With his 6-foot-4, 280-pound frame culminating with his bald head and fire red goatee, Justin Hartis looks like a warrior.

And the junior lineman from Charlotte had a chance to battle with some of the best warriors in high school football Saturday afternoon during the Nike Football Training Camp held at the practice fields next to the Duffy Daugherty Football Building.

Nike and Student Sports Inc. organized the camp which featured more than 200 high school athletes.

After the teaching, competing and sweating were finished Saturday, Hartis traded in his tough demeanor for a smile.

“This is one of the most fun things I’ve ever done in my life,” he said. “I love the intensity.

“I wish I had my helmet and pads on.”

Hartis, who has taken an unofficial visit to MSU, said he’s also being courted by Nebraska, Iowa and Michigan.

With so much at stake, one might think competitiveness would lead to bad blood between the players, but Hartis said that assumption couldn’t be more untrue.

“Everybody I’ve met here is a great guy,” he said. “I haven’t talked to one person I didn’t like, and I know these are the guys I’ll be seeing down the road.”

The camp provided the players with an opportunity to go through a NFL combine-esque workout before receiving instruction, both general and position specific.

Players from all over the Midwest, including some from as far away as Nevada, gathered on the MSU campus for a shot to measure themselves against their peers.

“I feel good about myself, knowing I just competed with the best in the nation,” Travis Noel said. “I held my own, and if you got beat there’s nothing to be ashamed of.

“Everyone here is as good as you, if not better.”

Noel traveled to the camp from Toronto. He said he participates in similar camps three times a year.

The junior safety said he hoped to polish the fundamentals in his game, while displaying his skill for plenty of curious eyes.

“Over the last few years, a lot of the guys went down to the States for camps, and it really helps get your name out there,” Noel said. “You get to come down and compete with the best.

“The best athletes are out here, and to go up against the best of the best only makes you better.”

Noel said he hoped to supplement his skills with detailed instructions and suggestions.

“What I try to do is incorporate all the little things I learn down here and put into my game as a whole,” he said.

And while the majority of players had only their senior season ahead of them, some underclassmen made the trip to East Lansing.

Sophomore running back Christopher Graham traveled to the camp from Indianapolis, having already been contacted by programs such as Indiana, Purdue, Boston College, Syracuse and Illinois.

Graham said working with all the coaches and instructors there can make all the difference when it comes to the amount of improvement he could make.

“They have the opportunity to teach you a few moves, and that makes it kind of neat,” he said. “When you go back to your own school, everybody’s like, ‘Where’d you learn that?’”

After his workouts were through, Graham assessed his performance and the importance of it.

“I think I raised some eyebrows,” he said. “At camps, you can make coaches notice you more than they noticed you before.

“I just feel so pumped up right now.”