Madill athletes return for Summer Pride after long layoff due to virus
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Madill athletes perform a stretching drill on the fi rst day of Madll Summer Pride June 1 at Blake Smiley Field. It was their fi rst session under new strength and conditioning coach Alex Rainwater, who was hired to join the staff of first-year head football coach Chad Speer. Matt Caban • The Madill Record -
New Madill strength and condtioning coach Alex Rainwater (center with whistle) leads athletes in a stretching drill on the first day of Madll Summer Pride June 1 at Blake Smiley Field as fellow coaches Jose Cortes (center left) and Chad Speer (right) look on. Matt Caban • The Madill Record
Nearly three months without sports came crashing down on Monday as Oklahoma athletes were allowed to return to school facilities.
In Madill, that meant the beginning of Summer Pride; the traditional start of offseason training and conditioning.
The early June training program had the added distinction of being the first time athletes interacted face to face with new head football coach Chad Speer and the man he has selected to lead the school’s strength and condition program, Alex Rainwater.
Speer, who was hired on March 12, is playing catchup with the offseason calendar due to the disruption caused by the pandemic.
“Overall, I feel really good with this being the first time out,” he said. “Basically, this is my first time being in front of them as a group so I was obviously excited about that. Guys haven’t done anything together for two and a half months so they’re excited to get together.”
Speer said he saw a lot of smiles as athletes gathered to begin their workouts.
“You gotta remind them,hey let’s social distance a little bit,” he said. “Trying to do those cautions with everything going on. But they were definetly glad to see each other. I’m sure they’re still seeing each other outside of here. Just to get everyone together was good.”
Speer said his approach isn’t tied to a particular program.
“They’re all out there; bigger, faster, stronger and all that stuff,” he said. “We’re gonna be more about dynamic movements, explosive movements. But it’s nothing that we’ve invented. Everything is made to make ours fit us.”
Speer said he’s entrusted operation of the strength and conditioning program to Coach Rainwater.
“I feel really good about him,” Speer said of Rainwater. “I’ve worked with him in the past. Know what he’s about. Know he’s gonna come in and make us better.”
The pair previously coached together as part of the Southeastern Oklahoma State University football program.
Speer said a goal of his staff is to get the kids out of their comfort zone to get better.
“We don’t want them to get comfortable and complacent,” he said. “Today, we focus on effort and attitude and attention to detail. There were times we had to redo stuff cause guys weren’t finishing or staying behind the line. All those little things add up at the end of the day.”
Athletes got an early start to their offseason program, Speer said.
“We had our older guys out there at 7 a.m. got some good work in,” he said. “Younger guys did the same workout after that first group. Now, the girls are out there.”
Speer said the first day for the new coaches meant a lot of introductions and a slow pace.
“Pretty much everything we’re doing is gonna be new,” he said. “We’re just showing the kids how to line up in stretch lines to the movements of the stretches. Probably spent a good hour just going through the dynamic warmup.”
Rainwater also had a positive experience on the first day with his new team.
“Boys are a lot more conditioned than I expected, which is really good,” he said. “It means we’re gonna get to do a lot more. We still have a long way to go. Not being with them [due to the virus] they’re gonna be sore, but we’ll take it slow.”
Rainwater, who previously coached tight ends at SEOSU, said both Madill’s boys and girls athletes performed well in their first session.
“They were great you know,” he said. “Star behind the line and finish on the line; that’s what we preach and they were doing that. Day one, not doing like we have before, it’s really good to see how they grasped that and kept it moving. That’s awesome.”
Rainwater said in a normal year the offseason program would have started after spring break.
“We would’ve had spring football at that time so, it would’ve been a lot more integrated then and summer would be a little more ahead than where we’re at, but we’re still happy to be out so that’s good.”
He also observed that kids were ready to work from the start of the day.
“It was kind of like back to business,” Rainwater said. “Especially not doing it for two months, I think everybody was just itching to get out there and work out and be there with their teammates.”
The recent break brought an unexpected silver lining for Rainwater and his wife, as they recently had their first child.
“Us being home has been a blessing for us,” he said. “We’ve been getting to do that instead of the busyness of the world. We were excited to do that for two months, but we’re both ready to start working again.”