Touring the new Champions Training Complex

In a room that's nearly 14,000 square feet and that's filled with dozens of high tech machines, the first thing that catches your attention in Florida State's brand new weight training facility is the floor.

Of course, it's not every day you walk across a $100,000 floor.

"It's very interesting that there are a number of people that have come through here and a lot of them don't know anything about strength training or lifting weights or improving athletic performance," FSU strength and conditioning coach Jon Jost said, "but the very first thing everybody notices is the floor."

Soft to the touch but strong enough to hold more than 20,000 pounds of free weights, the floor is but one example of how the FSU athletic department spared no expense in revamping the Roger Holler Champions Training Complex.

Jost said the flooring -- called Infinity anti-bacterial flooring -- was one of the nicer finishing touches put into the facility, which is located underneath the north end zone adjacent to the Moore Athletic Complex.

Included in the new facility is an 8x8 foot video board, a "concert quality" sound system and a Body Composition Area where athletes can check their body fat and lean muscle mass.

Jost gave a tour of the new facility to a handful of reporters on Wednesday and he spent nearly an hour in full "recruiting mode."

Upon entry to the facility, visitors are first greeted by poster-sized pictures of Leon Washington (Most Improved Athlete), Ray Willis (winner of the Seminole Warrior Award) and Jerome Carter (another Seminole Warrior winner).

Coming soon will be another full-sized picture, this one of FSU coach Bobby Bowden.

From there, visitors enter the nutrition area, which is fully stocked with Powerade and MetRx nutrition products.

A few steps later and you are in the Body Composition Area or the "bod-pod," which Jost said is a rarity on college campuses.

"It's about a $39,000 piece of equipment," Jost said. "It's a great tool for us to have. One of the things we tell a lot of recruits is that most of the NFL teams have a bod-pod but very few colleges have one. It's a great tool for us to make sure that when an athlete is gaining weight, they are gaining the type of weight we want them to gain or need them to gain."

Jost and nearly his entire staff of strength and conditioning coaches (and student assistants) have office space just outside the "bod-pod" area. (Strength coaches for the men's and women's basketball teams have their offices set up in the basketball training facility.)

The "bod-pod" area opens up into the main weight room -- which sits in front of a "control center." The control center, accessed by a short set of stairs, overlooks the entire room and Jost and his staff can supervise every piece of equipment from the top.

Of course, it is difficult for one person to supervise every piece of workout equipment. There are simply too many work stations for one person to oversee.

The facility features 24 self-contained powerlift work stations and each individual station has at least 500 pounds of free weights. Most of the individual weight plates feature the "Florida State Seminoles" lettering and were custom made by a company in Japan.

The work stations also sit on customized parquet flooring, which feature the Seminole head logo.

Most impressive, though, is that each powerlift station has a small computer that hooks up to the bar and measures the "horsepower" generated by each lifter. By computing the power of each lift -- "weight times distance divided by time (or speed," Jost said -- athletes now have a new measuring stick for performance.

He used an example of how two lifters could be squatting the same amount of weight for the same number of reps, but that one could be generating 900 "horsepower" and another 1,100 "horsepower."

"Our athletes are so competitive that any way that you give them instant feedback on their lift they are going to try harder and put forth a greater effort on the next rep," Jost said.

And to further illustrate his point of "horsepower," Jost can simply point to an 8-by-8 foot video board that is centered on the front wall of the facility. On the screen, Jost showed a video clip used to document how his workout program translates to on-field success.

In the video presentation was a clip of FSU running back Greg Jones performing squats and cleans -- "generating power" -- and then another clip of Jones turning North Carolina tailback Dexter Reid into "Mr. Potato Head."

"As you know, that shows power," Jost said with a sly grin.

The video presentation Jost showed on Wednesday is the same one shown to visiting recruits.

In it, several FSU players in addition to Jones are shown doing specific training exercises and then shown putting that training into work.

Craphonso Thorpe is shown working on his speed and acceleration, followed by clips of him winning the 100-meter dash at the ACC Championships and then catching long touchdown passes against Colorado and Virginia.

Lorenzo Booker is shown in a change of direction drill and that is followed by a clip of his touchdown run against North Carolina.

B.J. Ward is shown working on his vertical jump -- on one of four special "Vertimax" training platforms -- and that is followed by clips of him blocking field goals against Notre Dame and Duke.

Leroy Smith is shown working on his explosiveness and that is followed by a clip of him scoring on an interception return against Notre Dame.

The video board is also used to give "instant replays" to athletes to help them perfect their training techniques. And it is also used for motivational purposes.

"Each day when the athletes come in they will have an inspirational quote of the day," Jost said. "That's followed by the play of the week, or the lift of the week -- depending if we are in season or off season -- and the nutrition tip of the day, along with what is being served on the training table that day. Then there is some inspirational and motivational things, what the schedule of the day is and stuff like that."

If watching the video board isn't enough for motivation, athletes have a $60,000 state-of-the-art sound system to get them going. Athletes can bring in their own music and it joins the master playlist in a rotating basis.

That music can be heard at every work station, including the dozen or so Olympic lifting platforms, the power shuttles and tred sleds and stationary bikes and step machines. All total, Jost said the complex features more than 50 machines "for specific training of any and every body part" and a huge collection of customized dumb bells, raning from five pounds each to 150 pounds each.

A stairway leads visitors to the second phase of the complex where the old "rubber room" on the second floor of the Moore Athletic Center has been transformed into the "turf room."

With 6,000 square feet of synthetic grass turf, the room is now the starting point for every workout. The "turf room" sits almost directly on top of the locker room and has meeting rooms and film rooms along the walls.

Post-game interviews have been held in the turf room all fall, with a temporary podium (and Seminoles.com backdrop) set up to hold Bowden's press conferences.

Jost said the multi-purpose room is a huge boost for his staff.

"That's where we start every workout," he said. "In football, we exit the locker room, go up to the turf room and we will do our warm-up, and flexibility routine. Depending on the day, we may do some speed work, some change of direction work. This week we did some conditioning up there.

"Every time an athlete comes to do a workout it will consist of something in the turf room, and something down here (weight room). That has been a huge addition to this room. I really believe has helped separate this facility from most other facilities."

The 6,000 square feet gives Jost nearly 20,000 square feet of training space. For comparison's sake, FSU's old weight room was 7,000 square feet.

And like the brand new Don Fauls Training Room, this weight/training complex certainly puts FSU's athletic facilities among the nation's finest.

While the facility is not quite completed, the final touches are being added almost daily.

Jost said he is using a common theme in the room -- "FSU: Where the elite become champions."

That slogan is used throughout the complex (and even on the video board). More decorations are coming soon, including banners celebrating FSU's two national championships and each of the bowls the Seminoles have competed in under Bowden.

"This is something that we are very proud of and we do believe it will be a facility we will be proud of for the next 10 to 15 years," Jost said.