Vikings: Rise and shine; another Childress camp dawns

MANKATO - On his first full-pads practice last summer as Vikings coach, Brad Childress checked every weather forecast he could find. They were unanimous. Heavy rain, all day.

His dilemma: Move to a small indoor facility, robbing him of a critical tempo-setting exercise, or slog outside and put his players -- and coaches -- through a miserable morning.

Eager to lay down a foundation for tough-minded practices, Childress made the latter choice. It was the opening salvo of a demanding training camp, one that safety Darren Sharper called "the most physical camp I've ever been to."

Yet as the Vikings reported Wednesday for Camp Childress II, there was a sense that the worst is behind them. While still planning a challenging camp, Childress has cut back the number of practices, increased time off and varied the schedule to break the monotony of three weeks at Minnesota State Mankato.

"There are still some things we're going to do every day," Childress said. "But some things remain to be seen. I would think that our tempo has been installed already, and I saw it during [spring drills]. You can get a lot of stuff done [quickly] if everybody understands how to practice at our high tempo."

This summer, Childress has cut two days of twice-a-day practices for the entire squad, from 14 to 12. He eliminated the early report date for rookies, cutting another three days of double practices for them.

Of their 12 afternoon practices, four are designated strictly for special teams while two others are scheduled for 45 minutes. Also, morning practices will start 15 minutes later this summer, moving back to 9 a.m. from 8:45 a.m.

Most notably, Childress is planning some significant downtime after the first week of practices, scheduling only two workouts during a three-day span. The Vikings have back-to-back night practices against Kansas City on Aug. 3 and 4, but they are off entirely on Aug. 5. They also are off Aug. 11.

Last summer, veterans practiced or played preseason games for 15 consecutive days -- 18 for rookies -- before they had their only day off of camp.

"This is still training camp, and we know it's hard work," right guard Artis Hicks. "But you still love to see a bone, a nice bone hanging out there for you once in a while. I think last year, a lot of guys were waiting to see, 'Are we going to get a night off?' It seemed like that night would never come. Now you can look forward to those things because you know they're happening now."

If nothing else, players seem less apprehensive after experiencing the toughest camp Childress could produce last summer.

"That definitely will help us," cornerback Cedric Griffin said. "We know him better as a coach and the kind of practices he runs, and he knows us better as players. So that will help us come together a lot quicker down here."

Said Hicks: "In some ways, this makes it easier. We've got a year under our belt now. We know what it's like. You can go to training camp a little more confident. You know what's going on and what's ahead of you, as opposed to coming in blind a little bit like last year."

Still, Childress has stopped short of planning an island vacation for his players. The Tiki torches are not up just yet, and no luau is scheduled. Childress made his point Wednesday, in case you were wondering: He walked into Gage Hall drenched in sweat after jogging in the middle of a 90-degree afternoon.

"Got to keep my girlish figure," Childress said with a laugh.

Along with midafternoon runs, however, Childress has no plans to pull back on daily tackling drills that led to some grumbling last summer. While players are instructed not to bring their teammates to the ground, often the collisions are violent enough to knock them down.

Typically, the intensity peaks during 9-on-7 drills, which mostly include running plays and leave out receivers and defensive backs.

"There really is no way around that," Childress said. "That has to happen every day. ... Somewhere, you have to play the game. If you're not tackling people to the ground, all of a sudden you sit back and realize, 'We're not a very good tackling team.' Well, you're not going to be if you're not practicing it.

"Will we have the same number of those [drills]? That remains to be seen."

One conclusion players can rest assured of: It can't be any tougher than last year.

Kevin Seifert • kseifert@startribune.com