Polamalu's preparation pays dividends

By Scott Brown
PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW
http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/sports/
Sunday, November 16, 2008

A new Nike commercial shows parallel tracks of two players who have become faces of the NFL.

It starts from their respective childhoods and runs through their college years. It ends with their lives intersecting on the football field as Steelers strong safety Troy Polamalu tackles San Diego Chargers running back LaDainian Tomlinson.

For the final scene of the commercial, Polamalu and Tomlinson ran full speed but ultimately past one another over and over to simulate the play. Extras were called in for the actual collision. Make that collisions.

"We sat back and watched them hit each other about 50 times at full speed," Polamalu said.

There will be no watching for either player today when the Steelers host the Chargers in a pivotal game for each team. As for Tomlinson and Polamalu, their paths have diverged since the Nike shoot in July. Tomlinson, a perennial All-Pro, has struggled - he is averaging 3.8 yards a carry, well below his career average of 4.5.

Polamalu's season has taken an opposite course.

He leads the Steelers with three interceptions, is fourth on the team with 46 tackles and is tied for fourth with six passes defended. The most significant number associated with Polamalu, though, may be zero.

The four-time Pro Bowler has not missed a game after injuries sidelined him for eight of them over the previous two seasons and hampered him in numerous other contests. A return to health for one the most disruptive players in the NFL is a big reason the Steelers' defense has been ranked the best in the league.

Polamalu staying relatively healthy - a concussion knocked him out of a game against the Cincinnati Bengals last month - can be traced to many things, including fish oil and overcoming his reluctance to reel himself in during the offseason.

The sixth-year veteran has added more healthy fats to his diet and his intake of fish oil, coconut oil and milk have allowed Polamalu to maintain his playing weight of 215 pounds.

The 5-foot-10 Polamalu played at around 205 pounds the previous two years, and he said he dropped weight so he could keep pace with fleet-footed wide receivers. Given the way he seeks out collisions on the field, Polamalu concedes that the added weight is probably something he needs to make it through an entire season.

"I hit a lot more in the box than play man-to-man (coverage), so this might be where I have to stay for the rest of my career," Polamalu said. "At 205, I would definitely say I feel faster."

He sure hasn't looked any slower, and part of that can be attributed to what he did during the offseason. Polamalu, with the Steelers' blessing, skipped all of the team's voluntary practices and trained in southern California.

He worked out at Sports Science Lab, where an emphasis is placed on how fast an athlete can move a weight and on exercises that simulate movements that are specific to a sport such as football.

"How much weight you lift is absolutely irrelevant to me," said Gavin MacMillan, president of Sports Science Lab. "The guy that lifts the most weight is never the guy that can run the fastest or jump the highest. In fact, it's quite the opposite."

That is not the only area in which MacMillan emphasized to Polamalu that less can be more.

"Honestly, what I think he did the two previous years was he over-trained, and I think that is really what hurt him," MacMillan said. "I think this summer he was able to kind of control that better."

Said Polamalu: "There were times when I would go there, and (MacMillan) would just send me home. I think I probably over-trained a lot."

It looked like Polamalu had overdone it when he arrived at training camp in late July with a slight hamstring pull. He aggravated the injury later in camp and sat out most of preseason practice.

The missed time hardly hurt him as Polamalu intercepted a pass in each of the Steelers' first three games. He has since re-established himself as one of the premier safeties in the NFL.

"Some of the things he does, you just don't teach," said ESPN analyst and former Cowboys safety Darren Woodson, who made five Pro Bowls while playing for Dallas from 1992-2004. "He understands angles.

"You know who he reminds me of? Junior Seau. Now, Junior took a lot more chances than Troy, but he was always making plays because he took great angles to the ball."

Polamalu is not nearly as verbose as his fellow USC alum and is, in fact, one of the quieter players in the Steelers' locker room. That makes him a silent assassin in another sense.

"In preseason, he gave me a water bottle and was like, 'Man, you've got to taste this Gatorade,' " Steelers wide receiver Hines Ward said. "And he loosened the top and I tried to squeeze it in my mouth and the whole Gatorade fell on my face. You wouldn't think of it from a guy like that. He can get a lot of guys because he's so soft-spoken. He's definitely one of those prankster guys."

But, as Tomlinson may find out today when the action is live, Polamalu is anything but a joke to the opposition.


Scott Brown can be reached at sbrown@tribweb.com or 412-481-5432.