The Final Call (7 page)

In preparation for my final season I started training earlier than I ever had before. When I was younger, I could ramp it up with two-a-day workouts after enjoying the off-season to the fullest. With age and injuries, I had to avoid letting my baseline fitness level get too far off track. Had I not been dedicated to a healthy lifestyle and pushed myself to maintain a high level of fitness, there would have been no way I could have worked at this level just short of my 58th birthday.

How does a 57-year-old man prepare his minuscule, well-used, sometimes abused body to enter into an arena filled with youthful, athletic gladiators whose chiselled physiques look like granite statues?

Well, if you want to walk in someone else’s shoes, you’d better shop at the same shoe store as they do. Not only did I find that shoe store just 20 miles from my home, but more important, I connected with the master shoemaker himself. Jimmy McCrossin has been the Philadelphia Flyers’ athletic therapist and strength and conditioning coach for the past 15 years. He and I are about the same height, about the same age (he’s only 52, but anything over 50 puts us all in the same category), and, like me, has a pretty serious knee problem. That’s about where the comparison ends. Jim leads by example as he competes hard in all of the components of the conditioning programs he designs for his athletes. They are challenged to keep up with him as he continually raises the bar.

My first extended interaction with Jim occurred after I herniated two discs in my back in 1995. The outstanding care I received from him and the specialists he put me in touch with allowed me to return to action in time for the playoffs. Jim McCrossin has always extended his time, talent, and rehabilitation facility to get me back on the ice through numerous injuries including knee surgeries in two successive off-seasons (2006 and 2007), a shattered big toe I suffered two days prior to training camp in 2006, and a partial thickness tear in my left shoulder that resulted from a blindside hit from behind I took in a game in Los Angeles in March of 2009.

(I shattered the toe when I fell down the stairs carrying Jaime’s television on her return home from a summer job, before she entered Rutgers Law School. I missed the second step, and as I flew down the stairs, I cradled the TV in outstretched arms in a pose reminiscent of a football wide receiver. I jammed my right foot down—as if looking for the sidelines—and the joint in my big
toe exploded. I am happy to report the television escaped injury.)

On the third Friday of June 2009, I outlined my personal objectives for injury rehab and ongoing maintenance: stabilizing my core, increasing my lean-muscle mass and adding strength, increasing my cardio capacity, and getting my body fat level below 10 per cent. Short of bronzing me and putting me beside the statue of Rocky at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, I knew it was a tall order to fill, even for someone of Jim’s ability. But he simply said, “We can do that. Just follow the same program I have set out five days a week for my players. When do you want to start?” I loved his confidence. The following Monday, I went to work. I embarked on the routine Jim had designed for the players, along with some specific exercises he’d added for knee and shoulder maintenance. Four hours each day, five days a week, and boy, did it pay dividends.

On Saturday mornings, I would ride with my son-in-law Harry Dumas III and the Pro Pedals Bike Club based out of Hammonton, New Jersey. We rode 50 miles at an average speed of between 21 and 23 miles per hour just before breakfast. I took the Sundays off and dedicated them to Kathy and the family.

I’ve developed a love for road biking over the past few years. I ride in charity events such as a 95-mile ride for ALS and the 50-mile ride from Philadelphia to the Jersey Shore, which is a cancer fundraiser. Some days, when Jimmy Mac had an upper-body workout scheduled for me, I would ride my hybrid bike the 20 miles to the Flyers Skate Zone, complete my workout, and ride the 20 miles back.

I got hooked on road biking by accident. Just two days prior to a scheduled knee surgery in June 2006 (to be performed by outstanding orthopaedic surgeon Dr. Peter DeLuca of the Rothman Institute, who works for the Philadelphia Flyers, NBA 76ers and the NFL Eagles), Harry and his father, Harry II, convinced me to participate in the 50-mile ride for cancer. While I hadn’t trained for the event, I thought, how hard can it be? The guys took it easy
on me and we only averaged 16 to 18 miles per hour. It was so much fun. I was immediately sold. Two days later, Dr. DeLuca scoped my knee, cleaned out some debris, and told me to take it easy for a while. Truth is, I couldn’t wait to get back on the bike with the Saturday-morning Pro Pedals group.

One Christmas, my family surprised me with a beautiful (and very expensive) Cervélo racing bike. I had been riding my hybrid, which has wider tires and is heavier than a racing bike, with the bike club.

Biking protocol, I learned early, is that you ride along in a line and the leader “pulls” the team along (breaking wind and setting the pace) for a period, then he bumps out to the left, falls to the back of the line, and it’s the next guy in line’s turn to lead. Everyone else drafts close behind the rear tire of the guy in front. When it came to my turn, the guy ahead of me had set a pretty good pace, so I continued on. Not wanting to wimp out among this new bunch of guys, I took a little longer turn in the lead than others had. I really gutted it out. The young guy behind me cruised up alongside on his lightweight racer and said, “Pops, that fucking mountain bike you’re on shouldn’t be going that fast!” I said, “You’re kiddin’ me; nobody told me.” I didn’t know the difference, but I came to learn that there are bike snobs who check out your bike before even looking at the rider. With their Christmas gift, my family provided me with a bike most of them drool over!

Between Jim McCrossin’s training program and my extra effort with the bike club, I felt like I had just been through two months of boot camp. I went to my final training camp in fantastic condition.

The primary objective of officials’ camp is to have some fun playing hockey against one another, refresh our knowledge of the rules as well as any new directions we are asked to implement, and above
all, leave camp healthy for the start of the season. While I aced Dave Smith’s medical and fitness tests on the first day of camp, I didn’t realize that boot camp wasn’t quite over yet. We were transported from Toronto to the Blue Mountain resort in Collingwood, Ontario. I was returning home, in a sense, as I played my first year of junior hockey with the Collingwood Blues of the OHA Central Junior B league as a 16-year-old.

Camp was moving along nicely, I felt good on my skates, my team was in first place going into the championship game, and I had been contributing. On the next-to-last day of camp, we played two games and sat through two administrative classroom sessions. During the latter, your body tends to tighten up from sitting. The agenda called for a “secret” late-afternoon field trip. We didn’t know what we would be doing or where we were going. The only instruction was to wear long pants, a long-sleeved shirt, and bring hiking boots. There was speculation that we might take a nice hike through the woods or into the hills along the shores of beautiful Georgian Bay. During our lunch break, beer was purchased so that each guy could have a couple of cold ones on the bus ride. It was a beautiful, hot, sunny day, and it sure seemed like a good idea at the time.

We boarded the yellow school buses, downed a couple of beers, and enjoyed the noise and merriment on the bus. We drove for some time in the direction of Owen Sound, and someone with some knowledge of the area exclaimed, “Holy shit, I think they’re taking us to the military training base in Meaford!” Our visions of a leisurely hike evaporated as the bus pulled up in front of Land Force Central Area Training Centre Meaford, which conducts year-round courses for regular personnel in the Canadian Forces, and a master drill sergeant herded us grunts off the bus and started yelling at us to move it.

We were divided according to our hockey teams on the parade grounds behind the centre, and the ranking officer addressed our
“shabby group” of “recruits” in a tone that left no doubt as to who was in charge. He spelled out the rules we would play by for the duration of our time at the camp. We were told we would be put through the same training course that the troops go through before heading off to Afghanistan, and that some of the drill sergeants were battle-hardened soldiers who had recently returned from multiple tours in that country.

“This is a very dangerous facility, and we don’t want any of you to get injured and not be able to start your season,” he said, “unless your name is Kerry Fraser!”

He continued: “We also realize that some of you might be nursing injuries from your training camp or from previous game-related injuries and pre-existing conditions. I want you to advise my master drill sergeants, positioned behind me, of anything you might have that would prevent you from doing an exercise that we ask of you or might cause you additional pain and suffering—
unless
your name is Kerry Fraser!” There were a couple more protocol instructions that singled me out, but I think you get the picture. I realized after the very first order was issued, and after taking note of the cold stares I was receiving from the drill sergeants, that these guys were all Leafs fans—I was doomed! I didn’t know whether to ask for the last rites or a blindfold.

My team was ordered off to the bayonet range first. It was about a quarter of a mile, and we were not allowed to simply walk—we were to jog, or preferably, double-time it on a dead run. Ever since I blew my knee out, I’d been confined to low-impact exercises—bike, elliptical glider, and so forth. On this day, I returned to jogging. If need be, I’d have had the damned thing drained afterward.

We were lined up in front of 75 pounds of battle gear, ordered to put it on, and instructed in the art of gutting the “enemy”—a stuffed dummy hanging on a hook. If you struck him in the right spot, with deadly force, he fell of the hook and “died.” The
master drill sergeant was scary; our team lucked out and got the trained assassin, recently returned from a fifth tour. There was no doubt in any of our minds that this soldier enjoyed what he did for a living. (I’d use his name, but I fear he’d hunt me down!)

When the order to “kill” was issued, I lunged at the enemy, catching him off centre and causing him to spin on the hook, drawing the wrath of the sergeant, who yelled, “Fraser, are you having fun?”

“Yes, Master Sergeant.”

“Then hit the fucking thing, and don’t tickle it!”

“Yes, Master Sergeant!” We were never to address him as “sir.” That was our very first mistake as a group, and it sent him into a profanity-laced tirade that he’d earned his rank on the effin’ field of effin’ battle and not through some effin’ school or effin’ academy like an effin’ pussy. Well, I just wanted to kill my dummy and move on to the next exercise.

As luck would have it, the rope climb was just next door—a short jog through a ditch. The thick rope was attached to a large wooden beam 20 feet off the ground. We watched a soldier go up that thing like a monkey, hand over hand—and usually, they do it in full battle gear. We were allowed to use our legs as well as our hands and arms. The team scored a point every time one of us climbed the rope and slapped the beam at the top. We had a set time in which to complete the drill. I went up and down the rope four times. While it may not sound like much, some of our really strong linesmen were unable to make it to the top even once because their legs were so large and heavy. I was only pulling 156 pounds!

By this time, I was feeling pretty good about myself and was ready for the obstacle course. That’s where my luck ran out. One of the obstacles was a rope swing over a ditch, on the other side of which was a retaining wall of planks. My arms were still heavy from the rope climb, and when I jumped for the rope to catch it, I
got it too low and slammed right into the bloody wall and snapped my ankle back and to the side.

The drill sergeant saw what I’d done to the ankle, and for a fleeting second, I think, he almost felt some of my pain. Then: “Fraser, get your ass moving!” I made it on the second attempt, then finished up the rest of the course on adrenaline. As our team toured the barracks and visited with recruits, my deep respect and appreciation for what our military men and women do to keep us safe and free hit an all-time high. None of us can ever imagine just how demanding the training is, let alone the sacrifices (sometimes, the ultimate sacrifice) these brave men and women make for us. God bless you all, and thank you for your service.