One of the high school athletes who trains at Driveline Athletics is currently on vacation and training at Bates College in Maine. During his training session, he was told “not to squat so low” and to “not drop weights on the platforms.” He is front squatting well-below parallel and uses the high-bar Olympic squat variation, getting nearly ass-to-grass – this is apparently unsafe and not good for the knees.

He was cleaning and snatching with bumper plates on their platforms when he was told not to drop the weights, which makes you wonder why they have bumper plates and platforms in the first place.

When I asked him about what the off-season football training program looked like, he said: “No one was squatting –  just light trap bar deadlifts and core work.”

Nice program. At least Bates College does pretty well in football despite the training program.

Well, actually…

Year – Record – Coach

1990 2 6 0 Web Harrison
1991 0 7 1 Web Harrison
1992 0 8 0 Rick Pardy
1993 0 8 0 Rick Pardy
1994 0 8 0 Rick Pardy
#1995 1 7 0 Rick Pardy
1996 0 8 0 Rick Pardy
1997 1 7 0 Rick Pardy
1998 1 7 0 Mark Harriman
+1999 4 4 0 Mark Harriman
2000 1 7 0 Mark Harriman
2001 1 7 0 Mark Harriman
+2002 3 5 0 Mark Harriman
2003 2 6 0 Mark Harriman
2004 2 6 0 Mark Harriman
2005 2 6 0 Mark Harriman
2006 1 7 0 Mark Harriman
2007 1 7 0 Mark Harriman
2008 2 6 0 Mark Harriman
#2009 1 7 0 Mark Harriman

(thanks to jsnipes for the heads-up)

Embarrassing.