Gates loses pounds to gain longevity
A lighter Antonio Gates is looking toward the future.
The Chargers tight end has chosen to trim his playing weight this season, he said Tuesday, cutting it down by five pounds.
It's not just something Gates wants to do.
It's something, he believes, he must.
"I've always felt deeply that as you get older, you have to lose a little weight," said Gates, who turns 32 next week. "I've always played at 260 (pounds). I felt like this year, I can play at 255 ... That's just the key. When I watch guys who have longevity and played for 15, 16 years, one thing I continuously hear is guys maintaining health, maintaining weight. They control their weight."
Gates, naturally, knows his 6-foot-4 body better than anyone, and he's noticed it doesn't burn calories as it once did.
In the earlier years of his career, to play at 255 pounds would mean weighing 265 or 270 in the offseason months. Then, during the summer training camp, the extra pounds would drip away.
The eight-time Pro Bowler goes about things differently now.
Taking a slower metabolism into account, Gates says he's currently about 258 or 259 pounds, much closer to his target weight for the Sept. 10 season opener in Oakland.
"It's got to be a good weight, too," Gates said. "I don't want to walk around and feel like I don't have power, or fatigue sets in because you've lost too much weight.
"I see these commercials of people who lose 10 pounds in one day and all this crazy stuff. I ain't on that plan. I'm at one pound a week where when I eat, I'm still at a good weight. I don't want to be 255 on weigh-in day and then eat a sandwich and be back to 263."
This isn't the first time an elite NFL tight end made a diet change at age 31.
In 2007, the Falcons' Tony Gonzalez made a dramatic shift, becoming vegan for a short time before turning to a less strict but still plant-based diet.
For Gates, the diet change is constant but less complex: maintain moderation over every meal and portion.
He can still eat like himself.
And, he's proving this offseason, he can still look like himself, too.
At the Chargers' organized team activities, Gates is running strong and stringing together consecutive practices, something that rarely occurred when dealing with plantar fasciitis the past two seasons.
"You can't discredit the fact that I've played going on 10 years," Gates said. "The aches and pains of playing are always there. But in terms of my foot, I'm able to get to practice at a rate that I wasn't able to do in the past. From that standpoint, I'm feeling great."
This article was written by Michael Gehlken and appeared in utsandiego.com.
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