Harvard-Westlake Gets Power Lift From Coach

North Hollywood Harvard-Westlake conducted a national search to hire its first full-time strength and conditioning coach, and guess which professional team the final choice came from?

It’s the one whose fans like to dress in black, wear eye patches and act a little crazy.

Mike Durand, who had worked as an assistant strength and conditioning coach for the Oakland Raiders since 2002, began his job at Harvard-Westlake this month.

It was the first time in a while that he had worn anything other than black to work.

“You don’t want to show up in red,” he said of his Oakland days.

Durand, 33, will be responsible for coordinating the strength and conditioning programs for all of the school’s boys’ and girls’ sports teams, plus its middle school teams.

“You can feel his excitement,” said Audrius Barzdukas, the head of athletics. “He’s fired up to teach kids.”

It’s rare in Southern California that a school would hire someone whose sole job is strength and conditioning, similar to what college programs have.

The person in charge of the strength program for Southern Section Division I football champion Los Angeles Loyola works in the school’s admissions office. The Santa Ana Mater Dei strength guru is also the dean of discipline.

Durand’s job, though, puts him in charge of the weight room day and night.

And why would he want to leave a job that put him at the top of his profession?

“Quality of life,” he said. “In the NFL, you work seven months out of the year, seven days straight. From July to January, you don’t have a day off, and it’s 14 to 16 hours a day.”

Instead of working with Jerry Rice or Tim Brown, Durand will be passing on his wisdom to teenagers with little weight-training experience.

“It gives me the opportunity to work with young men and women eager to learn,” he said. “We’re starting a strength program from scratch.”

Durand fills the position of a full-time physical education instructor, with the approval of Headmaster Thomas Hudnut.

“Physical education has become much more individualized,” Hudnut said. “It’s not just roll out the balls and let them play in a gym anymore. Apparently, the business of weight training has changed a lot in the last 10 years, and we wanted to get somebody who’s up to date.”

Durand had to answer questions in his job interview about his philosophy regarding the use of performance-enhancing drugs, a topic much in discussion in the professional and amateur ranks.

“He’s absolutely adamant it’s unacceptable and wrong,” Barzdukas said.

Added Durand: “You have to educate why it’s bad for the body and why it’s a banned substance.”

Durand warns that improving strength doesn’t happen in a week or even a month.

“A good strength program is built over months and years,” he said.

People will be watching Harvard-Westlake closely to see what effect a full-time strength and conditioning coach can have at the high school level.

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Harvard-Westlake has established a college-like administrative structure in athletics. Its recent hiring of former USC running back Terry Barnum to become athletic director in charge of internal and external communications gives the school four athletic directors.

One is in charge of operations (budget, equipment, uniforms), another takes care of compliance and scheduling and another oversees coaching development, video and trainers.

The school tuition is $20,000 a year.

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Venice, which lost to Carson in last season’s City Section football final, picked up two top sophomores at the semester break after they apparently moved into the school’s attendance boundaries.

Enrolled at Venice are Ken Ashley, one of the most productive running backs in the Serra League last season at Anaheim Servite, and Jonus Moutan, an All-Bay League safety from Inglewood.

Both are acquaintances of Venice assistant coach Martin French, who coached at Inglewood and Hawthorne.

Venice Coach Angelo Gasca said French denies any involvement in the players’ move.

Whether the players are eligible to compete for the Gondoliers next season will be determined after school administrators confirm the new addresses.

Eric Sondheimer can be reached at eric.sondheimer@latimes.com.