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Miller spent his offseason primarily in San Francisco for “Chameleon Training”
By NICKI JHABVALA | [email protected] | The Denver Post
PUBLISHED: July 29, 2017 at 6:23 pm | UPDATED: July 31, 2017 at 2:42 am
Von Miller went to hell and back this summer, and he recently returned to Colorado to tell his teammates — and the thousands watching Broncos training camp — tales of his journey.
Ty Sambrailo got an earful, as Miller blew past him repeatedly without contact in individual drills. Fellow offensive tackle Menelik Watson heard one story early in practice Thursday — a lethal spin move — and was so dumbfounded, he begged to hear another until it fully registered. Rookie offensive tackle Garett Bolles learned a bit, too, but the kid has been in the know since April, really.
Throughout the last seven months, Miller has shared snippets from his trip, often with camera filters, a steady beat of rap music and his friend and supporting actor, Cyrus Gray, at his side in professionally produced Instagram videos. For a stint in the middle of his odyssey, when he returned to Denver for organized team activities (OTAs), Miller recruited some of his teammates to tag along so they, too, could experience life in hell.
But hell hath no fury like a trainer disguised in a hoodie, black sunglasses and enough deceptive charm to call his clients “Sir.”
“That dude’s crazy,” said safety Will Parks.
That dude is better known as “Hell’s Trainer” and less known as Frank Matrisciano, a name few can match with a face because of his desire to stay out of the spotlight. He has no Twitter account. No Instagram documenting his famous clientele (his face is blurred out in Miller’s videos). No website and no interest in advertising his services.
Last week, Miller did enough of that for him, arriving at camp with quadriceps the size of watermelons, an explosiveness that has left onlookers chuckling in disbelief and a bend that defies the laws of gravity.
“I want to push my body to a spot that it has never been before,” Miller said in May. “You’re never guaranteed that working hard off the field will translate to on-the-field success, but that is what I am hoping for this year. I’ve never worked as hard as I am working this offseason.”
Attention at Broncos camp was supposed to be centered on the quarterbacks vying for a starting job. But Miller has claimed the spotlight, and this is no continuation of his Super Bowl 50 media tour.
Von Miller is on a mission.
“Controlled chaos”
Miller’s primary hell was stationed in San Francisco, with the blue sky and Pacific waters as backdrops. Four days after Denver’s 2016 season ended with a playoff-less thud, Miller jetted to northern California to meet with the man he had long heard about.
Miller’s agent, Joby Branion, had tried to convince Miller to get with “Frank” for years. Go to Frank, he would say. You need to go to Frank.
“Guys don’t really do this right away,” Matrisciano said. “They don’t really just jump into this training. For every 10 guys, only three stay.”
When Miller fell one vote short of being the NFL defensive player of the year, fell two and a half sacks short of the league lead and his Broncos fell one victory short of a postseason berth, he listened.
Miller rented a house in San Francisco, and every day that he could for about eight weeks, he and Gray — and others such as Shane Ray, who rotated through — endured Matrisciano’s “Chameleon Training,” a grueling regimen that emphasizes adaptation to unstable environments.
“I got tired of this cookie-cutter stuff,” Matrisciano said of his workouts. “You always want to do something different to shock the muscles. In San Francisco, the sand is unstable. That’s going to make someone stronger than it would if they were on a stable environment, like a football field. With me, I don’t like to put guys on hard surfaces. I don’t like to put them in a position where they’re going to put wear and tear on their bodies.
“The stuff is sort of crazy, but it’s controlled chaos. Everything I do is for a reason.”
...
Full Article at Denver Post
By NICKI JHABVALA | [email protected] | The Denver Post
PUBLISHED: July 29, 2017 at 6:23 pm | UPDATED: July 31, 2017 at 2:42 am
Von Miller went to hell and back this summer, and he recently returned to Colorado to tell his teammates — and the thousands watching Broncos training camp — tales of his journey.
Ty Sambrailo got an earful, as Miller blew past him repeatedly without contact in individual drills. Fellow offensive tackle Menelik Watson heard one story early in practice Thursday — a lethal spin move — and was so dumbfounded, he begged to hear another until it fully registered. Rookie offensive tackle Garett Bolles learned a bit, too, but the kid has been in the know since April, really.
Throughout the last seven months, Miller has shared snippets from his trip, often with camera filters, a steady beat of rap music and his friend and supporting actor, Cyrus Gray, at his side in professionally produced Instagram videos. For a stint in the middle of his odyssey, when he returned to Denver for organized team activities (OTAs), Miller recruited some of his teammates to tag along so they, too, could experience life in hell.
But hell hath no fury like a trainer disguised in a hoodie, black sunglasses and enough deceptive charm to call his clients “Sir.”
“That dude’s crazy,” said safety Will Parks.
That dude is better known as “Hell’s Trainer” and less known as Frank Matrisciano, a name few can match with a face because of his desire to stay out of the spotlight. He has no Twitter account. No Instagram documenting his famous clientele (his face is blurred out in Miller’s videos). No website and no interest in advertising his services.
Last week, Miller did enough of that for him, arriving at camp with quadriceps the size of watermelons, an explosiveness that has left onlookers chuckling in disbelief and a bend that defies the laws of gravity.
“I want to push my body to a spot that it has never been before,” Miller said in May. “You’re never guaranteed that working hard off the field will translate to on-the-field success, but that is what I am hoping for this year. I’ve never worked as hard as I am working this offseason.”
Attention at Broncos camp was supposed to be centered on the quarterbacks vying for a starting job. But Miller has claimed the spotlight, and this is no continuation of his Super Bowl 50 media tour.
Von Miller is on a mission.
“Controlled chaos”
Miller’s primary hell was stationed in San Francisco, with the blue sky and Pacific waters as backdrops. Four days after Denver’s 2016 season ended with a playoff-less thud, Miller jetted to northern California to meet with the man he had long heard about.
Miller’s agent, Joby Branion, had tried to convince Miller to get with “Frank” for years. Go to Frank, he would say. You need to go to Frank.
“Guys don’t really do this right away,” Matrisciano said. “They don’t really just jump into this training. For every 10 guys, only three stay.”
When Miller fell one vote short of being the NFL defensive player of the year, fell two and a half sacks short of the league lead and his Broncos fell one victory short of a postseason berth, he listened.
Miller rented a house in San Francisco, and every day that he could for about eight weeks, he and Gray — and others such as Shane Ray, who rotated through — endured Matrisciano’s “Chameleon Training,” a grueling regimen that emphasizes adaptation to unstable environments.
“I got tired of this cookie-cutter stuff,” Matrisciano said of his workouts. “You always want to do something different to shock the muscles. In San Francisco, the sand is unstable. That’s going to make someone stronger than it would if they were on a stable environment, like a football field. With me, I don’t like to put guys on hard surfaces. I don’t like to put them in a position where they’re going to put wear and tear on their bodies.
“The stuff is sort of crazy, but it’s controlled chaos. Everything I do is for a reason.”
...
Full Article at Denver Post
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