There are 100 toe raises with the 30-pound barbells; 22 minutes on the treadmill; 11 minutes on the stationary bike at a not-insignificant incline.
Spurrier says he thinks he’s in better shape now than he was when he won the Heisman Trophy as a quarterback at Florida in 1966.
“I work out more for sure,” Spurrier said.
Spurrier told Kendall that he works out six days a week during the season, but his routine isn’t as defined during the offseason due to travel.
Kendall said the “most impressive” aspect of Spurrier’s workout was his core work that includes 400 crunches on a medicine ball and a one-minute plank (which you see at the 1:12 mark in the video).
I’m tired just thinking about it.
Spurrier said his attention to working out his core has spared him from back surgery. Though some doctors still suggest it, Spurrier’s personal doctor told him, “Just keep doing what you’re doing.”
And then to cap the workout off, Spurrier asked Kendall to pose alongside him with his shirt off. Kendall was hesitant at first, but then came around.
“It’s never something I would normally do but I thought to myself, ‘How many times in your life do you get a chance to pose shirtless with Steve Spurrier?’ So what the heck,” Kendall said.
You made the right choice, Josh.
For more South Carolina news, visit GamecockCentral.com.
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Sam Cooper is a contributor for the Yahoo Sports blogs. Have a tip? Email him or follow him on Twitter!
