I hope everyone who reads the blog is doing great. We are excited here in Anaheim as a new season is right around the corner. Our rookie camp went great and our main camp is going smooth as well.
At HockeySc.com, we have added some great content since my last post about the site.
First up is Darryl Nelson’s Fall Phase 1. What I have always liked about Darryl’s programs is the simplicity. Darryl ensures that his players get good and strong at the basics in the weight room. This is very similar to a way that I would design an in-season program.
Next up is my Off-Season Phase 1. I think this is actually the first off-season phase that I have posted on the site. We really had a good off-season here with a lot more players sticking around at the beginning of the summer before they headed back to their off-season homes. In the program, you can see how we switched over to a less CNS intensive model in the weight room. Mondays and Wednesdays were Leg emphasis days while Tuesdays and Thursdays were a more upper body emphasis.
Next up is Kevin Neelds’ Hip Stabilization Exercises video. Good exercises from Kevin here that are really easy to implement once your athletes learn them. We try to perform several hip stabilization exercise as well as exercises for flexion, extension, abduction, and adduction.
Darryl added his 2-Day In-Season Strength Program that he uses with a 14-year old goalie. This is a great 2-day total body program. We also use several of the exercises in this program in-season.
Next up was an article that I originally read at Mike Boyle’s blog. It is a good piece- Great Advice to Start the Season by Dan Bauer. It is really a good, common sense advice article that puts things into perspective for hockey parents. Even though our site is for strength and conditioning, these articles are a nice addition.
We hope you enjoy the site. If there is anything that you need to help make your experience at HockeySC better, please don’t hesitate to contact us.
I really can’t believe it is September 2nd. This summer has gone by quickly. I really love this time of year as all of the guys start filtering back in to town to get the season going.
Recently at HockeySc.com, we have some really good discussions on the forum including discussions on the importance of adduction exercises, pros and cons of hockey skates, and the use of creatine. We will be adding much more content as we get into the pre-season and in-season mode.
Here is what we’ve added this week:
Med Ball Core Circuits by Mike Potenza. These are 2 medicine ball workouts that are performed in a circuit like fashion. I like the progression that Mike uses and I like how they are sport-specific like at this time of the year. Good stuff from Mike.
Three Questions Every Coach Should Ask Themselves by Chris Pietrzak-Wegner. I really like this quick article from Chris as it is a good self-help piece for any Strength and Conditioning Coach. I am a big believer in that as a Strength and Conditioning Coach, you must practice what you preach. These are 3 good questions that you need to ask yourself.
I like to post these quick blog posts every week or so because I feel that HockeySC.com is a great resource for anyone that works with hockey players. If you are a Strength and Conditioning Coach, Athletic Trainer, or even a Coach, HockeySC is for you if you are working with players on or off the ice. Right now we are offering a dollar a day for a 7 day trial. I think it is the best site on the internet for hockey strength and conditioning info.
I am posting this on the morning of the first day of the RKC certification here in San Diego. This has been on my calendar and a goal of mine for a few months now. I am excited and nervous at the same time. I plan on writing a blog post on my whole entire RKC/Kettlebell experience real soon.
Back up in Anaheim, we just capped off the first week of our final phase of the off-season. I can’t believe how fast the off-season has gone by.
At HockeySC, we have had some good content put over the last 2 weeks or so. Here is what was added:
Relative Age Effect by Darryl Nelson. This is a really good, interesting piece submitted by Darryl. It kind of reminds me of the chapter in the book Outliers that where Gladwell talks about all of the January birthdays on the Vancouver Memorial Cup team. I have actually have never given any thought to what is talked about in Darryl’s article, but there are some very interesting stats to say the least.
Phase 5 ACL Re-Conditioning by myself. I added this to the previous 4 phases that are on the site. If you have been following along, I would suggest printing up all of the phases so that you can see the progressions of all of the exercises involved from phase to phase.
Lateral Plyo’s: End of Summer Phases by Mike Potenza. These are some quality plyometric videos submitted by Mike. I really like the box jump variation.
Please check out the forum and don’t be afraid to post a question if you have one. We are always checking in to answer questions and continue discussions.
Here are five exercises that are effective for hockey players at any level. They are also exercises that consist of using minimal equipment including barbells, dumbbells, and weights. These are also 5 “staple exercises” in our program. I would also classify these exercises as “Pareto Principle” exercises which are 20% of our exercises that give us 80% of our results in the weight room.
1- Front Squat- I really think that improving double leg strength is important for hockey players. Although hockey players do actually skate on 1-leg at a time, there is also plenty of time during a game when a player is in the gliding phase of skating. They may be gliding up the ice during a shift or may be battling in front of the net with 2 skates on the ice.
We front squat during the off-season once per week and will use it at the beginning of the in-season phase prior to transitioning to 1-leg variations. With front squats, we are able to get better, consistent technique across the board with an adequate load on the bar. In my view, this is unlike the back squat where you may see several variations being performed in a team setting. Examples of back squat variations would be the bar positioning on the back, depth differences, and torso positioning. With front squats, the bar is always held across the shoulders with the elbows up. The torso position allows the athlete to squat deeper because it is upright. If the torso isn’t upright, then the athlete will drop the bar.
One of the most important factors to consider is the load on the bar. Proper technique in any exercise needs to be established first and foremost. In my experience, what breaks technical proficiency down is too much load. Injuries occur as a result of the load being too much which causes form to break down.
2- 1-Leg Squat- the 1-Leg Squat and its variations are key exercises in our program. Although we still front squat (see number 1 above), we will always do 1-leg squats within our program during both of the off-season and in-season phases.
1-leg squats can be performed anywhere. In-season, we actually perform them in the visiting team locker rooms on the road when we don’t have access to adequate facilities. They are great exercises that really help us in the injury prevention process.
3- Hang Clean- Young hockey players need to be developing power. For us, the best way that has worked over time is Olympic lift variations. We will do cleans, snatches (both barbell and dumbbell), and jerks (also both barbell and dumbbell) from the hang position. Simply, we ask our athletes to move the weight as fast as possible with great technique.
The reason why we do them from the hang position versus the floor is that like the front squats, I consistently see better Olympic lift variations from the hang position. I have seen many different variations of pulls from the floor throughout the last 12 years or so. I have unfortunately seen too many back injuries both acute and long term. Too much can go wrong with pulls from the floor than with the hang position. Please ensure that proper technique is established before progressing. We are not training Olympic weightlifters.
In my coaching situation, I always need to look at what the perceived advantage of one exercise is versus another. I really don’t see the necessary advantage of lifting from the floor versus the hang but I do see a much safer variation that can give the same results.
4- 1-Leg Dumbbell S.L.D.L.- This is another staple in our strength and conditioning program. We call it a 1-leg DB S.L.D.L. when it may be more of a 1-leg slightly bent knee deadlift. We are able to get a good exercise for the posterior chain while balancing on 1-leg. The coaching cues for this exercise include having a flat back, sliding the dumbbell or kettlebell down the leg until either there is a stretch in the hamstring or the back can’t maintain its arch. Then the athlete will proceed to come back up.
Like the 1-leg squat, this is another exercise that can be done
anywhere.
5- Pull up- Pull ups and vertical pulling variations have been in my programs ever since I started writing them. I see absolutely no reason to
remove them. Athletes need more upper back strength and pull ups have shown to give you the most bang for the buck.
The inability to do pull ups is an indicator of weak upper back strength. People with weak upper backs are more prone to injury, especially at the shoulder joint(s) which is important for athletes in contact sports such as hockey. In my experience, the athletes who don’t (or in their mind can’t do pull ups) are the same athletes with bad shoulders. They could also be
just plain lazy.
Pull ups need to be done correctly for the athlete to get the full
benefit. Proper execution is when the athlete starts at full extension and proceeds to pull his/her chin up over the bar. Then they need to lower themselves under control to full extension before doing the next rep. Get off the lat pull down machines and do pull ups.
These are 5 basic exercises that have worked well for us over time. Although we do plenty of other exercises and progressions, I don’t think we could conduct our program successfully without these 5.
Sean Skahan has been a Strength and Conditioning Coach since 1998. During that time he has worked with several athletes who are now playing in the NHL, NFL, and MLB. Sean received his Bachelor of Science degree (B.S.) from U-Mass Boston in 1998. After that, he received his Masters in Kinesiology (M.Ed.) from the University of Minnesota in 2000. He became a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist (C.S.C.S.) in 1999. Sean was certified as a Russian Kettlebell Challenge Instructor- Level 1 (RKC) in August of 2011. He was certified as a CK-FMS in 2012. He also speaks throughout the world on Strength and Conditioning.
I hope everyone has had a great week. It is unbelievable to think that training camps will be starting in a little over a month now.
This week at HockeySC, we got some good contributions from different people other than me, Mike, Kevin, and Darryl. I think it is great when other coaches and practitioners contribute to help make our site what it is. Here is what we added this week:
The Hip Airplane by Jeff Cubos. In this week’s video of the week, we have an excellent re-gression for the Single Leg Straight Leg Deadlift. This is an important exercise to master as is has many benefits for any athlete, not just hockey players. We use the 1-leg S.L.D.L. often with our players. We are actually doing at least one form of it daily as either part of warm up or as a strength exercise with dumbbells or kettlebells. Jeff’s videos
show simple ways to make some necessary corrections with athletes who may have difficulty in extending the back leg straight.
Choosing a Protein/Energy Bar Wisely by Chris Pietrzak-Wegner. This is a great article which gives necessary tips on selecting the right protein/energy bar. Choosing a good nutrition product can be quite confusing for any person. There is a huge variety of protein bars on the market today and unfortunately, most aren’t much different from candy bars when you look closely at the ingredients involved. Chris does a great job in explaining what to look for in simple terms.
According to the website Dictonary.com, the definition of Durable is “The ability to resist wear, decay, etc. well; lasting; enduring.”
In team sports, the ability for athletes to be healthy on a game to game basis is sometimes what separates the good from the not so good.
In the NHL and NFL, statistics are kept on man games lost to injury (NHL) and starters games missed (NFL). Over the course of the season, it is ideal
that those numbers are low to ensure that the team is healthy. In professional sports, the athletes obviously possess enough talent to play their sport, but not so many have the durability to help them remain in the lineup. Having the best players on the team available to play in each game gives a team the best chance for success.
Unfortunately, injuries do occur. Broken bones, head injuries, and other
ailments are unfortunately unavoidable. In hockey, the speed of the game combined with physical contact and a hard rubber puck that is shot around the ice and in the air at upwards of 90+mph can create plenty of opportunities for injury. It is the soft tissue injuries such as strains/pulls to muscle groups such as the adductors, abdominals, and hip flexors that can be avoided. Can we prevent all of them from happening?
Probably not, but we can do our best at implementing strategies to help
our athletes avoid them.
Creating and implementing strategies to help prevent these injuries from occurring needs to be part of the strength and conditioning coach’s responsibility. We can’t continue to wait for these injuries to happen before we take action. We need to be pro-active, not re-active. I am not suggesting that we should be spending all of our time on “pre-hab” or “corrective” exercises instead of trying to get our players stronger at the basics. Although we do what some would refer to as Pre-hab and/or corrective exercises daily in our program. These are done with all of our athletes even if they have been identified as someone who doesn’t have any issue to “correct”. However, we use our pre-hab or correctives in conjunction with more traditional exercises used to increase strength and power. Some may refer to this as functional training. I am not
sure what it should be called to be honest, but I don’t feel like it needs to be classified as a system of training. It is what works for us and our players.
In the NFL, the youngest age a rookie may be is 21 years old. Most of these players are already strong, fast, and powerful as a result of being involved in a structured collegiate strength and conditioning program. In the NHL, the physical maturity of a young player is mostly different from the NFL. First, the NHL drafts young men when they are 18-19 years old. Also, NHL drafted players are not exposed to the similar training methods that collegiate football players are. NHL drafted players are being selected at the same age that football players are when they begin a collegiate strength and conditioning program.
In my opinion, there are only a small number of college hockey programs with good strength and conditioning programs in place. As for the junior players throughout Canada and the U.S., the off-season strength and conditioning programs provided by private strength and conditioning companies are probably the best option as the in-season strength and conditioning programs at the junior level are not as structured as the U.S. collegiate programs. The teams in the major junior leagues play double the amount of gamesthat college players do which doesn’t leave an adequate amount of time to train.
Unlike in the NFL, an 18 year old may have the talent to play in the NHL right away. With these young players, it is crucial that they embrace the strength and conditioning process so that they can develop the durability necessary to play in 82 regular season hockey games at a pace that they have never played in before. It may still take time for this development
to occur, but we must make it a priority. With the veteran NHL players, they are more like the NFL players who already possess the physical tools to play in the NHL. These players need to continue to work on their durability in the off-season and the in-season so that they can play every game. They may not need the overall hypertrophy that the younger player may need, but they still need to address some physical characteristics so that they can remain healthy.
How do you create or improve durability? Methods to prevent the breakdown of the body have to be implemented. It may be different for each player. For one player, it might be gaining strength and lean body mass. For another player, it may be continuing to gain strength but also to
improve their overall mobility. These are just some examples, but I think the point is made. Identifying the weakness and trying to improve it so that it is good enough relative to the strengths is a huge component.
What I think is important in designing a strength and conditioning program is developing an all-encompassing program which takes everything into consideration. Even though an athlete may have specific weaknesses versus strengths, we can still work on their strengths at the same time. I don’t think that other areas need to take a back seat as we work on weaknesses.
Durability should also be the focus of the training for the average trainee. The ability to resist wear and decay should be why we embark on exercising. You don’t have to be a pro athlete to not want to decay.
I hope everyone has had a great week and also have a great weekend. This week at HockeySc, I will call the Mike Potenza week because we had 2 awesome contributions from him. Mike is a really good Strength and Conditioning Coach who has done an ubelievable job with the San Jose Sharks. He is also a good friend who I get to share ideas with every once in a while. Here is what we had added to the site by Mike:
Linear and Lateral Movement Training– This a really good in-depth article on Mike’s linear and lateral movement philosophies and progressions. What I like most about the article is the coaching cues included. These types of movements are important for hockey players to learn and do properly so they can move more efficiently. I have a very similar belief system with this philosophy. My only addition would be the importance of the crossover step. Check out my Improving the Crossover Step For Hockey in the article section of this site if you have not.
2-Day Summer Travel Workouts– This is something that does come up quite frequently with hockey players, especially the pros. Sometimes when a player goes out of town for a few days, workouts like these are necessary. The hotel gym may not be good enough or what I run across more frequently is players not having enough time. A players’ personal time on vacation really needs to be taken into consideration. These are is quick, bang for your buck, workouts that will be just fine in any situation.
Thats it for the week. Special thanks to Mike Potenza for putting up some great content. Also, don’t forget to check out the forum. We have a good discussion going on about how to design an on-ice conditioning program late in the off-season.
We have had tons of content added since my last post about HockeySC. Along with the quality content in the form of articles, videos, programs, and webinars, the forum continues to have great discussions. Currently, there are discussions on slideboards, short off seasons, and summer hockey schools. If you are a member and you want to ask a question, please don’t be afraid to post it on the forum.
Here is what we have added in the last few weeks:
In Season Training Webinar by myself. In this Webinar, I give the same presentation that I gave live last month at the Roger Neilsen’s coaches clinic. In season training ias something that I am passionate about as it consists of the most time that I spend with our players.
Training with the NHL Carolina Hurricanes is a video featuring Peter Friesen, the Athletic Trainer/Strength and Conditioning Coach of the Carolina Hurricanes. Pete is a passionate, high-energy coach who gets the most out of his athletes. This is a good video that shows Pete in action.
ACL Rehab Phase 4 by myself. This is another part of my ACL rehab program. You can see how we progressed along with all of the exercises included in the program. The exercises during this phase aren’t too much different from exercises used with “healthy” players.
Interview with Power Skating Coach Cathy Andrade by Mike Potenza. I am seeing the benefits of proper power skating coaching with players, especially younger ones who might need to fine-tune some aspects of their skating. As a result, I’ve seen some drastic changes in some players’ stride and technique over the years from good power skating coaching. This is a good interview with a good power skating coach.
4-Day Off Season Program Phase 3 by Kevin Neeld. This is a good program designed by Kevin. I really like the pre-training assessment questions on the sheets of paper for each workout. There are some excellent exercise variations in this program.
Posterior Chain Variations by Darryl Nelson. In this video, Darryl shows some examples of the posterior chain exercises that he uses with his players. Darryl shows how uses such as the stability ball, slideboard, and the TRX for strengthening the posterior chain. Good stuff from Darryl.
First, here is some background information for those who are reading this blog for the first time. I am scheduled to do an RKC workshop in San Diego in August. I am currently training with Kettlebells so that I can make it through the weekend (which I hear is brutally challenging) and pass the Snatch test. My training is going really well. My sessions are spread throughout the week where I am doing h1-arm swings with a 32k on Monday, snatch prep with the 24k bell on Wednesdays, and high rep snatch work with the 16k bell on Fridays. Each day I am also doing Turkish Get Ups and Presses. This is a routine that I picked up from reading another one of Brett Jones’ articles and getting some practical instruction from Jim Hooper RKC who owns and operates Balboa Fitness here in Newport Beach, CA. I was fortunate to spend a few hours with Jim where he critiqued my form and gave me some pointers. We both agreed that the program I am following will be beneficial to me as I build up strength and endurance for the weekend and the test.
For those wondering about my snatch progression, I am on the 7+7 reps each arm on the minute for 12 minutes. I just finished 11 minutes last Wednesday; however, my form was breaking down on my left arm. I really didn’t think that another set would look or feel good. I am going to get another week of 7 reps before I head to 8 reps each hand in 10 minutes. I am going to own each stage before I progress to the next. On a different note, one thing that I was concerned about was my hands. I have experienced torn calluses now a few times. Each time, I had no clue they were torn until I looked at my hand when I put the bell down. Now I feel that I have figured it out as I have been obsessively shaving them down and smoothing them out. Now they feel better and I can grip the bells pretty good. The 100 rep goal will be attainable when I head down to San Diego.
What does this have to do with Hockey? I think as a Strength and Conditioning Coach, you owe it to your athletes and yourself to be in the possible condition you can be in. Many times when I tell someone what my training routine is, I usually get a response “what else are you doing” or “what are you doing for cardio/conditioning?” I probably don’t need to be doing anything else besides the work with the kettlebells because all of the endurance work with bells is probably sufficient enough. However, I really can’t train 3 days out of a possible 7.
One thing that I really enjoy is playing hockey. I have been playing in an adult league now for the last year. When I play, I really enjoy the competition. I really want to win no matter if it is a league game or a pick-up game that I play once per week. I actually just played a 10:40 pm game this past Saturday night. On the way to the rink, I thought back to when I was in my early twenties which was when Saturday nights were for other activities. If you asked me then if I could ever picture myself at age 35 playing a hockey game at 10:40 pm on a Saturday night, I would say you were crazy. Actually, the toughest part was that I am usually in bed an hour before the start time! It is just amazing how life changes right in front of you.
I really never skated until about 4 years ago here in Anaheim. I would started skating with the injured players to help them get their on-ice work done. It was difficult at first as I was absolutely terrible out there. However, our guys were more than helpful when it came to the small technical instructions that have helped me along the way. (By the way, I am still terrible when in comparison to the pro’s.) I know that my experience with our injured players and by playing in a league has helped me do my job better on a daily basis. My perspective has changed when it comes to designing workouts for strength and conditioning sessions for our players.
So when I am asked what I do for conditioning besides work with kettlebells, I say that I play hockey 2-3 times per week. Playing hockey is a really good conditioning tool. Several times, I will wear a heart rate monitor and I will usually see my heart rate in the 175-182 bpm range.
For now, this is what’s working for me. I feel great as I think the kettlebell work is helping my hockey performance and the hockey skating is helping my conditioning in the kettlebell work.
The off-season is going by quickly. I can’t believe that we are already at the annual NHL draft weekend as it seems like it was yesterday that the regular season ended. Next week is also our annual prospect conditioning camp. I really enjoy the prospect camps because we get to teach young players how to train what we feel is proper. Most of the teams in the NHL are incorporating these camps now as I think everyone is starting to see the benefits of them to their success.
As we prepare for the camp and I roll along with working with some of the roster players who are in town during the summer, it is time to give an update on what’s happening on HockeySc.com. We have had some really great content added over the last week or so.
The HSC Roundtableis a new feature to the site. In this segment, myself, Mike Potenza, Kevin Neeld, and Darryl Nelson give our thoughts and opinions on setting up a training facility. Although some of our answers are very similar, there are some differences as we each have had different individual issues that we had/have in setting up our facilities.
My Barbell Complex video was up next as I added a complex that we use with a barbell during the last phase of the off season. We will also use this as an exercise in-season as well.
Off-Ice Games by Darryl Nelson is a video showing some simple, fun games that Darryl has used with some youth players that he has worked with. These are ways to make the drills exercises fun with the benefits of gaining some speed and agility.
There were 2 programs added this week in 4 Day Off-Season Training Phase 2 by Kevin Neeld and Speed Strength Phase of Training by Mike Potenza. Both of them are good programs that work well in Kevin and Mike’s system. I always read the programs to look at the coach’s template and workout flow. These are some really solid programs from these guys.
Next up was a link to an interview with Mike Babcock. This was submitted by Kevin Neeld and it was originally on NHL Network. Mike is one of the most driven to succeed person that I know. He is someone who approaches everything with intensity, including continuing his own education and getting better. This is worth a listen for some extra motivation to seek constant improvement in whatever your profession may be.
Last up was Darryl Nelson’s Core Training. In this article Darryl explains his philosophy on core training. Like me, Darryl is a believer that we should not be performing flexion and rotation. We should be performing ant-flexion/extension and anti-rotation exercises in our core programs. In the article, Darryl references Dr. Stuart McGill who I have read about and seen speak several times. This is article is a must read if you are still doing crunches or sit ups with your players.
