The sound of helmets cracking and pads thumping arrived Friday, but everything else that comes with fall football practice was in full swing Monday as Lake Travis opened practice for what it hopes will be a fourth straight championship season.

“It feels great,” Lake Travis head coach Hank Carter said. “We’ve been talking about it for a long time, so it’s nice to get past the planning and get back out on the football field and get ready for the season.”

The Cavaliers opened the day of practice with a morning session that included heavy conditioning before the sun dialed up the heat, and then followed that with an afternoon session that ended around 1:30 p.m. after a short break between. The heat broke a bit from the 100 degree temperatures that have been hitting Central Texas for much of the summer, but it was about like throwing an ice cube in a pot of boiling water.

“It’s not too bad right now, of course, the kids might feel a little different underneath those helmets,” Carter laughed. “But this morning especially – it was great.”

While the heat is always the least welcome part of the start of fall practice, every other aspect had the team and coaches excited, leading to high-energy practices.

“I didn’t sleep much last night,” Carter said. “I texted Coach [Ryan] Luedecke last night late and he wasn’t sleeping, either. We’re all like that and I’m sure the kids are the same way. We were all looking forward to getting after it the first day and we’re all just happy to be together again and working.”

Practice zipped along with the furious pace the team became accustomed to under Chad Morris and virtually the same exact staff the last two seasons, and that bodes well for continued dominance on the field once the season starts.

With music blaring from the practice scoreboard, quarterback Michael Brewer zipped passes to a bevy of receivers at one corner of the field, while in another the lineman went through blocking schemes and in another the defense ran through drills under Carter. Pre-timed intervals pushed the team through various stages of practice, and it ran along with the pace of a practice four weeks into the season. Which is exactly what Carter was hoping for when he took the job – very little change and a routine that kept players in the right mindset.

“It’s made the transition a lot easier,” Carter said. “We all know how things are going to be, there aren’t a ton of surprises and we can get right back into the groove.”

His assessment after the first day?

“We had a lot of excitement this morning, which is exactly what we expected and wanted to see,” he said. “This afternoon was a little different as it heated up, of course. Overall, I was happy with the effort we got from the kids and it was a pretty typical practice for us, which is great.”

The team hosts media day this Saturday, along with a team scrimmage at 8 a.m.