Last month the National Association of Athletic Trainers ended its annual meeting with a proposal for a nationwide halt to two-a-day football practices in August.

The association said that heat stroke has become too great of a risk to the high school students, and it was logical to run the same program colleges use.

“I think we’re kind of tied up by the hamstrings by the GHSA,” Riverwood head coach Robert Ingram said.  “I say that when I respect what they do and respect the decisions they have to make— but we have a starting practice date of August 1, and we have to get  in as much work as we can.  Every practice counts and every practice helps.”

Ingram said he believes there is a way to get enough practices in before the games begin as well as to accommodate the trainers’ desire for safety.

“Don’t just give us a start date of August 1 and say okay you can go immediately in helmets,” he said.  “Why don’t you give us the last week of July— and give us that week to go into shoulder pads and helmets or just shorts and helmets.”
“Give us something to get [the athletes] acclimated to the heat because the biggest danger is having a kid sit on his butt all summer and then Aug. 1 throw him in a helmet, shoulder pads, pants, a girdle and pads and beating the crap out of him for two hours,” he said.

Holy Innocents’ athletic director Robert Welz disagrees with the idea of having an earlier starting date.

“I am not in favor of starting practices earlier to get acclimated to the heat more gradually,” he said.  “I feel that the season is so long to begin with that it would only add to the potential risks.”

Mount Vernon Presbyterian athletic director Mark Heiser said he believes the administrations should be the ones to determine when practices should or should not be held.

“I think something like that should be in the hands of the administrators or the athletic directors to make those types of decisions,” he said.  “I understand what the athletic trainers are saying, but at the same time we hire those people to be there so that they can tell us when we need to pull back.”