ou’re in good hands with Matt Mangum. At least, your workout program is.

In his second full year as NIU’s strength and conditioning coach, Mangum designs, implements and oversees workout programs for all of NIU’s nearly 350 athletes.

“The most important thing is that these athletes stay healthy,” Mangum said. “If you don’t lift weights and stay in shape, you’re going to hurt yourself.”

To make sure that doesn’t happen, Mangum and his two assistants, Bryan Miller and Ryan Zeman, individualize each workout program to adapt to an athlete’s specific strengths and weaknesses.

What sport an athlete participates in plays a role in how his program is designed.

“I look at the sport itself and what that sport requires,” Mangum said. “Explosive strength, muscular strength and muscular endurance or maybe all three.”

During the school year, Mangum and his assistants are in the gym by 6:15 a.m. and regularly put in 12-hour days.

When asked what motivates him to coach athletes day in and day out, he was quick with an answer.

“The athletes,” Mangum said. “The way the athletes respond to me and my staff. There really is a short-term fuel behind my fire, knowing that athletes want to come in and work out so bad that sometimes they’re going against doctor’s orders.”

Mangum is well qualified to be deciding how athletes should exercise.

While at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, the Detroit native worked under Mark Philippi, a regular partaker in the World’s Strongest Man competition.

A picture of himself and Philippi on Mangum’s desk is proof of the effect Philippi has had.

“That’s really where I learned a lot of the stuff that I’ve put into practice out here,” Mangum said of UNLV. “Anyone can write a program based on the core lifts and the generic lifts. But knowing how to address specific sports demands and knowing how to make the workouts fun and challenging is the tough part.”

On the same weekend the NIU football won its season opener, Mangum took second place at the U.S. Powerlifting Federation National Bench Press Championships. He managed to bench 490.5 pounds, his career high.

This accomplishment was another step in Mangum’s quest to hold up his end of the bargain.

“We like to practice what we preach and stay in shape,” Mangum said. “If I’m going to yell at a guy and expect him to squat 500 pounds, I’m going to be more influential if he knows I’ve done it before.”

Something Mangum doesn’t do is encourage use of controversial supplements such as creatine.

For Mangum, a healthy diet is just as important as a strong workout regimen.

“Few people know what it feels like to give 100 percent in the weight room,” Mangum said. “Even fewer people put the proper time and effort into their meal plan. The athletes should be having three-to-four meals a day plus a meal-replacement shake here and there to increase the calories.”

From his perch above the weight room at Huskie Stadium, Mangum sees all. Sometimes that can be a bad thing for athletes who may not be putting the proper effort in.

“If we don’t see the athletes working out with the intensity we want, we want to get on their case before it’s too late,” Mangum said. “Then they get some extra special attention. They get a few ‘reminders’ so they can get everything done correctly.”

Physically overseeing workouts isn’t the only way Mangum has of catching someone slacking off. He has another trick up his sleeve.

“If I pull out an athlete’s workout log book, and I see she’s not writing workout notes, doesn’t cross out numbers or write other things down, I know she’s not doing her job,” Mangum said.

The NIU football team didn’t need many reminders over the summer as Mangum said it had the best summer of conditioning he’s been a part of.

Senior offensive tackle Tim Vincent, who said Mangum is the best of three strength coaches he’s had here, agreed with that assessment.

“We ran bleachers and we did everything, and everybody is in real good shape now,” Vincent said. “It works real well for the season because by the end of games, we can tell that the other teams are wearing down. We’re able to push through it because we’re that much more in shape than they are.”

Part of making sure that advantage happens is ensuring athletes don’t lose the day-to-day motivation needed to be elite players.

For 157-pound All-American wrestler Scott Owen, he just has to put the negative thoughts aside when he has a lazy day.

“Everyone has those days,” Owen said. “I’m no exception. But I just work as much as I can to make myself better in any way I can.”

Mangum and his crew try to keep the lazy days to a minimum by making the weight room atmosphere a positive one.

The 5-foot-9, 205-pound Mangum also wanted to dispel an urban legend.

“The real-world stereotype is that people don’t enjoy working out and this is made to be a drill instructor atmosphere and people don’t look forward to it,” Mangum said. The thing is, we keep them so focused on trying to achieve goals. Plus, we’re on the floor supporting and coaching them as opposed to yelling at them and trying to get on their case all the time.

“Positive reinforcement goes a lot further than negative reinforcement, especially with this generation. You scold a kid, he shuts down.”

With the football season now in full swing and basketball time coming in a matter of weeks, it would be understandable if Mangum backed off a bit with the players from those sports.

But Mangum isn’t from that school.

“I don’t believe in maintenance,” Mangum said. “I think that’s an excuse a lot of strength coaches use in order to explain why sometimes their athletes aren’t getting any stronger. It’s like, ‘Well coach, we’re in maintenance phase right now.’”

From what Mangum says, NIU athletes have no problem subscribing to Mangum’s theories.

“We have a very, very self-motivated group of guys,” Mangum said. “They see so many of their teammates getting better, they’re getting mad because they may not be. They’ll start to correct the problem before it even comes to us.”