On The Road with Cruiser: Cougar Sleds

Most of us have either done it or seen it being done—pushing large steel sleds around a football field with a coach standing on it blowing a whistle. It’s been part of football workouts for generations. But now there’s a new sled in town, one that coaches love and players hate.

The new sled is basically a single length of steel, bent and doubled back on itself like one of those handheld magnetic roller toys kids used to play with in the 60s. It doesn’t weigh much, probably not more than a hundred pounds, but where the old football sleds were built to slide across the grass, this new kind has a plate underneath that hugs Mother Earth like steel velcro. Just what players don't want.

And it was design by Coach Omer. That’s right; our own weight and conditioning coach, Jay Omer, who spent eight seasons as the Player Development Director at Georgia Tech before coming to the Y in 2001, designed this implement of torture and gave the plans to a fabrication company, which now makes them for universities around the country. The sleds are appropriately called "Cougar Sleds." Michigan has ten of them. The University of Utah has half a dozen or so. (But Utah refuses to call them Cougar Sleds and even had the name removed.)

What does Coach Omer get for his invention? Not much really, just the promise that BYU can get all the sleds they want for free. And for somebody who makes a living by inflicting pain and misery on football players, he couldn’t have a better reward.

Generally, you see the linemen pulling or pushing them around the field. (They work backward and forward.) But last week one of the skill players mouthed off, saying the linemen were wimps for complaining about the sleds and that anybody could pull them across the grass.

Wish granted.

Last Wednesday the skill players, including quarterbacks, took turns harnessing themselves into the sleds and pulling them forty yards. Said one player: "Twenty yards is pretty easy, but you’re surprised by how much drag that little sled has. After thirty yards, your quads are burning and you’re gasping for air. After forty yards, you have a near-death experience." Omer had them do it six times each. Ten players threw up. I could name names but will protect the embarrassed. Coach Omer never got on a sled, and although they can hold 400 pounds of free weights, he didn’t put any plates on either, choosing to have "mercy" on the players. Most of them, including some prominent names, practically crawled off the field.

One or two, though, held up pretty well. Brian Kehl looked like he could have pulled the thing a hundred yards and done a 5.0 forty doing it. Markell Staffieri looked strong, as did Joe Semanoff. But then again, I don’t know what they were feeling while doing it. It could have been an act. For all I know they collapsed like common mortals when they got in the locker room.

One thing I do know, though, is that the player who mouthed off to earn this opportunity for himself and his friends was singing a different tune afterwards—something about "having seen the light."