This Hellish 5-Minute Workout Will Get You Ready for the NFL Combine

3 min readWANT TO KNOW what it takes to be a future first-round NFL pick? Besides having size, athleticism, and of course football skills, being conditioned to last through this 5 Minutes of Hell workout will give you an idea of what goes into being prepped for peak performance on the football field.Travelle Gaines put Men’s Health fitness editor Brett Williams through a condensed set of drills that he typically uses to prep some of these future football superstars to be combine ready at Max Impact Training in White Plains, New York. The founder of training company Athletic Gaines has helped 54 first-round picks get ready for the NFL combine, including Myles Garrett, Kayvon Thibodeaux, and Marshawn Lynch.According to Gaines, these aren’t just random moves, but instead carefully selected exercises that provide gameday benefits—from sustaining that extra burst of cardio until the whistle blows late in the game to being able to hold on to the football (not to mention looking jacked in an NFL uniform).“You have to have some great cardio to last a long period of time to see those quick-burst, boom, boom plays,” Gaines says. “So the cardiovascular component is very important to what we're doing.”This "Metabolic Fridays" session is a staple of Gaines' programming. For his NFL prospects, the goal is to make it through three rounds of these seven moves by the end of the program. Williams was given five minutes to knock out as many as he could.The NFL Combine Prep 5 Minutes of Hell WorkoutAssault Bike 30 seconds all-out This is going to provide you with plenty of cardiovascular work in a short period—which Gaines says is important for any high-level football prospect.Medicine Ball Slams10 repsPicking up, reaching high, then violently slamming a med ball works on your triple extension—the idea is to strengthening the hips, knees and ankles all at once while building explosive power, a football necessitySled Push (High Handle) Pushing the sled is going to hit your north-south football driving technique and add a bit more cardio as well.Medicine Ball Slams 10 repsSled Push (low handle)You've heard the saying "low man wins," right? Work on your pad level by pushing from the other side of the sled and the lower handle, which forces you to drive from a different position.Keiser Biceps Curl 30 seconds This unlikely Combine prep exercise is essential for developing grip and forearm strength, which will come in handy for any player trying to shed blockers or hold onto the football as defenders try to strip it from your grasp. The results: After going through two rounds, Williams is gassed. That's fine—this drill was for conditioning. The goal for all of Gaines’ athletes is to work toward three rounds, but that's after they've gone through his entire training program.“What we'd like to do in our summer program is work the guys up to three rounds,” Gaines says. “They'll start off with the first couple weeks doing one round, the next few weeks doing two rounds and before they leave to go to training camp, we have them doing three rounds. It gets pretty intense.”Jeff Tomko is a freelance fitness writer who has written for Muscle and Fitness, Men's Fitness, and Men's Health.