 Hi, I'm Mary Caltrider and welcome to Boiler Bites, an up-close look at what's happening at Purdue. We begin our show with a peek inside Purdue Athletics State-of-the-art football performance complex. This massive three-level structure first opened in August 2017, sprawling more than 100,000 square feet. You have to see it to believe it. The glitz, the glamour of it, it's one of those projects where you can dream big and the dream comes true. The scale and the size of it is much bigger than what we walked out of at the Old Mall and Coff. I mean, it was a spacious, spacious facility devoted 100% to football and the sheer size is almost mind-boggling. In April, Purdue broke ground on a new football performance complex. Football alum and Super Bowl MVP Drew Brees joined Purdue dignitaries at the event. It was built in about 18 months, which is almost unheard of. $65 million was the price tag privately financed. The team moved in 2017 and this provides that one central location where if you're a football player at Purdue, you know you can hang out. The administration was so gracious in saying this is what you guys are going to be moving into. Tell us exactly what you want. We had input on everything. A couple of things that stood out early on were the need for a locker room, a bigger locker room, a locker room that was enough for 110 players where everyone could see the head coach and certainly a new state-of-the-art weight room. And that was an area that the new strength coaches, Justin Lovett and his crew, were able to tweak and finalize and suit to their needs, which was awesome. We wanted something that our players could come back in 20 years and say, wow, this is awesome. You might have to replace a couple of things, but it's not gimmick, it's not slogan-driven, it's not fad. Right now, they can go from the locker room, they can get their treatment to the sports medicine area, then go lift weights or they can lift weights, get post-workout treatment, then go back to the locker room all on the same floor, coaches' offices in the same building, team meeting rooms in the same building. We see our trainers a lot more. We see our players on both sides, performance enhancement and sports medicine. Meeting room, we can go get them in a meeting room if they don't have their water bottle. We don't have to change buildings or go hunt for players. They're right there. So that couldn't be better. That was well-designed and well-thought-out. But then there's also, as we talked about earlier, just the fact that everything's in one building now. And although it's a huge building and they do have to ride an elevator or take a stair to get from here to there, it is all centrally located. One of the goals was to have the student-athletes, when they got there, to want to be there and want to study film there and want to spend time with their teammates. They have little places to go and little hiding spots where they can do their homework and be uninterrupted. So it's a good flow to the building. It's a good space that's utilized upstairs and downstairs. It's right in the middle of the football complex, if you will. You've got the Malkhoff Center, which is where we have our indoor practice field, just to the south. And then the 200-yard outdoor practice fields are right to the north. It's all in one spot and that was what we didn't have before. They get dressed for practice and they're right there. Everything's black and gold here. So the weight room's black. Whatever's gold is going to go on the wall in terms of the trophies that we win and bring home from bowl games and eventually championships. The lobby is kind of the one area that's open to the public. A great kind of history of Purdue football fans, whether they're here for a game or any other day of the year, the building is open. That lobby is accessible and it's kind of a neat trip down memory lane. It's got its own ambiance and character so it's definitely a lasting first impression with recruits and that's been a noticeable thing to us. We feel we're at the top of the heat now. Everything's just so much bigger and better than they had before. It wasn't bad before but it's off the charts now and I'll put ours certainly up with anybody in the country. I think Justin and Strength and Conditioning would agree with that. I know the players talk about it. I can't believe they still get a workout in this place. When they walk in the locker room, look around with the TV, walk in the weight room with the technology and the size of the place, this room is built for us to grow into. So we have some work to do to press the big weights and we have 200 pound dumbbells. We're pulling them and rolling them and shrugging them but we're not pressing as much yet but that's going to come in time. So this room and this facility upstairs and downstairs is built to grow. Athletics officials say that the football complex has not only made a strong impression on visiting recruits, it's also greatly enhanced the lives of Purdue student athletes, especially for time management. With so many first class amenities all under the same roof, players and coaches don't have to trek across campus anymore. That'll wrap up this edition of Boiler Bites. Remember that you can catch up on all our past stories at BoilerBites.com. See you next time.