It’s a tough time to get, or even stay, in shape.

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“They could go run in the park, they could run from one telephone pole to the next one in the neighborhood,” Alabama coach Nick Saban said on Wednesday in an interview live on the Sportscenter’s Instagram account. “I mean whatever it was, we actually wanted them to be able to self-monitor. That’s where the Apple watches came in.”

Saban said it was important for his staff to identify ways his players can exercise safely with minimal equipment since everyone won’t have access to weights and other exercise equipment for the foreseeable future.

Alabama provided the players with a band workout that Saban says the team has used in the past. Of course, the other thing the players took home, an Apple watch, has caused quite a stir across the college football community lately.

Under NCAA rules, the Crimson Tide is not allowed to monitor players’ physical activities. Saban said the watches give the strength coaches access to player heart rates, but he emphasized how important it was that the watches allowed coaches to track the players’ sleeping habits.

“If you sleep eight hours and you do all these other things correctly, you’re going to be at maximum performance, 100 percent,” Saban said. “If you sleep six hours and do all the same things, you’re going to go down 20 percent in your ability to perform.”

Those workouts are just one of the ways Saban is trying to provide his players with some semblance of normalcy and routine. He and the other Alabama coaches have four hours Monday-Thursday to work with players to go over techniques and attempt to install certain pieces of the playbook remotely.

“Maybe this (the remote coaching session) is something they look forward to,” Saban said. “Because there’s not a whole lot to do, and I think being able to stay focused on what you can control right now, rather than getting bored or sort of losing focus because of this circumstance.”

Saban acknowledged current circumstances have created a lot of uncertainty about the future. From a college football perspective, Saban said multiple contingency plans should be on the table, but there’s one the Crimson Tide coach prefers.

If it is safe to do so, Saban hopes to receive 14 days of non-contact practice over the summer as a replacement for the spring sessions he lost. During the interview, Saban said the number of practices for other teams could be adjusted so that everyone ends up with 14 total days across both spring and summer.

“I think that would go a long way to helping, young players especially, catch up on some of the learning and development that would have occurred during spring practice,” Saban said.

The Alabama coach compared these practices to the OTAs he took part in during his stint with the Miami Dolphins. These hypothetical summer sessions would allow him to teach techniques and even run 7-on-7s.

“You either control the circumstance or the circumstance controls you,” Saban said. “So we’re trying to control the circumstance the best we can with our players, and their response has been really, really positive.”

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