He and the Georgia Athletic Department let Champion magazine show what goes on behind the scenes when a Football Bowl Subdivision team travels for a road game.
His mission? To make everything as routine as possible so the Georgia coaches and players can concentrate on playing โ and winning โ the game. Left to right: Meet with hotel staff. Review and sign forms. Walk-through with Teri Weise at hotel; check areas for breakfast, taping and team meetings. Top to bottom: Head to stadium to get credentials.
Stadium walk-through. Back at the hotel to meet with Jim McNeil to ensure hotel keys are prepared. In his business, you expect the unexpected to occur. Brooks arranged travel with Delta Airlines, which sent a seat plane and two seaters. The Bulldogs need three planes because the runway at the Athens airport is too short for larger jets. Today, because of the degree temperature in Georgia and the amount of jet fuel needed to make the longer-than-normal flight, a third-party engineer told Brooks that the travel party was 2, pounds overweight.
Brooks and Hutcherson have to fight the urge to panic. Both men say Georgia head coach Mark Richt is even-keeled. There were two solutions. One was to put less fuel on the planes and gas-up in Atlanta or Nashville, Tenn.
The other was upgrading one of the seat planes to another seater. We thought we had planned for the worst-case scenario, but the third-party engineer inspection showed there was more for us to consider. Clockwise: Head to airport to review escort route with patrolmen.
