As much as a week of triple-session practices has been good preparation for the East and West squads that will meet in Friday night’s 14th annual Maine Shrine Lobster Bowl Classic, it’s also a physical challenge for even some of the most well-conditioned football players in the state.

“You just can’t simulate coming out on the field with 20 pounds of equipment on. That’s the biggest change for most of the players, including myself,” said East wide receiver Danny White of Foxcroft Academy. “You can train all summer and you still can never simulate putting on all the equipment and coming out in real live play.

“After contact starts the mornings are tough,” White added. “It takes three or four days to get used to it.”

The reward for enduring the pains and strains of training camp comes Friday night, when the best of Maine high school football’s Class of 2002 gather at Waterhouse Field in Biddeford.

The game is scheduled for a 7:30 p.m. opening kickoff. Tickets are $10 for reserved seats, $7 for general admission. All proceeds benefit the Shriners Hospital for Children in Springfield, Mass.

The West has won 12 of the 13 games in the series, including a 13-0 victory last July. The East’s lone win came in 1999.

“Winning is obviously why you come down here,” said East head coach Tom Bertrand of Maine Central Institute in Pittsfield. “This is for the kids at the Shriners Hospital, but when you practice three times a day for two hours in the heat each time, you’re not doing it to lose the football game.

“It is very important for us as coaches to give our kids the best opportunity to win the game and for them to give us the best performance they can.”

Both rosters are loaded with talent from all three high school classifications. The East squad includes offensive lineman Jacob Folz of Oxford Hills, headed to the University of Maine on a football scholarship; running back Jeff Parenteau of Belfast, a 5,000-yard career rusher who was a Fitzpatrick Trophy finalist; defensive back Zak Ray of Bangor, another Fitzy finalist as well as the state’s reigning Mr. Basketball who will attend Bates College in Lewiston this fall; and White, the 2002 Little Ten Conference Class C Player of the Year.

Handling the quarterback duties for the East will be Jason Coleman of Orono, who twice passed for more than 1,000 yards in a season for the Red Riots, and former Waterville High standout Ryan Lockard.

“I think defensively we’re a pretty fast team,” Bertrand said. “The defense has come together really well as a unit. Offensively we’ve got some good backs and good receivers and we’re pretty good up front, and it’s just a matter of bringing the whole thing together.”

Sharing time at quarterback for the West will be Keith Derrig of 2002 state Class A champion Portland and David Chase of Oak Hill High School in Wales.

Other West stars include Fitzpatrick Trophy winner Carl Frye of Portland, Nial DeMena of Scarborough and Max Arsenault of two-time Class C state champion Boothbay, all running backs; Matt Benson, a two-time all-state center from Jay; University of Maine-bound tackle Shawn Demaray from Livermore Falls; Will Hews, an all-state tight end from Portland; and wide receiver Max Janelle, a Fitzpatrick Trophy semifinalist from Thornton Academy in Saco.

“They’re huge, they’re huge, they’re huge, ” said Bertrand of the West squad. “They have big guys up front, big backs, and big kids on defense. They’re just going to line up and be physical with us. They make no bones about it. They’re gonna say ‘Here we are come and stop us,’ and we need to do that in order to be competitive.

“We’ll counter their size with schemes and with our athletes, trying to get people in the right place at the right time and making the right plays. We feel like we’ll be able to line up and match up across the board if we get things done the right way. “