<http://schema.org/articleBody>
" Every 15 minutes or so a new name is called. Every time a shiny new NFL draft pick walks across the stage to meet the\u00A0commissioner, it marks the culmination of that player&amp;#039;s lifelong dream. But\u00A0before that grip-and-grin moment for the cameras, in the months of torturous waiting leading up to the draft, these athletes have undertaken high-tech training, testing, and body perfecting of a kind that wasn&amp;#039;t even possible a few years ago, and all to earn a moment on the stage just a bit sooner than the next guy. NFL teams don&amp;#039;t just watch film of old games to decide which college players to draft. They poke. They prod. They subject the potential draftees to pre-draft workouts and psychological examinations; 40-yard dashes and tests of mental prowess. Because all these metrics have monetary ramifications, sending players rising or falling in the annual seven-round extravaganza, maximizing every ounce of muscle, every pound of power, and every split second of speed matters. That&amp;#039;s why, long before the April NFL Draft and the February meat market of the NFL Combine, agents pay the up-front thousands of dollars to send prospective NFL players to a data-driven biometrics-tracking quasi-boot camp. They send them to a place like EXOS.    With its headquarters in Phoenix and major training centers in Florida, California, and Texas, EXOS hosts about 140 would-be NFL athletes every year. From the moment an athlete walks on campus\u2014a 30,000-square-foot indoor center that includes ice baths, a recovery pool, physical therapy rooms, a nutrition center, in-house chef for all meals, film rooms, study rooms, artificial turf field, track and more\u2014their typical six-week stay is totally scripted. It starts with &amp;quot;performance quotient reports&amp;quot; on each player. The report includes questions around training and nutrition and includes measurements with respect to specific movements\u2014often using force plates and motion-capture systems to get pinpoint speed and power data and video to dissect form\u2014valuable in combine-measured drills, such as vertical jumps measured in multiple ways, 40-yard dash times and weightlifting measurements. Craig Friedman, vice president of the EXOS performance innovation team, says the company then uses a proprietary algorithm to make a unique performance signature for every player.    Questions about what motivates a player to workout and perform, how they feel during workouts and their history with nutrition and training help give a subjective view of a players&amp;#039; ability to handle intense training. Add in objective movement measurements, heart rate variability, field tests, and nutrition and recovery habits, and Friedman says he can map out a figure that gives EXOS coaches targets for specific improvements\u2014key areas where a player can improve. &amp;quot;We can paint a reasonable picture for the athlete and the agent,&amp;quot; he says, &amp;quot;and give them a target of expectations.&amp;quot; In a new twist this year, EXOS has taken the nutrition component to a tech-focused realm, offering athletes the opportunity for a blood draw at the start of the program so that nutritionists and dietitians personalize and customize plans. Laura Kunces, EXOS&amp;#039; director of research, tells Popular Mechanics the blood markers track vitamin and mineral deficiencies and inflammation and hormonal markers. &amp;quot;What small dietary things can we do to make a large impact on a performance outcome?&amp;quot; Kunces asks. &amp;quot;What health markers improve bone density and make them a stronger, better?&amp;quot; EXOS, in tandem with Thorne Research and WellnessFX plan to review data from this year to check on correlations between performance and diet. &amp;quot;For a lot of athletes, this might be the first time they have ever gotten their blood drawn,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;Most have no clue what any of this stuff is.&amp;quot; The real-time data can then define which foods athletes should eat based on ingredients, and help the recovery experts decide what nutrients are needed in post-workout shakes, for example. EXOS also maps athletes&amp;#039; body cell composition to understand deficiencies, such as if a player needs more fatty acids, Omega 3s, or other supplements.    &amp;quot;The diagnostics have caught up to a point where you can start to be empowered with your own data versus having to wait for it to be translated by a medical provider,&amp;quot; Amanda Carlson-Phillips, EXOS vice president of nutrition and research, tells Popular Mechanics. &amp;quot;As we start to understand nutrients, let&amp;#039;s look at markers as things that might translate to better performance later.&amp;quot; Each athlete&amp;#039;s personalized nutrition needs then inform the creation of a dynamic meal plan, often one much healthier than they experienced in college. Carlson-Phillips says an athlete might need a carbohydrate in a certain phase, an anti-inflammatory food in a stressful time or adaptions to proteins, amino acids and more during recoveries. &amp;quot;It all melds into individual recommendations they see in the training floor, fueling station, in the food they are eating and in the way we are concocting hydration beverages,&amp;quot; she says. &amp;quot;It is feeding into a unique athlete experience.&amp;quot; And it changes with them, based on training and performance data.    Darian Thompson, a Boise State University safety projected as a possible late first-round pick, says this crazy data-driven process has been far different than what he experienced while at school, and much more interesting than he imagined. &amp;quot;I thought I would just come in and get faster and stronger,&amp;quot; he tells Popular Mechanics. &amp;quot;I didn&amp;#039;t really realize how many steps there are and how important each and every aspect of the training is.&amp;quot; With that final handshake the goal, high-tech training helps get every possible ounce of performance from these athletes. Those ounces add up when it comes to draft day.  Follow Tim Newcomb on Twitter at @tdnewcomb. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/adventure/sports/a20473/exos-nfl-draft/>