Yankees pitcher Roger Clemens got his nickname “the Rocket” because his
fastball is as speedy as a missile, but there’s also science behind his
success.
A relentless conditioning program has made the 39-year-old Clemens
one of the most powerful players in the game.
By all rights, Clemens should have retired years ago (he hits the big
4-0 in August), but the Yankee ace is stronger than ever, having won his
sixth Cy Young Award in 2001 after a year in which he went 20-3.
And he owes it all – or at least an awful lot – to Brian McNamee.
McNamee, or “Mac” as Clemens calls him, is Clemens’ own personal
strength and conditioning coach (he’s not on the Yankees payroll) and
the one credited with turbo-charging the pitcher’s career, giving
Clemens a level of power that doesn’t seem possible for someone
approaching middle age.
“I don’t feel 40, I’ll tell you that,” Clemens told The Post during
the Yankees’ spring training, which started Feb. 14, in Tampa, Fla.
“Strength-wise, conditioning-wise and my endurance level…”
Propelled by McNamee’s rigorous regimen of distance running, sprints,
weightlifting and heavy ab work, Clemens keeps getting better.
During each of the past five years, when McNamee began training the
Rocket, Clemens has steadily improved, defying the traditional career
arc of a power pitcher.
“I’ve had more than a handful (of trainers), and Mac is a definitely
the best,” said the 6-foot-4, 238- pound future Hall-of-Famer, who’s
notched 3,717 strikeouts in his 18-year major league career.
“The reason why my velocity continues to be what it is because of
what we’re doing behind the scenes.”
McNamee, a 34-year-old former New York City cop and emerging favorite
among select big league pitchers, mixes up his workouts, exercising
various parts of the body.
Every third day, he has “Clem,” as he calls Clemens, and Yankees
pitcher Andy Pettitte go through a series of sprints and runs, weight
training (using both machines and free weights) and medley of abdominal
exercises.
The pitchers also do a lot of stretching and throw from the mound
during the sessions, with McNamee catching.
The workouts are characterized by lots of crunches, which have fallen
out of favor with some trainers who think they put undue stress on the
neck and back.
But you wouldn’t know it from the hundreds of reps that McNamee
forces on his charges, including “power” abs in which McNamee holds up
Clemens’ legs or provides other resistance.
One signature of McNamee’s training is what he calls an “agility and
plyometric” workout, which involves “a lot of stop-and-go movement,” he
said.
“It’s sprinting from point A to point B as hard as you can. Then
stopping at Point B. Then sprinting back to point A as fast you can, “
said the coach.
Weightlifting is another key component.
For the upper body, McNamee favors low weight (25-pound dumbbells for
Clemens’ bench press, for example) and low reps. Most of the work is
done with free weights.
For the lower body, he has the players lift successively higher
weights (up to 245 pounds for squats) using a machine.
The result is bigger leg muscles – crucial for generating velocity on
the mound – and less bulk and more flexibility in the arms.
McNamee grew up in Breezy Point, Queens, and still resides there with
his wife, Eileen, and their two sons, John Francis, 2 and Brian Jr., 5.
He is a graduate of St. John’s University, where he was a catcher and
captain of the baseball team (“which is good because I get to catch for
(players) and they trust me more,” McNamee said), and has a B.A. in
athletic administration.
From 1990 to 1993, McNamee was a New York City Police officer and
would patrol the streets of Manhattan in a yellow cab, part of a
plainsclothes anti-crime unit.
But the hours were long and McNamee decided to use his skills for his
true passion, baseball. And he quickly found work as the assistant
strength and conditioning coach of the Yankees from 1993 to 1995.
After getting a masters in sports medicine and exercise physiology
from Long Island University in 1997, he was hired as a conditioning
coach for the Toronto Blue Jays, for whom he worked until 1999.
He and Clemens met in Toronto , when the Rocket pitched for the Blue
Jays. McNamee also received a doctorate in nutrition from Columbus
University. (He attended during the off-season).
After Clemens was traded to the Yankees in 1998, McNamee left the
Blue Jays and began working privately with him and select other major
league pitchers like Woody Williams of the St. Louis Cardinals and C.J.
Nitkowski of the Houston Astros.
McNamee knows that there’s great pressure not to overdo it with his
clients. An injury during training could cost a player millions 0- and
cost him plenty professionally.
“I have a lot of liability. My insurance is very high,” said McNamee.
“I have to be very careful training the players that I train. It’s like
being a doctor who pays a lot of liability insurance and malpractice.”
What makes McNamee so good? “Mac is no-nonsense,” offered Clemens.
“When he’s working, it’s strictly work and we’re able to get the work
done in a reasonable amount of time. That’s why he’s good at what he
does. I’m a pretty driven person, so I expect my body to do certain
things and he was able to get me there.”
But not everyone can handle the demands of McNamee’s training. Even
Clemens couldn’t keep up at first.
“We built up to this,” Clemens recalled. “When I jumped in with both
feet with McNamee way back, it sent me back a bit. Younger players
might get hurt if they do my weight.”
And, of course, McNamee has very specific ideas about nutrition.
“We try to stick mainly to a complex carbohydrate diet with lean red
meats, chicken and a lot of water, a lot of low-sugar fluids,” he said.
“It’s very hard for them to eat as much as they need to with all the
time we spend, so I’m big on meal replacement powders and shakes.”
The shakes are critical, he said.
“They can drink the shakes two hours before or 30 minutes after. I
think of it as flushing the body out of the work that we did.”
McNamee also suggests that his clients take a one-a-day vitamin every
morning.
But don’t think that just by following McNamee’s routine, you too can
become a major league pitcher overnight.
“Everything is related around strength,” said McNamee. “For the
weekend warrior type people who play softball and baseball on the
weekend, it’s a good sound thing.
“Exercise and nutrition is like brushing your teeth and combing you
hair. Get into a routine where you make it part of your life, part of
your day.
“If you can work hard, you can do whatever you want but make sure
that you understand: everything in moderation.”
For more information, contact: bmac@jockrx.com.
THE MOVES THAT MAKE THOSE MARVELOUS MUSCLES (see newspaper for full
description) Hold you breath before reading any further.
Just hearing about the paces that trainer Brian McNamee puts his
major leaguers through can be exhausting.
And don’t’ try this on your own.
“Make sure you’re properly supervised by a health professional,”
McNamee cautioned.
One-day routine (total workout time: roughly two hours) On Upper-body
days On lower-body days (done with a back-support weight belt)
