VIDALIA — Vidalia High School football players Joshua Pace and Devonte Loyd have big dreams.

“I want to play in college and the NFL,” Pace said.

“Playing big time football and making big time money,” Loyd said.

That is why throughout the summer, Pace, an 11th-grader and Loyd, a ninth-grader, have been putting in extra work.

“This is the hardest I’ve ever worked for football,” Loyd said.

Their workout is pretty simple, but that does not take away from its strenuousness. It involves a pair of cleats, a hill (in their case, it is the side of the levee), and a tire.

The defensive backs that will also play on the offensive side of the ball for Vidalia run up the hill five times backpedaling, then five times side-pedaling right, followed by another five side-pedals. After those, they run five sprints up the hill.

One would think the workout ends there, but it does not. They strap a tire to their backs and run up the hill five more times.

The amazing thing is not that they do the workout in the blazing heat and humidity, it is how un-winded the boys are when it is over.

“I’m not tired. I just feel good,” Pace said.

Pace started working out like this purely because he had nothing to do during the summer.

“I was bored,” he said. “So I decided to get better at football.”

“It helps keep me out of trouble.”

Assistant coach Rob Faircloth was watching the boys run after being invited by Pace.

“These guys are the epitome of what we want and what we used to be,” Faircloth said.

After an 0-10 season last year and the practices under head coach Jeff Hancock, Faircloth believes everybody on this year’s football team is working harder.

“This is the hardest working team I have ever been around,” he said. “No matter what, hard work pays off.”