Early enrollee Lamont Wade turning heads in Penn State winter workouts

UNIVERSITY PARK Early enrollee defensive back Lamont Wade is “a real intriguing guy” in the eyes of Penn State strength coach Dwight Galt after a rapidly productive winter.

Wade, who’ll compete for playing time as a freshman at cornerback or safety, did not have an adequate training background, his strength coach said.

“He came in and we had to back off and teach him a little bit,” Galt added on Friday, Penn State’s final “Max Out” day of winter workouts. “But talk about someone who’s a quick learner, big heart, great work ethic, and he just exploded.”

The Clairton graduate bench pressed 325 pounds on Tuesday, second-best among Penn State cornerbacks. He managed only 255 pounds when he arrived on campus.

Wade also struggled to power clean 185 pounds in the first two or three weeks, but finished out at 300 pounds Wednesday.

And in the 40-yard dash, Wade posted a run of 4.58 seconds at the start of winter.

“His technique was kind of shoddy,” Galt recalled, “and I looked at him, and I saw that fire.”

Wade rebounded, running a 4.40 on Monday.

“We had a really good speed cycle,” the strength coach said. “He embraced it, paid attention, worked hard at it and really got some good gains.”

This story was originally published March 17, 2017 at 8:04 PM with the headline "Early enrollee Lamont Wade turning heads in Penn State winter workouts."