Christian Ferrara provides lift for Western Mass. athletes

When Christian Ferrara first came to Springfield Central in 2014, he could not believe his eyes, and not in a good way.

"The whole culture in the city (was bad)," Ferrara said. "How in a city this big with all these special athletes and you're not pumping out Division 1 after Division 1 athletes? We have all these studs here, why aren't we pumping out more Division 1 athletes?"

A former 38-game starter at nose tackle for Syracuse in the late 1990s, early 2000s, Ferrara came up to Massachusetts in 2012 to help a friend open up some gyms on the East Coast. But when he began his stint as a strength and conditioning coach at Central along with his work at the alternative school there, Ferrara knew he had to start from the ground up when it came to getting the most out of the talent.

"They didn't know how to program their athletes properly in the weight room," said Ferrara, who trains athletes all over Western Mass. now, including East Longmeadow native and Florida Panthers forward Frank Vatrano.

Ferrara works with over 80 of the top athletes in Western Mass. from high school to the pros and across multiple sports under Excel Strength and Conditioning and Strength 93.

"I train basketball players, wrestlers, boxers, you name it," Ferrara said. "Every sport doesn't do the same style of training."

And it is not just elite athletes that Ferrara works with. Physical therapist Jim Maloney will send his patients to Ferrara, with whom he trusts to help in rehab and recovery.

Christian Ferrara (center) with a group of the athletes he works with.

What Ferrara instituted at Central was essentially a Division 1 strength and conditioning program that he honed over the years learning from those in the profession. However, in 2014, he had to start small.

Basic things like where to store the weights when athletes finished using them and other details were not given the respect Ferrara demanded. So he literally and figuratively cleaned house.

"That's when the initial change of culture happened at Central, and I knew it was going to take at least four or five years to get the people we needed to get in the door, meaning the kids," Ferrara said. "There was a lot of cancer, a lot of issues. So we weened those people out. Slowly but surely, 2015, when (current Colgate wide receiver) Myles (Bradley) was a freshman, that whole class came in, that was my first class. And, as you can see, the culmination was the (MIAA Division 3) state championship in December."

And it has started to take hold, as the younger players for the Golden Eagles have begun to gain more scholarship attention, too. Whether it be for the Football Bowl Subdivision, Football Championship Subdivision, or Division 2, Central has seven football players currently with offers spread across the 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023 classes.

"Those kids bought in," Ferrara said. "They've been with me since the fifth and sixth grade. Everything that's supposed to happen is happening. People say, 'Oh, it's crazy.' No, it's not crazy. This is what happens when you put the work in, when you bust your butt: when you buy into academics; when you buy into your body; buy into your strength and conditioning; when you buy into your speed; when you're not scared to travel and compete against the best players in the country."

Still, Ferrara knows that not everyone who works with him is automatically going to get the same type of results. He is realistic with those who work with him about their true ceiling.

He does, though, believe wholeheartedly that his methods help athletes hit it, even with facilities that aren't state of the art.

"But we get it going. We're old school," he said. "You push steel, you get stronger, you get faster. You do the Olympic lifts, you get bigger, you get stronger, you get faster."

When he gets a fifth- or sixth-grader, again, he starts small, helping them understand their body mechanics, teaching them how to do the various exercises right so they don't build bad habits.

In the seventh and eighth grade, he goes to the Olympic movements and lifts, but stresses the importance of the basics.

"If you have bad habits before, it's only going to get worse," he said.

By the ninth grade, "now I ramp it up. Now we're doing a Division 1 college (strength and conditioning) program."

When his athletes get to college, Ferrara wants them to have smooth transitions.

"All my athletes, girls, guys, they say, 'We've been doing this for four years. (The colleges) just got nicer equipment,' " Ferrara said.

But for all the success in that arena, Ferrara sees the rest of the city and still feels more is possible.

"The city needs to wake up. Downtown needs to wake up," Ferrara said. "We just had seven kids go Division 1 (in the 2019 class) out of Central. Not all athletes go to Central. There's five other high schools. . . . With the amount of talent in this city, it needs to be tapped."

Down the line, Ferrara sees himself at a college program training athletes at that level. Some of his peers wonder why he's not doing that already.

"This, I feel, is the most rewarding age," Ferrara said. "One day, it will happen, I will be a college strength and conditioning coach. That's the end goal for me. Right now, this is the process it's going to take for me, just like my athletes, the steps. These are the steps I have to go through to get to that level. So, slowly but surely, I'm inching my way closer and closer.

"I've had multiple coaches say, 'Hey, why are you still doing high school? You belong with us. You belong at the higher level. You're too good.' I don't believe in that. I'm never too good to help a kid. So I feel like this is the most rewarding, because the thank you from a kid after four years, whether it's for a National Letter of Intent, or just, 'Hey, coach, without you, this wouldn't be possible,' you really can't put a dollar sign on that."