Football camp draws a crowd.

Byline: Bob Clark The Register-Guard

They came from here and far, one high school football player listing his home state as Florida, another Massachusetts.

Jonathan Stewart, maybe the most heralded potential recruit among the 300 high school players on Oregon's football practice fields, had to make a midnight dash down I-5 from a summer camp he was attending with his high school football team to attend Saturday's workout, and then turned around and headed back to Ellensburg, Wash.

An easier trip was made by Matt Bramow, the senior-to-be at South Eugene, who was among about 20 local athletes on hand for the Nike Football Training Camp. But for most of them, the reason to be there was about the same as those who traveled from 18 other states.

`It's a chance to know where I'm at against everybody else in the region who came to the camp, and have some fun,' Bramow said. The camp, he said, `brings in more competition, more (players) you can judge yourself against.'

One of those near the top of the comparison scale would certainly be Stewart, a tailback from Timberline High School in Olympia. Named the outstanding player at this same camp a year ago, he was almost equally as impressive on Saturday, compiling the second-highest score based on a compilation of results from testing on speed and strength.

Not that Stewart needed to show a lot to any colleges. He's likely to be the most recruited player in the Northwest this year, though he still said `the camp is good to see where you fit in because all the best players come to it.'

The Saturday session at Oregon was the 11th put on around the country, under the auspices of Student Sports, a recruiting service, and sponsored by Nike. The previous camps had drawn between 250 and 500 players each, all by invitation and at no cost to the player other than the transportation to the site. It brings a mix of high school classes, and as clear as the difference in ages were some disparities in ability and conditioning.

And though there is the obvious interest on times and measurements, camp director Andy Bard also reminded the players during a group talk that `everything today is about speed and quickness. If you can't run, you can't play ... you just can't.'

On that premise, more than half of the approximately five hours was spent on training techniques, particularly related to running. Among the instructors brought in was Tom Shaw, a strength and conditioning coach with the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots 

`I got different ways to prepare myself for the season coming up, and it was a chance to work on some things,' Stewart said. `I gained a lot out of this for my technique. I still have a lot of things to work on.'

The marks that earned the 5-foot-10 Stewart a total fitness score in the top 20 in the country out of some 4,200 players who have attended the Nike camps this spring were a 4.5 time for the 40-yard dash, a bench press in which he did 29 lifts of the 185 pounds, a standing vertical jump of 37 inches and a 4.3 time for a 40-yard shuttle run.

`I don't feel good about them at all,' Stewart said of the times. `I've run faster than 4.5 (for the 40) but that's what I ran.'

The surprising number to him was his weight, up to 224 pounds. If there's an extra ounce, it wouldn't be easy to detect, one of the reasons he's going to be the object of some serious recruiting interest in the coming months.

Stewart said `I like the University of Oregon' as a potential choice for a college, but he clearly remains very open to his options.

`I think the recruiting process is a chance of a lifetime, so I'm going to experience all of it that I can,' Stewart said. `I'm leaving it up to God. I'll go to college where He wants me to go.'

Stewart won't be one of the players staying for Oregon's camps, either the one-day version set for today or the one-week option that begins with check-in tonight. He was headed back to rejoin his teammates at the camp being held at Central Washington University, and he'll later attend a camp at Washington State.