Patrick Mahomes’ Trainer Provides A Peek Into The Chiefs Quarterback’s Workout Routine

| American Football | 03/23/2020

Editor’s note: This article is from early September 2019, before Patrick Mahomes led the Kansas City Chiefs to their first Super Bowl win in 50 years. It is as relevant now as it was then.

By Jeff Fedotin

As phenomenal as Patrick Mahomes’ 2018 season was, the NFL MVP saw room for improvement.

Bobby Stroupe, Mahomes’ longtime personal trainer:

“Neither one of us was happy with how probably the last quarter of the season went from the standpoint of movements. His play was at a high level — no doubt — but if you look at his film from the beginning of the year versus the end of the year, he moved around a lot more in the beginning of the year. His escapability, his strength in the pocket, was a little bit different.”

The goal was to create a more robust athlete who could absorb more contact while also having greater mobility, and the Kansas City Chiefs quarterback reported to training camp looking noticeably more sculpted.

“I cut down some of the fat,” Mahomes said, “and made it more muscle.”

Mahomes accomplished his objective through about 60 workouts from the Super Bowl through OTAs with Stroupe, the founder of Athlete Performance Enhancement Center (APEC).

Their workouts had three major areas of concentration. One focus was on movement skills or speed, agility and reaction time. An example of a drill featured an eight-point leaping sequence where he had to jump in different directions.

Another emphasis was on mobility, stability and flexibility. Securing the passer’s shoulder girdle and increasing hip flexibility were priorities to help with injury prevention.

The final focus was on strength and conditioning through rapid fire, plyometric drills. Mahomes would granny toss objects weighing two, 10 and 20 pounds. Not surprisingly, on exercises where Mahomes threw medicine balls, Stroupe said he had the highest velocity of any of his NFL or Major League Baseball clients.

“Nobody matches Patrick,” Stroupe said. “Nobody ever has.”

Though the emphasis was on more functional exercises, the quarterback did some old-school lifts for power. Mahomes can deadlift more than 500 pounds (or two-and-a-half times his body weight).

And Mahomes, who is 23 (and will turn 24 on Sept. 17), is only getting more powerful.

“He hasn’t reached his physical peak,” Stroupe said. “He’s still growing and becoming a man. He’s still not physically mature. It will be several years before he is, and that’s a scary thing for everyone in the NFL to consider.”

Long before he was an adult, Mahomes was working with Stroupe. While in the fourth grade, the future quarterback met him while Stroupe trained his father — 11-year major league veteran Pat Mahomes — when he was attempting an MLB comeback. The pitcher’s son has been working out with him ever since.

At this point the relationship is more like close friends than pupil/trainer.

They share roots. Stroupe, who played college football at Southeastern Oklahoma State, has a facility in Tyler, Texas — where Mahomes grew up — and another in Fort Worth, Texas.

When Mahomes wasn’t in the Lone Star State this offseason, he used an app Stroupe created, so he could check his workouts and communicate how his body felt. That tool was necessary given Mahomes’ hectic schedule, which included attending the Final Four and Stanley Cup playoffs, accepting an ESPY award for best NFL player, vacationing in Turks and Caicos and promoting a slew of new endorsements.

“(I was) able to align myself with a lot of great organizations and partners that understood that football was still the first thing,” Mahomes said, “but I got to go around and see and meet a lot of great people.”

Mahomes, who works out in a group about 60% of the time, also has met several of other Stroupe’s clients while exercising.

Stroupe trains athletes from seven different sports, including 30 MLB players. His 65 NFL clients include Dede Westbrook, O.J. Howard, Solomon Thomas and, of course, the reigning MVP.

After his 50-touchdown, 5,097-yard passing season in his first year as starter, Mahomes is the talk of the NFL. And with Mahomes in the third year of a four-year, $16.4 million deal, most predict he will become the NFL’s highest paid player with a contract that will average at least $40 million a year.

But you wouldn’t know of his lofty standing by his attitude in the gym.

“He’s a worker,” Stroupe said. “He won MVP this year, but he still had a hefty list of things he wanted to get better at. He wants to win the Super Bowl. He doesn’t look at himself as complete.”