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Which Gators are the biggest freaks in the weight room?

Untitled designby:Nick de la Torre•07/20/22•

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Florida-Gators-Kingsley-Eguakun
Florida Gators center Kingsley Eguakun. (Photo courtesy of UF Communications)

ATLANTA — If you want to play Division I football you better be in the weight room. If you want to play football at the University of Florida, you better be moving some serious weight.

That’s exactly what the Florida Gators did on Wednesday morning. As part of their Regimen program, the Gators had a max lift day. Squats were on the menu and some of the numbers being thrown around were insane.

The question of which Gator is the strongest always elicits the same answer.

“Shoutout to Kingsley Eguakun, man. The center. 65 if you guys don’t know,” left tackle Richard Gouraige said. “He’s going to turn heads this year, he’s an animal. He’s the hardest worker I’ve seen thus far. I love him. That’s my little brother.”

If a career in football doesn’t pan out, Eguakun could be a powerlifter. The Gators’ starting center has over a 450-pound bench press and put up an unbelievable 735-pound squat today.

“Stuff like that you don’t see every day,” quarterback Anthony Richardson said. “Freshman running back (Trevor Etienne) squatting 600. The freshmen, when I came in I didn’t see anything like it. For them to be in there doing that is different. Daejon Reynolds squatted 600, too. Stuff like that shocks you. You don’t see it that often. Shout out to them for grinding.”

Richardson is as physically impressive as a person can be. However, you won’t see his name atop the lists. When asked where his max lifts stand among some of his teammates he laughed.

“They try to hold me back because I’m a QB. I don’t really get to unlock or unleash everything,” he said to Gators Online. “They got me in a cage. Can’t let the beast out.” 

Watch: Princely Umanmielen posts impressive squat

Not to be outdone by Eguakun, Princely Umanmielen added his own max squat today. That’s 700-pounds on the bar and it was moving.

The Gators haven’t played a game yet, but the effort they’re putting in off the field and in the weight room isn’t going unnoticed by Billy Napier.

“We’ve got a group that embraces the weight room, the running, the speed improvement, the OTAs, the Gator plan, all those things that we’ve done throughout the summer,” Napier said. “The accountability structure. We’ve got a lot that goes into that. And they’ve embraced those things. I like that. They love to compete. I think they’re tough. And I think they’ve got a little bit of an edge.”

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