SALT LAKE CITY — Doug Elisaia lets loose a laugh. It’s both guttural and genuine.

What does a normal day look like for Utah football’s longtime director of strength and conditioning? He’s been asked the question over and over these last three months since his world of structuring specific workouts for student-athletes in Utah’s football facility morphed into trying to piece together something applicable to every Utah football player, dispersed across not only this country but the world, too. Reality check: nothing is normal about it.

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A typical Doug Elisaia day this spring looks like yours and just about everyone else’s.

“Zoom calls, all day long, it seems like,” he said. “That, and sending documents and just keeping our ear to the ground as far as what the NCAA is thinking. It seems it’s changing day to day and week to week. We’re just trying to prep for the next date when we assume things could go back to normal, but right now, you just don’t know.”

When COVID-19 exploded across the country in March after three of Utah’s scheduled spring practices, Elisaia and his staff had a serious undertaking ahead. Not only were they checking in on the well-being of their student-athletes everywhere, but they were tasked with figuring out which student-athletes did or didn’t have access to weights or workout equipment when students were sent home.

“From that point, we met as a staff over Zoom and planned our course of attack as far as how to keep our guys in physical shape,” he said. “That started with workouts and with everybody in different spots, we just spent about a week calling everybody, figuring out what their situation was, how they were doing and just understanding what their layout was and what they were working out with. That’s kind of how we started our attack as far as writing programs for our guys.”

Beloved and respected within the Utah athletics department, Elisaia is used to pushing student-athletes to their limits. Inside the Alex Smith Strength & Conditioning Center within Utah’s football facility is where music usually blares and playlists are exchanged before student-athletes lay down for a bench press or prepare for squatting hundreds of pounds. Right now there is no grunting, no clanging of metal on metal, no high-fives or the thumping of the sound system. Just silence.

The hometown pool of players in Utah’s football program stretches across the globe’s largest oceans, from Australia to England, from Hawaii to Louisiana. No player’s circumstance is the same. Socioeconomic factors come into play and Elisaia’s team understands that. Some players have a gym at their disposal. Others don’t have a set of weights to maintain muscle.

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“It’s just either you have weights or you don’t,” he said. “Those are the two options. When we sent out the workouts, one’s a weighted workout and one’s a body workout. We kind of went from week-to-week programming, just because we didn’t know what would change. We also went through and sent our guys some equipment. We had to collect addresses, see where they’re at and go from there. We sent them some workout bands to some guys who didn’t have access to weights and to do some programming based off of that.”

Utah’s strength and conditioning group also spent much of the last couple of months researching force plates. That helped them better understand how to tailor workouts for those student-athletes stuck at home during the pandemic. Force plates can measure and examine the kinetics of an athlete’s movement. This work helped Elisaia and his team see where the most force was in different techniques they mapped out for the players. They ended up designing workouts based on those varying techniques that they would use while doing body weight workouts in order to stay as explosive as possible.

The workouts sent to Utah football players last anywhere from 60 to 70 minutes each day. The month of May is normally a discretionary month in the NCAA calendar, meaning student-athletes are allowed in the facility and allowed to use the equipment at their leisure, but there’s no coaching going on. On the field or in the weight room. Elisaia said these last three months have just felt like one very long typical May month. But much more difficult, obviously.

“We’re just so limited as far as what we can do,” Elisaia said. “We’re not allowed to coach them up on the phone. We’re not allowed to really talk about workouts. We sent them, in general, the workouts and an explanation of what they do. If they call us with questions, we can kind of explain it to them, but really, all we can do is just call and see how they’re doing since it’s all online.”

Per NCAA rules, Elisaia can’t even discuss publicly what his student-athletes are doing to get creative in their at-home workouts around the world. He sees some of their social media posts, but that’s the extent of his public acknowledgement. Before building a customized press and squat rack back home in South Carolina, transfer quarterback Jake Bentley was lifting cinder blocks. What looms for not just Utah’s strength and conditioning staff, but strength and conditioning staffs nationwide in college football, is what kind of shape players return in when campuses re-open.

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The Pac-12 Conference announced this week that at the annual spring meeting of school presidents and chancellors a return-to-play guideline was being worked on. The suspension of team activities by the NCAA is scheduled through May 31. And June 1 had long been the target date for a slow rollout for student-athletes’ return to on-campus facilities. On Wednesday, the NCAA Division I Council voted to approve voluntary athletic activities. Presidents of the Pac-12 universities are scheduled to decide next week whether or not they’ll allow the June 1 return for each of their respective athletic departments. So, it’s a start. But preparing nearly 100 young adults for the rigors of a football season is already a task from a strength and conditioning perspective. Take away the use of gymnasiums and equipment and that ask becomes even more pressing.

“It all depends on what type of shape your guys come in,” Elisaia said. “We can’t assume our guys are in shape. You’ve got to assume and we’ve got to take responsibility as strength professionals to make sure that we work our guys back into the proper shape they need to be in. I know a lot of people are saying back in the old-school days there were no summer workouts and we came back and got ready in two-and-a-half weeks and then had a season. That’s good and great, but in those days your guys still had access to weights and they were working out and had access to facilities. Our guys, right now, no one has access to the facilities and they can’t work out. It’s not the same.”

In various interviews during the last week, Utah athletic director Mark Harlan said the ideal timeline for preparing for an on-time start to the 2020 football season is a six-to-eight week run-up to the season opener. That’s been agreed upon by head coaches in the conference. In an interview with 1280 The Zone on Wednesday, Harlan said that the ideal timeline is now in the hands of the NCAA football oversight committee as well as medical professionals who are being consulted.

During a webinar hosted by former Utah. Gov. Mike Leavitt last Friday, Harlan said Utah is planning, at the moment, for all of its fall sports to start on time.

“The first step in all of that, of course, is getting our student-athletes back on campus,” Harlan explained. “Not only at the University of Utah, but elsewhere, and really trying to figure out how many weeks does a young man need to be prepared to come back for a football game? The national standard right now is settling in around six weeks. You look at that first week in September and you go back six weeks, that’s really the timeline.”

While on the Jim Rome Show this week, Utah coach Kyle Whittingham said the six-week lead-in to an on-time start is adequate. He also acknowledged the possibility of how some states might be left behind in the run-up to the start of college football depending on their handling of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“There’s two things you’re looking at there: number one is when are these states and universities going to open up and bring back your guys just to start training in the weight room with the strength and conditioning aspect of it,” Whittingham said, “and second part is, when are you going to able to start with your fall camp. I think you may see some different start times just with the strength and conditioning based on what state you live in. I think there’s going to be a uniform start as far as when you can start your actual fall camp.”

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Every corner of a college football program will be affected by the changes COVID-19 will demand of this potential 2020 season. For Elisaia, it’s not just about putting on weight or making sure his players are at peak physical shape. That’s a huge component, sure, but it’s about understanding and adapting to the change that’s forthcoming.

“It’s not just about a return to play, but a return to campus,” he said, “and what that’s going to look like and make sure we do things right. And not just to rush into things and put the safety of the athletes ahead before they even get into the weight room or even into our facility. And how we’re going to handle that situation.”

For example: if and when the Utes are allowed to return, what does that look like? Odds are, early, you won’t be able to have a spotter on the bench press. Elisaia and his staff are already scripting workouts for players where they won’t need any assistance to ensure social distancing measures and the avoiding of close contact. At least early on.

“But when we do get back, it’s not going to be the normal coming off of May,” he added. “ It’s going to be some body weight stuff to see where guys are at and get a different sort of evaluation to see where we’re at in terms of a starting point. This is nothing we’ve gone through before. We’ll probably go through a week before we even put a weight on the bar, just to see what type of shape they’re in.”

Some strength coaches are known to yell. Not Elisaia. He only raises the decibel levels of his voice when he deems it absolutely necessary. That’s why when you ask players what it’s like to hear him yell, it’s intimidating at times. He knows his athletes are dealing with an unprecedented time, so when June 1 rolls around, football programs can finally begin their soft return to campus life. Elisaia said he and his staff will be ready to help them press on.

“I wouldn’t say it’s stressful,” he said. “It’s just something we’ll get through. Just some adversity we’ve got to get through and that’s what we’re telling our players. Just be ready to go when it’s time to go and when we do get back, it’s not one of those deals where you’re trying to get guys rushed back to the field. We’ve got to do it right. We’ve got to start slow and work to get fast. From easy to hard again, it’s not just hitting the ground running.”

(Photo of Doug Elisaia (right) and Kyle Whittingham: Chris Gardner / Getty Images)