Rhabdo follows Iowa to Indianapolis

Every Iowa player heard the question.

Media mob heard "Iowa" and immediately thought "rhabdomyolysis" or the hospitalization of 13 players. The question came haltingly, but that's understandable. If you don't live in the 319 area code, you might not even know what rhabdo is.

In late January, Iowa had 13 players admitted to the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics after winter workouts that included timed squats and a series of sled pushes. All 13 players have been released. They are expected to recover for spring practice, which begins March 21.

Media heard "Iowa" at the NFL combine Thursday at Lucas Oil Stadium, but also heard "rhabdo." That's the way it's going to be in these settings for a while.

Iowa punter Ryan Donahue was asked if he had a grasp of what exactly happened.

"It's just weird that it happened to 13 guys," he said. "I don't think anyone can really figure out. It's something we've done in the past and we've gotten through it. It had to be some kind of freak thing."

Donahue said he visited players on the following Tuesday after they were admitted.

Head coach Kirk Ferentz took quite a bit of heat for his absence on the Wednesday during the outbreak. Strength and conditioning coach Chris Doyle also was in that conversation.

"I think that was evidenced when all the past players came out and said, coach Doyle is the best in the business, we wouldn't be where we are without coach Doyle and the strength and conditioning program, so we back him 100 percent," Donahue said. "Coach Ferentz has so much on his plate. I'm not sure what his take on any of it was, but he reasons for everything."

As he has every year at Iowa, Doyle prepared Hawkeyes who have a shot at the NFL in Iowa City.

Along with Donahue, quarterback Ricky Stanzi, defensive linemen Christian Ballard and Karl Klug, offensive lineman Julian Vandervelde, tight end Allen Reisner, fullback Brett Morse and linebacker Jeff Tarpinian worked with Doyle in the last month and a half or so.

"He's been great," Donahue said when asked about Doyle. "He's handled it all really well. He's a strong-minded man. He knows we've done this in the past without any other incidents. It's a hard, strenuous workout, but there have been hundreds of guys to go through it."

During a news conference that addressed rhabdo, Ferentz outlined a workout in which players did a number of squats with their equivalent body weight in June 2007.

"It's hard, but it's like a marathon, you have to do it," Iowa tight end Allen Reisner said. "It can't be easy. If it were easy, we'd have a lot more than 110 players."

Vandervelde remembered that particular workout well.

His body weight was 300, so that's what was on the bar. You squatted your body weight until you failed. He got to about 20 or 25 and thought he was done, but his teammates encouraged him to keep going. Vandervelde remembered then-quarterback Jake Christensen specifically.

Vandervelde said he reached 44 or 45 just on the encouragement. He doesn't think the workout should be eliminated. He called it a "galvanizing experience."

"I remember it being a brutal experience. It was something that me and my classmates from that year still kind of talk about," Vandervelde said. "We kind of warn younger guys, hey, just so that you guys are aware, this is coming. And a lot of them don't believe us.

"But when it comes on you, the most important thing about it is it has a tendency to reveal where guys are in their commitment level."

"We'll find out who wants to be here" was one of the quotes that made headlines during this. According to an ESPN.com report, a member of Iowa's strength and conditioning staff said that before the workout. Later, Ferentz said he stood behind that statement.

"I think that it can reveal the heart of someone and I think it can galvanize a team together, that entire workout," said Vandervelde, who wouldn't go into detail on the workout citing it as a "Hawkeye secret."

The games are a part of the journey. Preparing their bodies for those games is probably a bigger part of a players' journey.

"The offseason workouts are the hardest," Reisner said. "The harder you work outside the games, the easier the games are. If you run the 100 meters in track, you're going to work a lot harder than those 100 meters."