Q&A: Resistance Band Training for Hockey
The first two weeks of May are jammed for sure so I wanted to send you a quick video about resistance band training for hockey – this one is for goalies and skaters. Before I get to that, let me give you a rundown of my week.
HockeyStrong training program started in the Revolution gym with new session times which always leads to mass confusion and then we are starting new programs for the hockey players AND our on-going Varsity athletes PLUS we started the new RevConPro rewards system where athletes training at the Revolution studio can gain points for doing what they do anyway – getting more flexible, stronger and more powerful.
The great news here is that the coach I hired back in January to work with me at Revolution Conditioning – Tyler Doig – remember him from the OHL Guelph Storm? Well he is an awesome coach – I think the athletes like him better than me – so things are running smoothly!
Then I had to take my Mom to the airport on Wednesday morning. My Mom has not flown without my Dad for over 50 years, so to say she was a little anxious would be an understatement, so naturally my car died while I was driving her to the airport so we had to finish the journey by cab 🙁
Then yesterday I was presenting at the Ontario High School Coaches’ conference in St. Catharines. Today I am running a workshop with Team ShutOut Goaltending in Toronto and this Thursday I fly out to San Diego to meet with my business coaches Bedros Keuilian and Craig Ballantyne – WHEW!
Okay now for today’s Q&A. One of you asked me about where to get resistance bands that he could use to complete the Ultimate Goalie Training 2.0 program. He also was not sure what to look for or what grade of resistance to buy, so I put it all in 3-minute video for you…
Two Brand New Goalie Training Videos…
Hope your day is off to a good start – I am a big believer in what one of my mentors Alwyn Cosgrove says “there are only good days and great days”and I will still call today a great day even though the sewer backed up into our basement this morning. Tomorrow we are out of town all day and Sunday we are running a 1/2 marathon (that we have not adequately trained for I might add) and THEN we get to come home to roto-rooter our sewer.
I know most of you think that roto-rootering the sewer is a job best left to the pros – and you would be right, but the Paul (the love of my life, darling husband) is big on being a do-it-yourselfer – so we will be spending Sunday afternoon wrestling a metal snake through the drain and about 20 meters out into the backyard. Yes, it will be exactly as fun as it sounds 🙁
But then I got this email from one of you and it reminded me of what is important – helping my 10,000 goalies win more games with fewer injuries – I changed it a little bit to protect the identity of the sender but here is what it said…
Understanding Sports Hernia in Hockey Players
There are different types of hernia – inguinal and umbilical are tears in the abdominal wall that will often include a bulge where the contents of the abdominal cavity can squeeze out (kinda gross I know).
Then there is what is referred to as the sports hernia which is also a tear in the lower abdominal wall, but there is not usually a bulge. Here is where the sports hernia is different, it will typically start with a groin injury or groin pain and develops over time from there.
So how does an injury move from the groin (or adductors) up to the lower abdominals? The answer is that it does not actually move from one location to the other. The injury in the groin leads to a secondary result of a change in the way an athlete uses their hip joint after groin injury.
Is The Injury Healed When The Pain Is Gone?
The goal of most hockey players (and some of their therapists) after groin injury is to make the pain stop. No pain = No injury right? Wrong.
Off-Ice Goalie Workout At Steve McKichan’s Free MiniCamp
What a weekend! Is it just me or did it feel like there was hockey on 24-hours per day for the last few days? Now, you know I did not stay up to watch the late games, but I did see lots of hockey. I was thrilled to see Team Revolution athlete Andy McDonald and his St. Louis Blues teammates move on to the second round.
I was cheering for Pittsburgh, but Philly did deserve to win that series so that is good for them. You may have heard me mention the new coach who is working with me at Revolution, Tyler Doig, those of you who follow the OHL will recognize him from his years with the Guelph Storm before moving on to play in the ECHL and AHL. Well, Tyler called the Kings to move past the Canucks in 5 before the series even started. There will be some major boasting going on in the gym today.
Finally, I watched the Washington v Boston game which I found really entertaining and I am keen to see how it ends up in game 7…BUT… The highlight of my weekend was heading out to Strathroy (we call it Strath-VEGAS around here) to run a session for Steve McKichan’s Future Pro mini-camp.
You see, Steve generously donates his time, expertise and ice to run a completely FREE mini-camp out of his home base in Strathroy for 20 goalies who are action takers. You see he posts this free offer over at www.GoalieStore.com and the first 20 goalies to jump at the offer are in!
So, in the spirit of giving I volunteered to head out and run the off-ice session – it was awesome! Some of the goalies had done a lot of off-ice training before so they ripped through the workout. Some had not done much off-ice training before and had never used an agility ladder, so it was a new experience for them altogether. But guaranteed, everyone found at least one weakness that they can now work on and improve.
Here is the workout we went through:
7 Glute Activation Exercises For Hockey Players (video)
Hope the week is treating you well so far – thrilled to see the Blues rolling vs. the Sharks (sorry Jonny :)) I hope they keep that going. Interested to see if some refs will actually show up to the Pittsburgh – Philly game tonight and if the boys will actually play some hockey. Hope so.
This is a quick post today as I wanted to make good on my promise to show you video of the exercises I mentioned in the post about how glute activation enhances leg power in athletes. The research study looked at leg power in Aussie Rules Footballers but leg power is leg power, so adding this to your dynamic warm-up will enhance your leg power too.
The study looked at the effect of doing one set of 10 repetitions for each exercise….cue the video.
Research Review: One Of These Warm-Ups Will Improve Your Power
There is constantly new research coming out every week suggesting that this training method is better than that one. It is a bit like taking a hike in the Amazon jungle, although at times it may be beautiful and pure, other times there can be questionable species lurking in the shadows.
What I mean is that some researchers do a great job of controlling the variables they are studying and drawing some very nice conclusions, whereas others are looking to make a splashy headline and have skewed the results – even though that is strictly taboo in the academic world – it happens.
I am going to help guide you through some of that research and give some practical applications which will either help reduce your risk of injury or improve your performance on the ice, so let’s get started with this study on the effect of different warm-up protocols on lower body power.
Bottom Up Training For Goalies – ADVANCED
You might recall a few months ago we did an entire “Bottom Up Goalie Training” series showing you ways to ensure your joints were doing the job they are intended to do. I explained the importance of proper function at the ankle, knee, hip, spine and shoulder, then went over some maintenance exercises that would help keep the injury bug at bay.
At that time I offered to do an advanced series and there was a good response to that offer, so here it is – the Advanced Bottom Up Training for Goalies series. We will once again start at the ankle.
In the video below we will explore dynamic mobility and stabilization of the ankle joint including:
The three planes of movement at the ankle (1:30)
– Building calf strength while developing balance and stability in the most vulnerable position for the ankle (2:35)
– Working tibial rotation at the ankle joint which really works the muscles of your lower leg, but also your hip (3:20)
– A nice lunge matrix that fits perfectly into any dynamic warm up – READ: This would be a good one to do before games & practices (4:30)
Do Hockey Players Need Strength Or Power?
Do You Know The Difference?
With fewer and fewer teams left in the play-off hunt, thoughts are turning to next season and off-ice training for goalies and skaters alike. It is also the time when I get phone calls from players or their parents to tell me what their child needs in his or her off-season hockey training.
One of the most popular comments is a variation of “Johnny does not need any more strength, I don’t want him to be bulky. He has really powerful legs, but he needs to be quicker and more agile.” There are a few contradictions in this statement, so my goal for today is to help you understand the difference between these two attributes and where they fit into the overall off-season training protocol.
Survey Winner + Real Life Nutrition Review…
I did a post last week on nutrition for hockey players and why you should not be eating like a supermodel. I got a request from a reader to review his weekly nutrition since it is something he has been working on as a goal for 2012. In fact he has totally eliminated soda pop from his diet in 2012. This young goalie is so polite and respectful that I wanted to help him out, so I figured I would turn it into a blog post.
I do this with all of the athletes I train at Revolution Conditioning and the players in my Elite Goalie Strength & Conditioning program so hopefully this gives you some ideas for your own nutrition planning. I will add my comments below in bold so they will stand out for you…
Your chance to be the Boss & WIN a copy of ALL my programs ($350 value)
You may not know this, but I am a huge Springsteen fan. Not the kind of ‘huge’ where people have seen 217 Springsteen concerts on 4 different continents, but I have seen him play four times in Toronto and had an outstanding experience every time. Even if you are not a Springsteen fan (or don’t realize you are one) I strongly recommend that you go to at least on show in your life. You will not be disappointed.
Anyway, I listen to the Springsteen channel on XM radio quite often when I am driving into the gym and sometimes they are running the feature called “you be the Boss”. This is where listeners get to phone in and decide what the next 3 or 4 songs will be.
So I am going to do the same with you guys. I want you to be the Boss and tell me what I should do for my next product (which I want to release in the next month by the way). I will give you until Friday, March 30th to have your say (you can still give me your input after that, but you will not qualify to win a FREE copy of ALL my programs – a $350 value).