It is finally the weekend, and to college and pro football fans that means that life is going to be good; as long as your team wins. Now this may not apply to everyone, but I remember when I was younger, everyone had “their” team, who they rooted for each week. And I remember wishing I could be one of those great players that went out their in front of those thousands of fans. It looked so easy from the comfort of my couch. As I grew up sports were my life and I wanted more than anything to become a professional athlete. It just looked like so much fun to have everyone know who you are and be famous for playing a sport. This is probably a similar story for many college and professional athletes. But those ideas of being famous and getting all that glory fade quickly when college freshmen step onto that field for the first time. Lets start from the beginning of the road for myself and my teammate and friend, Holden Huff. Growing up in Rocklin,CA, was an amazing experience for the both of us. I met Holden when I was a sophomore and he was a junior, we met on the football field. We played together and improved together and we became stars in the little town of Rocklin. Walking around campus, everyone knows who you are, whether you are wearing your jersey on game day or just walking around in regular clothes, they know. Because we were two of the better football players in our area, not only were we known by other kids at our high school, but people in the community followed us and our football season. Besides being stars at the school, another great part of high school was that our friends and family were always there for us. We both grew up with the kids at Rocklin and they were like our brothers. And Holden put it best when he said “nothing beats going home to an amazing meal cooked by our parents after a long day of school and football." All around high school was an amazing and fun time in both of our lives that we will never forget. But little did we know the challenges that lay before us. Receiving a scholarship may seem like the best thing to happen to a high school athlete, and in many ways it is. But in some ways when you sign that letter of intent, you are signing away your body and mind to the coaches you will play for, for the next 5 years. I say 5 years because in both Holden’s and my case, we both redshirted. Ncaa.org defines a redshirt as “a student-athlete who does not participate in competition in a sport for an entire academic year”. Holden got a little head start on the college football experience by gray-shirting. This is when you don’t enroll in the college until the spring semester. Both gray-shirting and red-shirting are ways to allow athletes to get better without losing any eligibility. Though redshirting benefits the athletes, it also introduces them to numerous challenges. Going fr