Only if you want more lateral agility

Quick Lateral Power Agility Drill For Goalies

For those of you who have attended the UGT Live or trained with me at RevCon, you know there is an awesome park right across the road.  We get our HockeyStrong group out there as much as possible during the summer for their off-ice speed and agility training.

It is awesome out there, so it motivated me to shoot a few vids out there with one of our goalies.

This hockey training drill is a great one for helping you build lateral power and first push quickness.  We use it with goalies and skaters, to teach proper mechanics to increase the efficiency of your first push.  In other words, this drill teaches you to move more explosively from your ready position without a time lag.

For a goalie it means you can play with more patience.

For a skater it means you won’t fall half a step behind your opponent when the puck gets turned over.

Here’s how to do it…

How It Improves Your Speed

If you are looking to improve your on-ice speed with this drill (which is the entire purpose of the drill), you will go for 10s or less per rep and rest for at least 50s between reps.  You can do mobility, core or skill work during the 50s rest.  Do 4-6 sets of 10s on: 50s off.

Key Points

  • Stay low in the legs
  • If you are a goalie, hold your glove hand and stick hand in proper position
  • Your shoulders should be moving straight across, there should not be any up and down
  • Keep your ankle dorsiflexed (toes pulled up) as you step laterally, this protects you from spraining your ankle during the drill.
  • If you don’t have microhurdles, that is totally fine – use a shoe, your hockey gloves, an empty laundry detergent box – whatever.  Just make sure you are not going to trip over it and sprain your ankle.

I will catch you later in the week for an advanced version, so make sure you try this one out today or tomorrow.

Cheers,
M

PS – I have picked San Jose in 6 for the Cup – – I like Pittsburgh too though. Looks like SJ is going to win the next four straight 🙂