This summer, motivation came in the form of the plank.
The isometric-core exercise involved toes and elbows on the ground, knees off it. To spice the routine, the Hawaii football players would do push-ups, counting down the reps from nine to zero, while in the plank position. Sometimes, associate head coach Chris Brown would place a 45 plate on each player’s back while they were doing push-ups or maintaining the plank. At first, the Warriors would do the discipline for 30 seconds, then eventually building to the goal of nine minutes.
The importance of nine? That was where the media predicted the Warriors to finish in the 12-team Mountain West this season. “To keep pushing, the mentality, that’s the place where you get stronger,” said Brown, who has led the weight-training program since strength/conditioning coordinator Kody Cooke returned to his alma mater, Tulsa, in January. “That’s where you show (the critics).” Each Warrior now can hold the position for 15 minutes.
“With the planks,” linebacker Jamih Otis said, “Coach CB tells us, ‘When things get hard, are you going to drop the knee or are you going to be there for your brothers?’ That’s what we live by. Everybody’s keeping their knee up. That’s our sign of discipline.”
Brown has always believed in the power of strength. “Growing up, I was always the action-hero guy,” said Brown, who collected action figures of He-Man, G.I. Joe, and Transformers. “I still have my He-Man toys,” he said.
He watched “Conan the Barbarian,” and the “Rocky” and “Rambo” movies with his dad, a former bodybuilder. His father introduced him to the weight room — “the Iron Church” — at an early age. As a 5-foot-10, 145-pound eighth grader, Brown won the King Intermediate School bench-press contest with a lift of 225 pounds. The runner-up benched 135 pounds.
When he was 14, his father took him to Bret’s Gym in Kailua, where he met Hawaii’s weightlifting legends. Sonny Ronolo, who set 35 records in a career that lasted into his 70s, tutored Brown on bench-pressing. Isaac Akuna gave him pointers on the dead lift. With his first allowance, Brown bought Weider’s Whey Protein at Longs. “I could have bought a video game or a magazine,” Brown said, “but I was obsessed with getting bigger, faster and stronger.”
He kept lingering at Bret’s so much that owner Bret Medeiros hired him for the summers.
His father fed Brown’s passion for training, preparing a breakfast of boiled chicken, rice and a protein shake. “Every single day,” Brown said.
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When he was 18, Brown entered “Big Gus” Rethwisch’s weightlifting contest. Brown benched 425 pounds and dead-lifted 600 pounds. By his senior season at UH, the hard-hitting middle linebacker had these marks: 500-pound bench press, 605-pound back squat, 42 bench reps of 225 pounds.
Brown had a stint with the Baltimore Ravens, where he learned the “lion’s mentality” from All-Pro linebacker Ray Lewis, of the quest to be hunter.
“Since I was a kid, I was obsessed with lions,” Brown said. “I loved that the lion was the king of the jungle. It went hand in hand. At Damien (where he graduated in 1999), our nickname was the Monarchs, but our mascot was a lion. When I played (at UH) that was my nickname. That’s something I took when I started coaching.”
At Bishop Gorman High in Las Vegas, Brown coached the linebackers and oversaw the strength program. The weight room, of course, was called the Iron Church. The linebackers were collectively known as the Lion’s Den.
When Brown was hired as linebackers coach on Timmy Chang’s first staff in 2022, he sent a group text to the position group. Brown invited the linebackers to embrace the lion’s den with a commitment to unity and leadership.
“It’s being a lion on the field,” linebacker Nalu Emerson said. “Having passion, going as hard as you possibly can. But off the field, it’s staying humble and serving others.”
In a group text on the mornings of game days, Brown will attach a clip of a lion hunting or attacking. He often references his initial text: “Linebacker is not just a position, it’s a mentality, it’s a discipline, it’s the standard. And the standard is king of the beasts. That’s a lion. Welcome to the lion’s den.”
