The Pike Liberal Arts Patriots have spent the summer in the weight room and on the field preparing for the 2016 season.

“We are ready to get started,” said Patriots head coach Gene Allen. “We are looking forward to it. We have had a great summer and the kids have been really energetic and working hard.

“We have been going now for about seven to eight weeks and it’s getting hotter and humid,” Allen said. “They have been doing really good with it.”

The Patriots have used 7-on-7 scrimmages to help prepare, focusing on skill positions.

“We have been spending most of our time working on 7-on-7 with our skill guys,” Allen said. “We are going to do what we do. We will play a lot of zone so we will play a lot of that in 7-on-7. We will put our offense in and run our offense. We try to get better at what we are doing.”

On Thursday, the Patriots will head to Lowndes Academy for a trio of practice games. Next week the Patriots go to Huntingdon to participate in a tournament that will consist of about 20 teams.

“The team we will meet up with week one will be a team we meet up with in 7-on-7 so we will see a little bit and see what they do,” Allen said. “Right now we are working on us. We will probably wait until a week  before until we really start working on them.”

The Patriots open against Clarke Prep on Friday, Aug. 26.