Long County High School’s 2012 football season began Wednesday as the Blue Tide kicked off their summer camp.  
With about 45 boys in shorts and helmets and plenty of water available, the team began a five-day period of acclimation and conditioning in preparation for full-contact.
Prior to the drills beginning at 9 a.m., head coach Ron Flott told the team he wanted to pick up where offseason conditioning left off and for the players to continue to listen to the instruction of the coaches and motivate each other.
“I want all of you to uplift each other and praise one another … You work hard and pay the price, and the rest will fall into place. We want to have a focus to win,” Flott said.
After the two-hour practice period, the team watched some films and had lunch.  
Under the new rules of the Georgia High School Association, each player must go through a five-day acclimation and conditioning period. After Aug. 1, full-contact practices can begin.  
After practice, Flott commented on the first day.
“I thought it went well,” he said. “It was very organized. The kids were focused, and all of our hard work over the summer paid off.”  
Flott added that with the summer break, many kids were out of town and on vacations, but by the time school starts he expects the number of players to go up even higher.  
“By the time school starts, I expect that we should have around 50 or 60 kids out there,” Flott said.
Last year, in Flott’s first year as the head coach, the Blue Tide were unable to notch a victory, going 0-10.  But even though the Tide were winless, three of their games were decided by a touchdown or less.  
Their first game is Aug. 31 in Ludowici when Long County faces Lanier County.
There will be several scrimmages prior to that, including the first intersquad scrimmage Aug. 6.