Bo Levi Mitchell was the Grey Cup MVP in 2014 and a CFL West Division all-star in 2015.

He’s entering his sixth CFL season but he’s still just 26 years old and no one has ever accused the six-foot-two Texan of being in poor shape. And yet, Mitchell this off-season is pushing himself harder than ever before.

“In my eyes,” he explains, “I didn’t feel as mobile as the previous year. If you wait until someone tells you that you’re overweight, then for me as an athlete, it’s too late. You already know your strengths but you need to find out where your weaknesses are and turn those into strengths.”

So he brought his off-season training base to WinSport and hooked up with Chris Osmond, who has a long record of working with professional and elite amateur athletes.

“Just training with an Olympic trainer and around Olympic athletes is a different way to push myself,” says Mitchell. “I started off increasing my anaerobic threshold, which is basically my cardio. Kind of building that engine to your body.

“For the first month, it was five days a week, basically heart-rate workouts. So keeping your heart rate from 175 to 185 for a certain amount of minutes and from 185 to 195 for a certain amount of minutes. I was doing that for about an hour each day. So I was dropping the fat at first.”

After the first month of the regimen, the workout routine evolved and included more strength training.

“(Osmond) really knows his stuff,” says the quarterback. “We’re doing some running and agility stuff and I already feel way better. I can just feel the difference taking off — the power in my legs. I’ve always had upper-body strength but I’ve never had a great foundation in my lower body.”

In 2015, Mitchell’s playing at 215 lbs.

“After the wedding,” admits the newly married Mitchell, “I was at 221.

“I’m trying to get down to 203. Two-oh-five is what I played at in college. Right now I’m at 208. I’ll be down there by the time the season starts.”

“Just training with an Olympic trainer and around Olympic athletes is a different way to push myself.”
– QB Bo Levi Mitchell

The goal for Mitchell is very simple.

“I want to take things with the cardio so that in the fourth quarter, I’m the faster guy on the field,” he declares.

He’d love nothing more than to follow the path of ageless ex-Stamps QB Henry Burris.

“I saw some old film of (Anthony) Calvillo and he looked athletic and he looked quick,” says Mitchell. “You see him towards the end of his career and the body starts to break down a little bit and you become much more of a pocket passer. In this league . . . you have to be able to move around, so you see a guy like Hank at 40 having a career year, it’s because of his lower-body strength and keeping in shape.

“That,” he says, “is where I want to be.”