New York Post - 06.08.2019

New York Post, Tuesday, August 6, 2019

nypost.com

I

T IS A fortress, but not one built in soli-
tude, for thisSuperman— the Giants’
superman— did not come screeching
downto theplanet.Although, heat
timeslooksfaster thana speedingbul-
let,more powerful thana locomotive and
ableto leaptall defensive backs ina single
bound.
This fortress, bornof nature, honedby
sweat and steeledby strain,belongs to
Saquon Barkley and it isremarkable—a
thingof beauty. It appears imperviousand
without flaw. Massive yet sculpted.Bulg-
ing yet lithe.It is thetempleothers worship,
aw e-inspiringbu t unatt ainablebecause
there is only oneSaquon Barkley and only
oneSaquonBody.
“Veryproudof my body,” the second-year
runningback and full-time physicalspeci-
mentold The Post duringa rarebreakat
Giants training camp. “Put a lot of hard work
in. I surroundedmyselfwitha great team.
Yo ur body is what you needto produce at
a high level in this sport, that’s whyItake it
very serious.”
Indeed,SaquonSeriousandSaquon
Body are one and thesame.Hisupperhalf
is tank-like, intertwining sinew and muscle
mass. His lower half is astounding, the
nexusa pair of impossibly massive, trunk-
like thighs that look as ifsomeoneon the
assembly lineat HumanTechnology mis-
read the sizing instructions.The total
package hasteammates agog and onlook-
ers aghast.

“He’sswole,” runningback Rod Smith

said.

“You don’t think he canget any

more fit, but he somehow did,”

said Jon Halapio,a6-foot-4,

315-poundcenter. “We only

hopeto look like that one day.

He has the body to show off. I

don’t know how it feels.”

Others could put in the

wo rkand neve r

look likeBarkley.

So it go esin

nature. Th er e

is body for

the beach

and body

for the

back-

field.

Bar-

kley

turns

heads walking on thesand andwaltzing

through thesecondary.

“There’salotof IG [Instagram] models

and IGguys who work out and they look

thepa rt but co uld never do what an y

of us do on thefootballfield,” Barkley

said. “I know guys who don’t have six-

packs but theircore is ridiculously

strong.For example,alotof our

linemen... they’re notrippedand

shredded.Yo u’re notreally focus-

ing on ripping it out or looking

leanand looking crazy strong, but

you understand thework that you’re

doing,you’re doing itto be a better

footballplayer and ithappensto help

your body lookbetter.”

Barkley is rippedand shreddedand

crazy strong.At Penn State, he seta

we ightro omre co rd of 405 pounds in

the power clean.Hedoesnot train

likeapower lifter but is confidenthe

co uld squat 70 0 pounds andbench-

press closeto 500 pounds.

nnnn

I

T IS his thighs that sethim

apart.Nooneever calledhim

“Saquads”before OdellBeck-

hamJr. lastyear hit therookie

with it.Beckham isgone,

traded to Cleveland,but his

nickname handiwork remains,

although Barkley gets it more

from outsiders than hedoes

teammates. Whenhe did some

of fseasonwo rk with Baker Ma yf ield,the

Browns quarterbacktaken No.1in the 2018

NFL Draft (Barkley wa s thesec ond pick),

Mayfieldshortenedit upto “Quads’’when

calling out to Barkley.

“People always said I have biglegs or I

would always get complimentson mylegs,

but onceIgot here, nowIget noticed by

mylegs,” Barkley said, smiling. “Iremem-

berI was walking through an airport anda

womancomplimented me, like ‘Oooo, you

have nice legs.’Iwas like...‘Thankyou?’

Yo u don’treally know how to react to that.

“Or you seeguys lookat your legs. It kin-

da grew.Idon’t care, it doesn’t bother me.”

The quads do not have mindsof their

ow n, but the y co uld be assigned separat e

zip codes.

“They’re ridiculous,” Smithsaid.

Th ey are taut and protruding andmea-

sure nearly 29 inchesaround, absurdly

immenseforapersonwho wears 36-inch

waist pants. In shorts, Barkley looks as if he

is powered bymatching pistons.

“I have people reach out to me all the

timegoing, ‘I know you work withSaquon,

how do I get quads like that?’” Ry an Fla-

herty, vice presidentof performance at

Nike and Barkley’s trainer, told The Post.

“I am like, ‘You didn’tgetachance to pick

your mom and dad.’Alotof that is genetic.

I’ve never seenquads that size. He’ll come

Workouts about staying healthy, not getting even stronger

By PAUL SCHWARTZ

Heis bigger, stronger,
fa ster than virtually ev ery -
one.He is so uncommonly,
ph ys ically dominant that the
persontasked with training
this supremeathlete is play-
ing the longgameto keep
Saquon Barkley powered up
foradecade.
“Whenit comesto an ath-
let e lik e Saquon,there’s only
so muchfaster and so much
stronger he canget or wants
to get,’’ Ryan Flaherty told
The Post. “Iwo uldrath -
er wa y over-index
on the injury pre-
vention side
than on the
speedand

strengthsidebecause there’s

laws of diminishingreturn.’’

Ever since the Giantstook

Barkley with theNo.2pick

in the 2018 NFL Draft, Fla-

herty as vice presidentof

performance at Nike has

worked with him, incon-

cert with AaronWellman,

the Giants’ strengthand

conditioningcoach. Once

Flaherty gotalookat those

arms and outrageous legs,

gotafeel for Barkley’s zeal-

ouswork ethicand listened

to his stat ed goals,Flaherty

realizedhis missionwas

less instantgratification and

more about adding timeto

the warranty.

“He wants to play a mini-

mumof 10 years and he

wantsto be ableto go out

on hisown terms,’’Flaherty

said. “He doesn’t want to go

out havingto be forced out

becausehe ’s injured. To do

that you have tobe healthy.’’

Lookingchiseledfroma

blockof granite, the6-foot,

232-pound Barkley may

appear imperviousbut he is

not.

A revelation: “He’s strug-

gledwitha little bitof tendi-

nosis in hisknee, which over

time is dueto a poor move-

mentpattern,’’Flaherty said.

“Whenyou fail to under-

stand how to land or change

direction— he puts load

on his hips,sometimeshe

putstoo much stresson the

knees.Fo r Saquon, with how

powerful andexplosive he

is, all that power andexplo-

siveness andforce is driving

through his joints, he’s at a

higherriskfor injury thana

Tom Brady is, given that he’s

so explosive. There’salot

that canhappenon a play.

There’s more exposure.’’

It is the life of an NFL run-

ningback.

“H e’ s battling stat istics

in termsof injuryrate,’ ’ Fla-

herty said. “The amount

of hits he’s gonnatake and

how fast andex plosi ve he

is can potentially pu t him in

a situationwhere he breaks

a tackle that mostpeople

shouldn’t andgets exposed

to ahitto hisknees.The

riskof injuryfor him on just

every play is higherthan just

about any other position.”

Focusing ondecreasing

the imbalance and asym-

metryin Barkley’s left and

rightsides— an imbalance

everyone has,to a degree

— Flaherty is attempting

to reduce the riskof injury.

There hasbeenextensive

workonBarkley’s gait,

whichneededrepair, as he

ran withwhat is calledback

side mechanics — hisfoot

motionswings behindhis

body and notunderneath

it, limiting the stride and

the amountof force he can

achieve.

Flaherty—who also

works directly withSerena

Williams and BrooksKoepka

— concentrated thisoffsea-

son on improv ing Barkley’s

biomechanicsand there sults

indicate he is actually faster

thanbefore. Barkley was pre-

viously timedat 1.88 to 1.90

seconds in the Flying20 drill

(attainingtop speedafter 20

yards) and now he is clock-

ing inat 1.78 to1.80, correlat-

ingto a 4.3 second 40-yard

dash.He ran 4.4 at the NFL

ScoutingCombine in 2018.

“Youcombine that with

a year of experience, he’s

almosta tenthof a second

faster in the 40-yard dash,

it could be scarywhat he’s

ableto do thisyear, even

with thedefensesfocused

on him,’’Flaherty said.

How scary? Flaherty and

Barkley reviewed seven

runs in 2018 that might have

gone for touchdowns with

oneex tra step of ge taway

speed.

Barkley, after seeingthe

benefitsof this training, is

all-in,sometimesto o much

so. Flaherty got wordback

in March that,unbeknownst

to him, Barkley was sneak-

ing out on Saturdays to run

hills.

“He was running scared

fromco mpetitionin his

mindhe believes is out-

working him,” Flaherty

said, “What he doesn’t

realize is he’s outworking

everybody.’’

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