Lineman tailors weight for game

Four eggs scrambled, a quarter pound of bacon and four slices of toast are laid on the counter to be cooled down.  It is 8 a.m. and there is only one person awake in the apartment.  Steve Brazzle, 22, lazily walks into the kitchen of his apartment, mounds the food onto a glass plate, quickly devours it and heads out the door to hike the highest of Tallahassee’s seven hills.

This is only the first of many large meals that Brazzle will consume in one day.

Lunch consists of a Double Quarter Pounder meal from McDonald’s and a 10-piece McNugget accompanied by a large strawberry milkshake to satisfy Brazzle’s sweet tooth.  
Dinner is the heaviest meal.

Brazzle consumes a half-pound of shrimp alfredo and a grilled chicken breast followed by two honey buns for dessert.

These large meals aren’t just to satisfy the appetite of 6 -foot 4-inch, 334-pound Brazzle.  This lineman has a much larger goal in mind.

“I can make my weight fluctuate in order to prepare for the team that we’re scheduled to play,” Brazzle said.  “It really all depends on whether I want to go up or down in weight. It takes three or four days for me to gain or lose between four and eight pounds.”
Brazzle is now gaining weight after purposely dropping eight pounds over a four-day period to be able to move faster during the homecoming win against Norfolk State University.  The gain has also attributed to the successful game against Morgan State University.

“To lose weight my diet is much lighter than the one mentioned before,” Brazzle said.  “For breakfast I eat a small bowl of Frosted Mini-Wheat’s with two percent milk.  Lunch consists of a turkey, lettuce and tomato sandwich and dinner consists of a baked chicken breast accompanied with broccoli and white rice.  I also make the consumption of at least a gallon of water a day one of my top priorities.”

Brazzle does not fear the risks.

“I’ve been doing this since high school and I think it’s healthy because have control over my weight,” Brazzle said.

Coach Joe Taylor explained how the players could control the gain and loss of their weight.

“Lately we’ve had additional running during practice,” Taylor said. “If the output is greater than the input then weight will be lost, but if the input is greater than the output then weight will be gained. So it’s all a result of his out put in relation to the additional running at practices.”

Offensive lineman Chris Sands, 22, weighs 330 pounds and stands tall at 6 feet 9 inches.  He is a fourth-year physical education student from Tallahassee. 

“I’m the same way with all the training, workouts and running,” Sands said. “We lose calories very quickly.  I’d say between two days I can drop between seven and 10 pounds quick.  I don’t do it purposely though.  If I realize I’m losing weight rapidly in a short period of time, I’ll try to gain it back by eating heavy peanut butter and jelly sandwich[es] right before bed at 11 p.m. to gain weight.  Most of the weight we lose is from water weight.”

Sands explained that the offensive linemen could spare the weight loss because of the extra weight they have to lose.

“Brazzle purposely losing weight is not that big of a deal to me because we’re all around 300 pounds on the offensive line and we have a lot of weight to lose,” Sands said. “He’s obviously not unhealthy because he can put up with the weight training and conditioning we can do.”

Anthony Collins, 22, is a fourth-year sociology student from Miami.  Collins is also a lineman and weighs in at 330 pounds and stands tall at 6 feet 2.5 inches. 

“I was surprised when I first found out that Brazzle could control his weight but I understand it,” Collins said.  “If he’s lighter he moves faster and if he’s heavier he’s harder to move.”

The average person might think that weight isn’t important to some one as large in size as Brazzle.

However, the goal is not appearance, it’s simply a game well played.