Vikings players were very appreciative of coach Brad Childress' decision to give them the entire week off to rest and recover physically during the bye.

Childress gave his players the rest of the week off until Sunday when they return to practice. "It's huge," wide receiver Sidney Rice said. "We need the rest. Everybody needs to rest their bodies and heal up. A couple of people got nicks and stuff like that. Hopefully we'll be able to over it during this bye." Veteran left guard Steve Hutchinson said the break this week does as much good mentally as it does physically. "It's probably more important at this stage for maybe as odd as that sounds," he said. "Everybody is beat up physically now, but you're used to that. You don't really feel good physically from the second day of training camp on. It's all the meetings and the stuff that goes on the other eight hours of the day than you're not practicing. That's the stuff that you get a break from. When you come back hopefully you feel good mentally." Hutchinson said he will be at Winter Park every day getting treatment along with a number of players. Other players were scattering to warmer weather. Rookie Percy Harvin said he was heading to Florida. "It's cold," he said of his first Minnesota winter. "I don't sit there and stand out there in the weather. I think the weirdest thing is I tried to roll my window down and it was stuck with ice. That was kind of unusual to me. I was going through the drive-through at McDonald's and I couldn't get my window down. I had to open the door." Naturally, someone asked what he ordered. "A double-quarter pounder with cheese," he said. On a more serious note, Harvin said he hasn't experienced any migraines since his visit to the Mayo Clinic. He said he feels back to normal now and it certainly looked that way Sunday. "The week I was down I had a lot of medicines in me," he said. "I just kind of felt yucky. I was not running the whole week and sweating and actually being at practice. I just felt a little sluggish. So I practiced two full weeks and got that juice back and like I said I'm feeling good now." Pro Bowl nose tackle Pat Williams also said he feels good after missing one game because of an elbow injury. Williams said he was on the field for 18 plays Sunday. "It was already hurt in Charlotte, that Carolina game," he said. "I had tweaked it early in the game and it was killing me in the game. Hurting real bad. … Every time I hit it, it hurt so I wasn't able to push off. So coach just told me to get out of there." Williams was asked about the Vikings 8-0 record at the Metrodome this season, which he credited to the energy of the fans. But he made a pitch for a new stadium in his own unique way. "I don't think that Dome will work," he said. "It's a loud stadium, but it's a raggedy stadium. You've seen that locker room. We're right on top of each other. It's like a high school room. I've seen high school rooms better than that. That ain't going to help. We've got to get out of there. You saw this locker room [at Winter Park] when I first signed here? Y'all saw this locker room. It's a whole improvement right here. Y'all saw this locker room. I almost changed my mind when I saw this locker room when I came out here before I signed. I was like, 'What the? This is the NFL? This locker room?' Naw. They need some improvements, man. I like the Dome, but it needs some improvements."