Hockey Players Are NOT Weightlifters!

If you’re a hockey player, don’t get so wrapped up in how much weight is on the bar. It’s really not that important! Here’s why…

Hopefully, you’ve been reading the articles I’ve been posting and you’ve started to implement my training tips. When speaking with Junior level coaches (players 15-20 years of age) I keep hearing the same thing. Their players are training for the beach and not the hockey rink. Their players are only training to get big and look good, they aren’t overly concerned with their athleticism. On the other hand, there are also hockey players who only train to get as strong as possible. While strength is very important when trying to improve athletic performance, there are a lot of other aspects of training that need to be taken into consideration when training for hockey.

Hockey players’ NUMBER ONE training purpose needs to be to improve muscle health and function; In other words, injury prevention. If you are injured then you can’t train and missed training days or missed games can be detrimental to your overall improvement. There are some things you can’t control and little setbacks may happen but following a program that is designed to make you be as healthy as possible is much better than one that only focuses on strength or size.

Hockey players need to lift weights to get stronger but that should never be the main focus. Becoming faster and more powerful while increasing your endurance should be the top priority for a hockey player’s workout program. If you solely focus on lifting weights you’ll miss out on the other aspects that will improve you as a hockey player. Hockey is a very dynamic sport so you must have all aspects of athleticism to excel at this sport.

Here is a quick list of areas to focus on for your off-ice training:

• A strong core is mandatory. The core is the centre of all of the body’s movements. If your core can’t support your own bodyweight with certain movements then how do you expect your core to brace and help you lift weights? To learn how to strengthen your core click here.

• Focus on moving better. If you can’t perform a bodyweight squat properly then why are you performing a squat with weights? Don’t add load to dysfunction! Learn to move better and then add weight to the bar. You’ll get stronger a lot faster and this strength will transfer better to your on-ice performance.

• Work on your stability. Having improved stability in the gym will help with sharper and more defined movements in the field when performing agility and change of direction drills.

• Focus on power exercises. Once you are moving better and your core strength and stability is improved start working on your power. Performing plyometrics is a great way to improve power. Click here to read how to safely work on your plyometrics.

• Improving your endurance can be done simultaneously while working on all of these other areas.

• The form is more important than weight. For example, when performing a power exercise like a hang clean, the focus needs to be placed on the bar speed and not the weight. The speed of the bar is what will transfer into a more explosive stride on the ice.

Everything you’re doing in the gym has to transfer to your performance on the ice. If you’re not feeling more mobile, quicker, stronger, more powerful, and better conditioned on the ice, then you’ve wasted your time and energy in the gym. Because at the end of the day it’s the results on the ice that matter not how much weight you’ve lifted.