Coaches: ‘Iron Works Preparation’ challenges status quo

August 31, 2015 at 12:05a.m.

Williams, Morris tout new approach

COLUMBIANA

When Columbiana High graduate Ryan Williams first met former University of Pittsburgh strength and conditioning coach Buddy Morris in 2010, he was immediately impressed with his future mentor’s cutting-edge approach.

Little did he know back then but Morris, a former Shenango resident now in his second season as head strength and conditioning coach for the Arizona Cardinals, was slowly becoming a fan of the former Clippers and Waynesburg University standout and future author.

“I’ve learned from some of the greatest minds in the profession and at 58 years old, I read a lot. I don’t acquire more knowledge, I acquire more wisdom,” Morris said. “We suffer from academic myopia in this country and Ryan [Williams] is just like us in that we’re not doing what everyone else is doing. We’re challenging the status quo and the status quo just doesn’t like to be challenged.”

To better understand Williams’ circuitous route to co-authoring his “Iron Works Preparation” training manual, you needn’t look any further back than his high school football career with the Clippers.

He earned nine letters — three each in football and basketball, two in baseball and another in track — but it was during his days as a member of head coach Bob Spaite’s football program when he bought into his “Bigger, Faster, Stronger” conditioning program that piqued his interest in the profession.

“I was 14 years old at the time and coach [Spaite] gave us his workout program to follow. I followed it to a ‘T,’ but after my senior year while getting ready for basketball I bought a few books, recommended by those in the profession in order to learn more about the trade,” Williams said “While getting ready for basketball season, I then asked our head coach, Eric Witmer, if he would let me implement our pre-practice and pre-game warm-ups in order for the team to get loose and ready. He liked the idea and because of that, it took my interest to the next level.”

Williams then played four years for former YSU and Cardinal Mooney football standout Rick Shepas at Waynesburg and in his first year, religiously followed Waynesburg’s training regimen.

When the Yellow Jackets’ strength coach left, the school hired Tanner Kolb, son of former Pittsburgh Steelers offensive tackle Jon Kolb who was a wrestler by sport, but someone who shared similar workout principles as Williams.

“Each strength coach has his own methodology and I found myself in Tanner’s office a lot talking about training and conditioning. We both had our own unique views as he sought my help with speed training and I ended up assisting him with his overall program,” he said.

Ironically, it was Shepas who recommended that Williams assist Kolb.

“Coach Shepas has great conviction and when he says he is going to do something, he does it. Once you step on campus and become part of his program, he makes sure that you stick with the team, graduate and enjoy the overall experience,” Williams added. “In addition to football, he also imparts many life lessons.”

When Kolb left for East Carolina University in the summer of 2011, Shepas approached Williams, who was entering his senior season, to fill in and help oversee its strength and conditioning activities, a role that he readily accepted.

Like with the Clippers, his duties included pre-practice and pre-game warm-ups. He also designed and implemented workouts for the Yellow Jackets. Just before graduation, Shepas offered him a GA position, which he accepted.

During those five months, he worked on an off-season training program that the football team was expected to follow over the summer months before reporting back to camp in August.

Williams had no idea that his summer manual would end up becoming a full-fledged book with Morris.

“It started out as a summer manual and in early-September, I posted a football conditioning test on a website called freakstrength.com,” he stated. “The test was tailored to different positions and that’s when Buddy e-mailed me, said he liked what I had done, asked if I had would meet with him and if I had any manuals that I had been working on.

“At the time Buddy was working in a private gym, training several players for an NFL career and he asked if I would be willing to expand the manual and turn it into a full-fledged book. Having just graduated and barely making $10,000 a year, I was all in.”

Williams knocked the book out in three weeks but it wasn’t edited properly until 2013. It became available on-line in September of that year.

The book sold more than 500 copies. That November, Joel Jamieson, the former strength and conditioning coach for the University of Washington and Seattle Seahawks, and owner of his own business 8weeksout.com approached Williams about developing a physical book.

In addition to Jamieson’s other business ventures, he also asked if both Morris and Williams would be part of a video course. In May, 2014, Williams flew to Arizona with Morris doing the instructing and Williams the demonstrating as part of Jamieson’s Bioforce Project.

“In this industry, self-education is necessary in order to sustain,” Williams added. “Every two days, we create as much information as we did from the dawn of civilization until 2003. By nature, as soon as information is ‘printed’ it becomes outdated.”

The video course, which costs $97, has already sold more than 150 copies while the bound book, which sells for $50, has sold more than 50 copies.

The first half of the book is theoretical and scientific.

“The second half of the book is pragmatic and practical and includes 120 pages of real life programs,” he said. “The greatest testimonial is that professional, college and high school players, high-level private sector performance coaches as well as strength and conditioning coaches from all over the world have already contacted me with questions and praise. The performance coach of Argentina’s International rugby team, Keir Wenham-Slatt has already set up a podcast via Skype as well so things are really taking off.”

Morris reiterated that Williams’ ability to pay attention to detail, and then put on paper what many in the business have been teaching in some form has been the key.

“The goal in training is to increase the biological output of the organism, which is nothing more than improving the working ability of the body systems as a whole. Ryan gets it, most do not,” Morris added. “No system in the body works independent of the other system. The human body is nothing more than an interdependent matrix system.

“There are a lot of dumb a---s in this business and the three types of people that scare me most are the ones that say ‘I’m old school.’ ‘I don’t understand science, but I know how to train athletes.’ And ‘This is how I did it when I played.’ All three are excuses for being lazy. Ryan will succeed because of his energy and willingness to learn and think outside the box,” he added.

The Iron Works Preparation hard-bound book, American Football Physical Preparation e-book and the BioForce Project video course can be found at www.willpreparefitness.com/resources while Williams can be reached at 330-720-3910 or via e-mail at ryan@willpreparefitness.com.