Muscle Beach

There was a time when one could tell the football players at the

beach by the mass and definition of their upper body. Biceps and

pectorals were the end to the means when it came to lifting, with the

bench press and curls a prominent part of any player’s off-season

routine.

Those sands, however, have long since shifted for most programs,

as lifts that translate into better explosiveness on the field have

gained greater popularity with coaches. Coaches, in fact, now try to

ween players away from the aforementioned lifts that tend to build

physiques, but not necessarily better players.

The Olympic lifts -- squat, power cleans and snatchs -- are now

the primary focus in off-season training for most top programs,

though bench press is still in the mix.

“It has been proved that Olympic powerlifting is the most

explosive sport there is,” Newport Harbor defensive coordinator and

noted strength guru Tony Ciarelli said. “There is no activity that

humans can do in which more power is generated than Olympic lifting.

The basic theory is that if you can explode with 300 pounds in your

hands, just how explosive are you going to be with nothing?”

Ciarelli, a standout tight end at Huntington Beach High (Class of

1972), later played at Orange Coast College and threw the javelin at

the University of Hawaii.

He learned much of his weight training principles under

then-Hawaii strength coach Bill Stoner. After a stint as a track and

field assistant coach at Damien High in Hawaii, he brought a similar

program to Edison, where he coached both track and football from

1981to 1988.

He then moved to Newport Harbor in 1989 and his program is

credited as one of the catalytic factors that helped Coach Jeff

Brinkley’s Sailors become perennial CIF Southern Section title

contenders.

Ciarelli also has had an impact on the Huntington Beach football

program, where he was head coach from 1997 to 2001. His wife,

Stephanie, was also a strength and track coach with the Oilers,

before joining the Newport Harbor staff this year.

Ciarelli, has coached a handful of junior national and senior

national powerlifting champions, including Olympian and Newport

Harbor product Cara Heads. He is one of only 10 to be recognized as a

U.S. international coach by the sport’s American governing body.

Ciarelli has shared his philosophies with several programs in

Orange County, and has also spoken about his program at dozens of

coaches’ clinics, all across the western United States.

Ciarelli developed a video with his nephew Nick Ziegler, a former

star at Huntington Beach who started at defensive ed at Colorado in

the 1990s, that illustrates the similarities between the cleaning

motion and the ideal form tackle.

“It shows the triple extension of the ankles, knees and hips,”

Cirarelli said of the video, which intercuts Ziegler lifting and

tackling a quarterback on an option play.