By MEGAN WENTZ

PVT

Pahrump Valley High School athletes are hard at work this summer, training with the Philippi Sports Institute PSI to work on their speed, agility, strength and flexibility, and their efforts are paying off.

The training camp has about 70-80 athletes enrolled in this summer program from all sports, such as volleyball, track and field, soccer and football, and ranging in ages from 9 to 17 years.

The training sessions are Monday through Thursday, three hours a day, for the duration of an eight-week program.

Joe Clayton, assistant coach of the varsity football team, started taking his two middleschool sons to the Philippi Sports Institute in Las Vegas about six months ago.

It didn’t take long for more students to become interested in training, and Clayton started taking six Pahrump athletes to PSI four times a week.

Clayton and PSI founder Mark Philippi decided with the growing interest it would be a good idea to bring PSI to Pahrump.

Philippi stated, “We felt like there was a need to help the community to play bigger schools. I think there’s the population base to support success, and we’re all very satisfied with the number of kids that showed up to train.”

Philippi’s institute has been recognized by Men’s Health magazine as one of the “10 Best Gyms” in the United States and trains all levels, from middle-school students in Pahrump to professional athletes such as Frank Mir of the UFC and Major League baseball player Jason Giambi.

It’s this type of assistance, focus and experience Pahrump needs to make a difference with their athletic teams.

Pahrump teams have struggled some in the past few years since joining the large-school 4A classification in 2008. Although Pahrump Valley High meets enrollment requirements for the 4A classification, it is now competing against schools with three times the number of students.

Athletic programs have found it difficult to keep up.

In an effort to change their streak of losses, team coaches and PSI trainers are teaching the kids that in order to succeed, it’s a year-round process.

Varsity football coach Leo Verzilli thinks this is a great start to a complete turn around.

“Our losses are in the past,” he said. “We’re ready to take on the larger teams. The nice thing is this training camp is going to bump right into football practice, and we will start the season off ahead of the game.

“The kids have really worked hard this summer. We can see their endurance, strength, and mentality improving every day.”

Clayton added, “We’re hoping to get the younger kids involved so that when they reach the junior varsity and varsity levels, they will already have a good foundation to work on.”

“We’re hoping that we can continue with small camps throughout the year and make the summer training camp an annual event,” Philippi said.

With the type of training these students have been offered and the time and attention they’ve received, the $185 per athlete for the summer training camp seems a great deal.

Although the effectiveness of the training camp won’t be evident until the seasons start and games are played, the coaches and PSI trainers have found this summer to be a huge success and the students have found their hard work extremely rewarding.