“This is how we’re gonna get down.”

That’s the phrase Washington Commanders coach Dan Quinn always uses with his players as he begins to lay out a plan of attack for their next opponent.

It’s time to get to work. The message is clear, as is the strategy Quinn, his assistants and players will execute to give themselves their best shot at victory. There are no cakewalks in the NFL, Quinn preaches. Every week, a battle awaits. The game is winnable if everyone executes their portion of the plan, but every contest represents a struggle nonetheless.

“It’s the humility of fighting,” Washington punter Tress Way said in explaining his coach’s messaging. “He’s not prepping us for a week to go out and play somebody and run them off of the field, like, ‘Hey, let’s just go wax these guys and onto the next.’ This is the NFL. Everybody is really freaking good at football. (Quinn) gets us hyper-focused and has this humble approach of how we are going to fight, our exact plan of what we are going to do to win that fight — but you’d better be ready to freaking fight.”

An 11-year veteran, two-time Pro Bowler and the longest-tenured member of Washington’s team, Way has played for four head coaches and has heard more than his fair share of game-planning speeches — the majority of which missed their marks.

Way recognized things had changed for the better the first time he experienced Quinn’s detailed mission statement.

“The way he comes in, being that clear and how he says the words, ‘This is how we’re getting down this week,’ I’m sitting there as the punter in the seats and I’m like, ‘Cool. This is how we’re getting down this week. Let’s do it.’ And you know you’re not doing it anyway but together,” Way said.

“Nobody ever feels like they’re on an island. And that’s why guys have found it so easy to get behind Dan.”

Sunday, Quinn will lead the Commanders against the Philadelphia Eagles in the NFC Championship Game, Washington’s first in 33 years. The Commanders are just one step away from the Super Bowl a season after a 13-loss campaign and yet another franchise reset.

In only a year, Quinn has managed to do something nine full-time predecessors could not: serve as the catalyst for the culture change of one of the most dysfunctional and disappointing franchises in the NFL and turn Washington into a bona fide winner.

Quinn has delivered change by being a walking, talking example of consistency, accountability, discipline, excellence and authenticity. He took the roster entrusted to him by second-year owner Josh Harris and first-year general manager Adam Peters and, helped by the play of dynamic rookie quarterback Jayden Daniels, made the Commanders one of the biggest surprises of the 2024 season. Washington went 12-5 in the regular season, then beat the Tampa Bay Buccaneers and the Detroit Lions — the NFC’s No. 1 seed — in the first two rounds of the playoffs to advance to Sunday’s NFC Championship Game.

“Coach Quinn is here just every day, preaching the same mindset, being consistent,” said eighth-year defensive lineman Jonathan Allen, who, like Way, has played under four head coaches in Washington. “He’s been on the same page with Mr. Peters and Mr. Harris, and that’s what it takes to change a culture. From Coach Quinn to Mr. Peters to Mr. Harris — they all have one goal they’re working toward, and that’s the start of any good company, business or team.”

They say the first step to solving any problem is to acknowledge that there is a problem. But when it came to solving the deep-seated problems that have crippled Washington’s football team for the better part of three decades, Quinn preferred to ignore them.

Long before his days as coach of the Atlanta Falcons and defensive coordinator of the Dallas Cowboys, Quinn played his college ball at Salisbury University (then Salisbury State) on Maryland’s eastern shore, two hours from the nation’s capital. His first coaching jobs were at William & Mary and Virginia Military Institute, two schools located in areas full of Washington football fans during the franchise’s glory years. Two-plus decades of coaching in the NFL with San Francisco, Miami, the New York Jets, Seattle, Atlanta and Dallas familiarized Quinn with Washington’s bleak years.

“I knew some of the history,” Quinn said during a recent post-practice interview. “I knew this was at one time a crown-jewel franchise, but they’d been stuck in the mud, and stuck for a while.”

But when Quinn interviewed for and eventually accepted the Commanders’ head coaching position, he didn’t concern himself with the details of previous owner Daniel Snyder’s 24-year reign of toxicity and futility. He didn’t tally the long list of coaches and GMs who’d promised hope, only to leave with the franchise still in shambles.

Harris would sign Quinn’s checks and Peters would work “shoulder-to-shoulder” with him to reinvigorate the franchise. That’s what mattered.

Quinn didn’t dig deep or query players or staffers to learn why his immediate predecessor, Ron Rivera, had failed. That’s because he knew and respected Rivera as a person and coach. But also, all that mattered to Quinn was how the Commanders would operate on his watch.

“I wanted to recognize that regardless of how the team had done ‘XYZ’ before, this is how we’re going to do it moving forward,” Quinn said. “I didn’t want to say, ‘The team didn’t do well,’ because I wasn’t here for that. I knew Ron, so there was zero reason for me to make any judgement on that. But I had ways I knew we were going to execute going forward. … I had really high standards I wanted our players and coaches to have, and I was clear on that.”

Quinn, 54, learned about high standards from his three most influential NFL mentors. He still leans heavily on lessons learned from Steve Mariucci while with the San Francisco 49ers, Nick Saban with the Miami Dolphins and Pete Carroll with the Seattle Seahawks — all three successful yet very different coaches.

Mariucci taught Quinn the importance of maintaining a standard of excellence while directing the franchise built to prominence by Bill Walsh. From Saban, Quinn learned the importance of demanding the same unwavering toughness and physicality in every single practice that he would in games. From Carroll, he learned how to prepare players for Sundays by building competition into everything the Seahawks did on a daily basis.

Despite folding all of those lessons into his coaching philosophies, Quinn has remained mindful to go about the job in his own way rather than trying to imitate his mentors.

“Coach Quinn has been so organic and just himself, and he’s just a guy you want to play hard for,” said Allen, who also played for Saban at Alabama. “He just gets it. He’s one of the guys, but he’s also just a great leader and a great coach to play for. I love it. Whenever you get an opportunity to play for a coach and organization that all they care about is winning, that’s the goal of an NFL player, so it’s awesome.”

As Quinn explained his expectations for his new players and his goals for the team, he also made it clear that for Washington to succeed, some of the loudest voices and strongest displays of leadership had to come from the locker room.

To help fill those roles, he identified three highly successful veterans for Peters to acquire in free agency: linebacker Bobby Wagner, whom Quinn had coached in Seattle; tight end Zach Ertz, who, like Wagner, had a Super Bowl ring and multiple Pro Bowl selections; and running back Austin Ekeler, a second-team All-Pro kick returner in 2024 and member of the NFL Players Association’s leadership team.

“I didn’t bring Wags here to coach,” Quinn said of Wagner, the future Hall of Fame middle linebacker who has consistently ranked among the league leaders in tackles during his 13-year career. “I brought him here to play, but I knew the standards he would have, and I thought he didn’t have to do anything, just be himself turnt up. And I thought the same thing with Zach and Austin Ekeler, who both had really high standards as ballplayers and teammates.”

When he got all of his veterans together for their first offseason conditioning sessions before the draft, Quinn invited a group of Navy SEALs to team headquarters for bonding exercises to help the Commanders begin to develop a strong sense of brotherhood. Quinn then split his players into groups and challenged them to compose a list of standards by which they believed successful teams operate. When the players reconvened, they compared notes and formed their tenets for the season — a list strong on commitment, accountability, dedication, unity and consistency. They called the document “The Commander Standard.”

This, according to Quinn, was how they laid the foundation for Washington’s new culture.

“Culture for a group,” Quinn said, “is all about how they do business together, because it has to be an everyday thing. … Environment is different from culture. Like, I’m upbeat by nature, and if you’re around here, you’ll feel an energy in people, and that’s how I live. I am positive. But that doesn’t make it your culture. The culture is the way you do everything together. It’s the meetings; it’s the discipline at the practice; it’s the way we communicate together and the standards you have for one another. So, sometimes I think people think of a happy place and assume that’s culture. No, that’s our environment.

“But we’re strict about what we do. We correct and teach a lot,” he continued. “I don’t think you have to be an (a–hole) to do it right, but you can’t look the other way either. So if Zach drops a pass, that’s on the tape. Bobby misses a tackle, that’s on the tape.”

And those gaffes are pointed out in front of the whole team, even if they are committed by esteemed leaders.

“That is the consistency any ballplayer or coach would want,” Quinn said.

That consistency further strengthened Quinn’s credibility in a Washington locker room where, in the past, some players struggled to trust and respect coaches and other team officials because of double standards they say they observed.

As the Commanders navigated offseason practices, training camp preseason and the regular season, Quinn’s messaging never changed. As expected, his leaders set a strong tone for the type of work ethic, professionalism and unquenchable thirst for improvement his players adopted throughout the season.

“We have a lot of leaders, but we do it in our own way,” wide receiver Jamison Crowder, a 10-year veteran, said. “I’m more a lead-by-example-type guy, and we have some more vocal, like the Bobby Wagners and the Zach Ertzes and those guys, but we have a lot of guys just helping out young guys with some things to do on the field, off the field, locker room or the training room, whatever it may be, giving them advice. You see that a lot, and that’s huge. Guys see that, and they just kind of follow suit.”

Player leaders certainly have set a strong tone for the Commanders. They have helped them weather adversity, like a lopsided 37-20 loss to the Bucs in the season opener, or the three-game losing streak from Weeks 10-12 that may have fractured previous Washington locker rooms. But players also credit Quinn’s leadership for their ability to pull their way out of that hole and reach the playoffs as a wild-card team after closing the regular season with five consecutive wins.

Every Monday starts the same way for Quinn and his players.

The coach leads a meeting he calls “Tell the Truth Mondays.” During that session, the coach and his charges review their game from the day before. Good plays draw praise. Bad plays draw scrutiny and correction. The coach — and the tape — tell the truth, even if said truths are uncomfortable. Once the session ends, Quinn encourages his players to either savor the win for a few more hours or let themselves feel the anguish of defeat further. Tuesdays are a day off for rest, recovery, family time and the final flushing of any feelings over the previous game’s outcome.

By Wednesday morning, the book on that game has closed. Win or lose, it’s never mentioned again. The attention shifts to the upcoming opponent, and Quinn again sets the tone for how the Commanders will take the next step of a quest that once felt so improbable, but now feels much closer to reality.

After three decades of suffering, change has finally come to the Commanders. Is a trip to the Super Bowl the next step? Perhaps, but Quinn hasn’t allowed his players to discuss that, because the Eagles await on Sunday, and that’s all that matters.

Instead, when the Commanders filed into the meeting room Wednesday morning and took their seats, they heard a familiar refrain.

“This is how we’re gonna get down.”

(Top photo: Scott Taetsch / Getty Images)

“This is the one!”

Lewis Hamilton could not hide his excitement as he walked among the road cars in the ‘heritage section’ of Ferrari’s headquarters in Maranello, Italy.

As he spotted a bright red Ferrari F40, one of the rarest of the manufacturer’s road cars, in the middle of the floor, he paused. Spreading his hands across the rear spoiler, a smile engulfed his face. He’d found his favorite.

It was this kind of wonder that Hamilton, a seven-time world champion who has seen and won it all in Formula One, sought when he decided to move to Ferrari. For all the success he enjoyed with Mercedes, nothing could match the history and the magic of F1’s most iconic team.

The moment he had dreamed about since childhood, becoming a Ferrari driver, had finally arrived.

Day one at Maranello had been almost a year in the making for Hamilton. Since announcing his shock decision to quit Mercedes after 12 seasons, he endured a difficult and, by his own admission, occasionally awkward final year. Closing that chapter in Abu Dhabi may have been emotional, yet Hamilton knew it was giving way to something new and exciting.

To mark the start of this era, uniting F1’s most successful driver and most successful team, every detail had to be meticulously planned. Ferrari F1 team principal Fred Vasseur was reluctant to have a big presentation or media event, not wishing to add any extra work or distraction to the team’s plate amid its preparations for the new season.

But it had to make Hamilton’s first week at Maranello memorable.

The F40 housed in the ‘old’ side of Ferrari’s factory — the headquarters is split between the historic part of the facility, noted by its yellow buildings and walls, and the ‘new’ side that is red — was wheeled through the Italian drizzle to the Piazza Michael Schumacher, named after the great who won five of his seven F1 titles for Ferrari. On it stands the house of Enzo Ferrari, the founder of the legendary manufacturer who had watched many legends sample his red cars from the window. History resides wherever you turn at Maranello.

Hamilton met with Vasseur and Ferrari CEO Benedetto Vigna before posing for photos outside the house next to the F40. Even Hamilton’s outfit for the day had been carefully planned by his stylist, Eric McNeal, right down to his red-soled Louboutin boots. The first official pictures of Lewis Hamilton, Ferrari F1 driver, quickly went viral and became the most-liked photo on F1’s Instagram page in less than 24 hours, as well as gracing all the front pages of the Italian sports newspapers the next morning.

Hamilton also made time to visit the fans, Ferrari’s loyal tifosi, who had congregated outside the factory gates at Maranello since the early morning hours, desperate to glimpse their new hero on his first day.

While at McLaren and Mercedes, Hamilton struck a strong bond with his fans (known as ‘Team LH’) and wants to rekindle that kind of relationship at Ferrari.

“I don’t know really what to expect, but I’m really looking forward to connecting with that community,” Hamilton said in a press conference last August. Taking a few minutes with fans to pose for pictures and offer signatures as they chanted his name was a good first gesture. It created a bystander out of Ferrari president John Elkann, one of the key brokers in signing Hamilton and perhaps the most powerful figure at Ferrari.

A lot rests on 2025 for both Ferrari and Hamilton. Ferrari missed out on its first constructors’ championship since 2008 by just 14 points, while Hamilton is still searching for a record-breaking eighth world title. His struggles with the Mercedes car through 2024 made for a season of lagging behind teammate George Russell. Shaking off that funk and proving he still has the edge that once made him near-impossible to beat at the peak of his powers in F1 is a critical part of this move.

It made Hamilton’s time getting to know his new colleagues through a factory tour and subsequent meetings on Monday and Tuesday vitally important. Hamilton always took strength from the closeness of his relationships with his teammates at Mercedes, particularly with his race engineer, Peter Bonnington, who he likened to a brother. Taking over that role will be Riccardo Adami, who was the engineer for Carlos Sainz (the Spaniard affectionately nicknamed Adami ‘Ricky’) as well as four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel, and will now be the voice on the end of the radio to Hamilton through races.

Hamilton suiting up for his first test at Fiorano. (Ferrari)

Ferrari planned Hamilton’s first on-track outing behind the wheel of its 2023 car for Wednesday at its private test track, Fiorano, which is adjacent to the factory. But it was always weather-dependent, making it hard to predict in the depths of January in northern Italy.

Preparations through Monday and Tuesday included a seat fitting and sampling Ferrari’s simulator, giving Hamilton a chance to feel, at least virtually, how his new car would perform. One of his great struggles through 2024 was feeling confident and balanced with the car, particularly under braking with his late, aggressive style. Over a single lap, Hamilton often failed to get the most out of the car. The simulator will have at least given a first read of what he can expect from the Ferrari this year, even if nothing compares to the real thing.

Hamilton’s new race helmet design for this year returns to the yellow he first used as a child in go-karts to allow his father, Anthony, to easily spot him on the track. Shots of the helmet, as well as Hamilton posing in the classic red Ferrari race suit for the first time, were shared with the world, building up excitement before his first on-track running. All that was required was for the weather to play ball.

Driving a two-year-old F1 car on a misty, cold day around a short test circuit may not have the hallmarks of a special moment, but for Hamilton, this was a day he had dreamt of since playing as Michael Schumacher on video games as a teenager, wondering what it might be like to be in the cockpit of the red car someday.

Just as it was for Schumacher at Fiorano at the end of 1995 ahead of his move to Ferrari for the following season, Hamilton’s maiden outing was both understated and poignant. After changing into his new red race suit in Enzo Ferrari’s house, Hamilton walked over to the simple garage setup next to the track, no bigger than a gas station forecourt (and branded like one, thanks to team partner Shell) and was greeted by his team. As the engineers ran through the processes, Hamilton scribbled down things to remember into a small notebook.

Hamilton and Ferrari’s crew hit the ground running this week (Ferrari)

There were a number of new faces in Ferrari gear for Hamilton to get to know, but a few watched on with added fondness, including dad Anthony. Vasseur had worked with Hamilton in junior categories and they always remained friendly, paving the way for their reunion almost 20 years later. Jerome d’Ambrosio, the deputy team principal, and Loic Serra, the chassis technical director, both worked at Mercedes when Hamilton was there.

But maybe the most essential and surprising returnee was Angela Cullen, Hamilton’s former trainer and performance coach.

Hamilton and Cullen worked together for seven years before suddenly splitting just two races into the 2023 season. Cullen had been a core part of Hamilton’s inner circle, overseeing his physical preparations and helping him ahead of races. She spent last year working in IndyCar but is now back with Hamilton’s team after signing with Project 44, his management company that looks after his business interests. Her return is important for Hamilton, who will take comfort in having some familiarity during the big adjustment that comes with joining a new team.

At 9:16 a.m., Hamilton peeled out of the garage and onto the track. At last, he was a Ferrari F1 driver. Fans and TV cameras had gathered at a couple of vantage points overlooking Fiorano to catch a glimpse of the famous #44 emblazoned on the Ferrari, including one on a bridge next to a busy road. No length is too great for the tifosi.

Testing an old car would not have given Hamilton much in terms of accurate readings of how the new season may go, yet it at least offered the chance to adjust to Ferrari’s way of working. The SF-23 car, the only non-Red Bull winner of 2023, offered a first understanding of the power delivery of the Ferrari engine and the functions of the steering wheel, both of which will differ from what he was used to at Mercedes.

Hamilton only managed 30 laps through a handful of runs in the morning, completing an installation run on wet tires before switching to slicks, and there were images of him locking up at points, yet it was never about outright pace or performance. The race drivers are limited to 1,000km of private test running in old cars through the year, meaning Hamilton’s 89km run, followed by teammate Charles Leclerc’s 42km run in the afternoon, leaves plenty of room for more ahead of the new season. A further outing is planned for Hamilton in Barcelona in the coming weeks before his first run in the 2025 car on February 19 at Fiorano, one day after the F1 season launch event at The O2 in London.

Neither the limited running nor the weather would stop his Ferrari debut from being, to quote Hamilton, “one of the best feelings of my life.”

Once his run was complete, he was taken in a black Alfa Romeo road car to get out and wave at the dozens of fans who stood behind one of the fences. His mother, Carmen, stood taking photos on her phone. Watching her son in Ferrari red for the first time, she drank in the moment. Hamilton could not help but break into a smile at the chants of, “Olé!, olé, olé, olé! Lewis, Lewis!” that greeted him. The tifosi have already warmed to Hamilton, instantly becoming their new hero.

“I already knew from the outside how passionate the Ferrari family is, from everyone in the team to the tifosi,” Hamilton said. “To now witness it firsthand as a Ferrari driver has been awe-inspiring. That passion runs through their veins and you can’t help but be energized by it.”

Ferrari perfectly balanced making Hamilton’s arrival a ‘moment’ without detracting from the focus, which must be on its performance. It knows how important this year will be coming off the back of a 2024 season that will go down as a near-miss but also a big swell in momentum that has ignited hopes just at the right time. As much as this week featured public nods to the new beginning, the behind-the-scenes work and adjustment was what really mattered to Hamilton.

It is a week that will have rekindled a lot of Hamilton’s love and passion for F1. As committed as he was to the Mercedes project, even through the toughest of times, the on-track difficulties caused that flame to flicker.

This change to a new, ambitious project, one which carries the weight of an expectant fanbase, a nation’s sporting pride and the history of those who’ve come and succeeded before in Ferrari red is precisely what Hamilton needed.

Now, it’s about working hard to make the adjustment as smooth as possible, before his full debut in Australia on March 16 truly begins his Ferrari era.

Top photo: Clive Rose, Alessandro Bremec via Getty Images; Design: Will Tullos/The Athletic