Bill Belichick explains how North Carolina uses yoga in practice schedule

After a full year away from the sport, Bill Belichick is back where he belongs out on a football practice as the first-year North Carolina head coach brings his nearly five decades of NFL experience to Chapel Hill. Belichick is in the midst of his first Fall camp leading the Tar Heels program after sitting out the 2024 season following his mutual parting with the Patriots after 24 seasons in New England.

But given his nearly five decades in the NFL, Belichick has worked to implement a NFL-like program at North Carolina, including adding yoga as part of the Tar Heels’ recovery process during preseason practice.

“Yoga is a recovery technique, it’s not really a training technique, so we use it more for recovery. And there are a lot of benefits to it, and certainly it’s a good way after three or four days of our practices to give the body a chance to recover. You know, stretch, get the blood flowing and so forth. That’s really what it’s used for,” Belichick explained following Wednesday’s preseason practice.

“It’s part of the recovery process. We do a lot of things for recovery, obviously food, nutrition, hydration, sleep, treatment, soft-tissue massage, contrast tubs, yoga, foam rollers, stretching, those kind of things. … Some guys use some more than others depending on what they’re trying to accomplish. It’s a comprehensive program, not just based on one thing. But the yoga sessions are part of it.”

Steve Belichick admits he never predicted seeing his father, Bill, coaching college football

The biggest shock of the college football offseason had to be the hiring of Bill Belichick at North Carolina. Belichick, who is widely regarded as the greatest NFL head coach of all time, accepted the Carolina job on Dec. 11, 2024 and entered the collegiate football ranks for the first time in his storied career.

Belichick was a NFL head coach for 28 total seasons, but his greatest run came with the New England Patriots from 2000-2023. He spent 24 seasons in New England, where he led the Patriots to a 302-165 record and six Lombardi Trophies. Accompanied by quarterback Tom Brady, Belichick was in charge of one of the greatest sports dynasties in modern history.

He’ll now undergo a new challenge this season in Chapel Hill, as he takes over a North Carolina program which went 6-7 last season. Tar Heel defensive coordinator Stephen Belichick, Bill’s son, discussed how shocked he was that his father took the job earlier this week.

“No, I didn’t see it coming,” Belichick said. “I take all the credit for him being in college. That’s on me. I just think that, for my dad, he loves coaching football. That’s his passion and so this opportunity presented itself and I was as surprised as everybody else to hear that he was going to North Carolina. I was just like ‘okay.’ But no, it was definitely a little interesting when it happened, but he loves to coach football and develop players and be around the game. It’s been that way my whole life and it hasn’t changed yet.”

— On3’s Daniel Hager contributed to this report.