X X O O
Team fights heat to get into shape
By Daniel Niemi Kansan staff writer
Kansan staff writer
Suddenly, Mike Whitaker passed out.
"It was at the end of one of the wards of two a-days," said Whitaker, a Kumssia pastor. "I went to the church and blocked out My body basically shut down. My temperature was 105.6 degree."
that had Cannon in a view.
"He was in excellent shape," said Lynn Bott, Kansas director of sports medicine. "He just pushed himself to the brink."
In the relentless August heat, when tem peratures reached 88 degrees in the shade the Kansas football team was pushing itsils to the brink.
When the relative humidity reached 72 percent, and the air飞 like a lead strait jacket, the team was pushing itself to the brink.
Bott and his training staff were on hand to make sure the team did not push itself over that brink and suffer serious injuries while training in the dangerous heat.
Even with a more rigorous conditioning program, Bott said there wasn't an increase in the number of heat related illnesses.
"I take extreme precautions." Bott said. "I bring in a lot of student athletic trainers. Each is assigned a coach or a position. They maintain water, through what we call 'pumpers'; and they make sure everyone is hydrated, including the coach."
Pumpers are yellow, three-gallon water jugs on handcams with attached hoses. The students who man them stand guard on the sidelines in the practice field, a safety net at the
or not. Bott said pumpers could be used for drinking or for spraying the whole body to cool it quickly.
In addition, Bott said the team physicians were at practices more frequently during the hottest days in case of heat-related emergencies.
In Whitaker's case. Bott said that the kidneys had been temporarily affected. Whitaker was limited to the exercise cycle
Bott said heat-related illnesses, such as heat exhaustion, affected the muscles and kidney function. In severe cases, he said, heat exhaustion caused an infant to exhibit kidney function failure.
for 10 days until his kidney function returned to normal. Doctors have given Whitaker the OK for practice and he plans to be ready to play against Bayon tomorrow.
Bott said heat-related problems were usually caused by a lack of climatization, or adaptation to a different climate.
"You run in a problem when an athlete works out two hours a day after he's finished working his job and his job has been eight hours in air conditioning." Bott said.
"Yes, they do what the coach requires and they do a good job. But once you get in camp, the only time it is cool when you're in the apartment. So they're in the heat to bury a day." and two bowels of steak. "They do not return to camp is not enough," he said.
still said many of the players worked outdoors this summer and were better adjusted to the heat, reducing the chance for heat-related illness.
Bott and assistant trainer Mark Cairns said the renewed emphasis on conditioning had paid off.
"People feel much better," Cairns said. "Our injury rate is down, and we attribute that to our conditioning. We don't have as many minor injuries as we used to."
we stut we have a few moderate injuries, but the little aches and pains are not there that you see when a football team is out of shape."
Cairns said there was an emphasis on speed and overall fitness.
"There is a good mixture of distance running and sprint work," he said. "Football is a game of short sprints that last maybe 10 seconds at the most, so you have to be able to give your most in that 10 seconds.
it seems like we're running more, and more quality laps. When Couch Mason says you're going to make it at 47 seconds, I say percentage of people out there make it.
Carrs said that the team also had improved its endurance.
"I got the feeling last year that we were running out of gas at halftime," Carr said. "This year, I don't think that's going to happen.
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University Daily Kansan FOOTBALL '88 September 9.1986 1