With the COVID-19 pandemic currently halting sports around the globe, North Carolina strength and conditioning coach Brian Hess had to improvise.

The university is closed, meaning all 100-plus players on the football team are scattered across the country. And, with the season just five months away and the team supposed to be in the middle of spring practice, stopping workouts and waiting for things to return to normal was simply not an option.

The show must go on, and that’s where Hess comes in.

The former Army strength and conditioning coach joined Mack Brown’s staff in January of 2019, having previously worked with current UNC defensive coordinator Jay Bateman at West Point for four seasons. Prior to that stop, Hess spent time at Sam Houston State, Delaware, Harvard, Georgetown and Iowa.

Besides contacting some of his former coaches and colleagues to discuss workout ideas they’re currently using, it was his two years at Harvard that gave Hess the creative ideas he’s implementing now to provide his players with workouts they can do from their living rooms.

“One of my first stops was Harvard and I was the low man on the totem pole, so I had a lot of the unique teams,” Hess said. “And with that, a lot of those athletes would do some unique internships in some remote areas being at Harvard.”

Hess was the assistant strength and conditioning coach for the Crimson from 2009 to 2011. It was his first full-time position and he was involved with 11 teams, ranging from football to water polo to Nordic skiing.

It was developing exercise programs for such a wide range of sports and uniquely different athletes that forced Hess to make more improvised workouts that he’s using again right now.

“Our take home programs over the summer were always, you had to include a body weight section of it, or a makeshift workout,” Hess said. “So, I had that background and immediately just went to some of the things that I had done there and I picked goals that I wanted to achieve during this time at home and then worked around that as far as exercise selection.”

Hess and the Tar Heels have been using Zoom, a live video chat platform that allows you to communicate with up to 100 people at the same time. Still, a lot of his players don’t have access to weights, which has made Hess revert back to some of the summer workouts he used to provide his student-athletes with while at Harvard.

Instead of using weights and other equipment, these exercises are strictly bodyweight workouts that use a person’s own weight to provide resistance against gravity. Push-ups, lunges and planks are just a few basic examples of these.

Hess has added some of his own personal touches to these workouts as well, including using backpacks full of items anyone could find laying around their own home.

“At first, we knew there would be guys who had no weight-room access, so we immediately wrote a program up and ran with kind of the idea to use things they have,” Hess said. “We know everyone has a backpack. We know everyone has access to heavy books, water bottles, things like that to put in the backpack. So, we immediately wrote that program.”

Having to implement these workouts via the internet might sound challenging, but Hess’ previous experience and understanding of what equipment his players have or don’t have at their own disposal made it quite simple.

“I knew the situation they would be in and what they had access to, so it wasn't too hard as far as shaping that,” Hess said. “The template that they're looking at at home is the same template they have here for individualized cards. And we just rolled out a program that my staff and I thought would fit the needs of the goal.”

Unprecedented times call for unprecedented action and Hess’ previous work experience in Cambridge, MA. has made the transition from in-person to virtual workouts that much easier for the UNC football program.