The Off-Season Cheat Code to Massive Gains

by Travis Martell | May 12, 2025 | Educational

As playoffs wrap up and spring hockey ends, we’re stepping into the real off-season. Even if you’ve only been able to train once or twice per week, that’s still progress. Every rep counts, and the work you’re doing now is setting the tone for the gains to come.

Keep the Goal the Goal

The goal is to become a better hockey player, not just to gain weight or lift more in the gym. Strength leads to power on the ice. Don’t get distracted by physique goals. Training is the means to improve performance, not the end goal.

Train for Strength, Not Size

Bodybuilders train for muscle size. Powerlifters train for strength. Hockey players must train for functional strength that improves skating, balance, and puck battles. Big muscles that don’t help you on the ice are just extra weight. And extra strength that doesn’t produce power is just a way to feel good in the gym because you can lift more weight. Hockey players need everything that they do in the gym to transfer to the ice so they can become better hockey players!

Fueling Your Gains

Recovery starts with nutrition. Here are your targets:

Protein: 1.6–2.2g per kg of body weight per day
Carbs: 4–8g per kg of body weight per day
Hydration: 3–4L of water daily + some sodium to aid water retention

Pre-training: 5–10g protein, 30 minutes before
Post-training: 20–40g protein + 4x carbs (e.g., juice, rice, pasta, oats)

Recovery & Sleep

Sleep is when your body grows stronger. Aim for 10–12 hours per night. Can’t hit that? Take a 30-minute nap after training. Sleep is the most overlooked performance enhancer. Avoid screens at least 1 hour before bed, and wind down with a book if needed.

The Power of Consistency

Consistency is king. Even one workout per week during busy months maintains progress. Keep the habit alive. Show up, even when it’s inconvenient. Small steps done repeatedly lead to big results.

Effort: 100% of What You Have

Your best effort may look different every day. Some days you’ll be full of energy, others not. But your job is to give 100% of what you’ve got in that moment. Show up and give your best based on how you feel that day.

Say Yes to What Aligns With Your Goals

Only say “yes” to things that push you closer to your goals. If it distracts from training or recovery, it’s a no. If it builds you up, it’s a yes. This filter helps you stay on track.

Prepare for Success

“Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.” ~ Ben Franklin. Pack your gear the night before. Plan your snacks and meals. Prep allows you to protect your most valuable resource, and this is your time, and ensures you’re consistent when life gets busy.

Bottom line: If you train smart, fuel properly, recover well, and stay consistent, this off-season will be your best one yet.

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Will Creatine Make Me Slow?

by Travis Martell | Apr 18, 2023 | Educational

Will Creatine Make Me Slow?

I was asked the above question the other day by one of my athletes. And the question reinforced the importance of speed in sports. You can be big and strong, but if you’re not fast then you’re in trouble. Before we find the answer to whether or not creatine will make you slow, we need to understand what creatine is and its role in the body.

What is Creatine?

Creatine is a naturally occurring compound found in the human body with about 95% stored in the muscles as phosphocreatine. This compound is used for energy production, especially during short bouts of highly intense exercise. Creatine is produced by the liver, pancreas, and kidneys and is also obtained through dietary sources such as meat and fish. Creatine is an essential component in the production of adenosine triphosphate (ATP), which is the primary source of energy for the body’s cells (your muscles!).

How Does Creatine Work in the Body?

When you consume creatine either through diet (meat and fish) or supplementation, it is converted into phosphocreatine and stored in the muscles which increase our intermuscular supply. When you lift weights, perform plyometrics, or you’re working on your speed, the body rapidly depletes ATP (adenosine triphosphates) as this is the main source of energy used each time the muscles contract during activity. Having extra phosphocreatine in the muscles acts as a reserve of energy that the body can quickly access during these activities and regenerate ATP thus maintaining a high level of energy during our training sessions which can lead to improved muscular strength, power, and speed.

Additionally, creatine has been shown to increase muscle cell volume and protein synthesis (rebuilding muscle), which can lead to increased muscle mass and strength over time. Creatine supplementation may also help reduce the amount of muscle damage and inflammation during exercise, which can improve recovery time and reduce soreness. Lastly, creatine has also been shown to increase muscular endurance, this will allow you to perform more repetitions during your training sessions before experiencing fatigue.

Debunking the Myth: Will Creatine Make Me Slow?

Finally, on to what is most important, will I get slow if I supplement with Creatine? Short answer, NO! One of the most persistent myths surrounding creatine is that it can make you slower. The theory behind this myth is that creatine causes the body to retain water, which can increase body weight and slow down athletes. However, studies have shown that creatine supplementation does not lead to significant weight gain in athletes, and any weight gain is likely due to increased muscle mass. And if you’re training the correct way for hockey, this increase in mass will help you become faster.

Furthermore, research has consistently shown that creatine supplementation does not negatively affect speed or agility. In fact, creatine has been shown to improve sprint performance and increase vertical jump height in athletes because of the positive effect it has on the development of strength and power of the muscles.

In conclusion, creatine is a safe and effective supplement for athletes looking to increase muscle mass, strength, and power. It does not cause significant weight gain, nor does it negatively affect speed or agility. As with any supplement though, it is essential to consult with a healthcare professional before beginning creatine supplementation and to follow dosing recommendations carefully.

From Box Jumps to Breakaways: How Hockey Players Can Improve their Game with Smart Training

by Travis Martell | Mar 24, 2023 | Educational

From Box Jumps to Breakaways: How Hockey Players Can Improve their Game with Smart Training

A quick internet search will yield numerous videos of individuals attempting to jump on exceedingly high boxes. Occasionally, you may even stumble upon clips of failed attempts. Although visually impressive when they land on the box, the activity ultimately serves as a mobility exercise instead of a power exercise. Rather than getting their hips higher off the ground which would require a lot of lower body power, the individuals merely lift their feet high enough to land on the box. Even though this may look impressive, it is not an effective technique for improving lower body power.

Before we get into the benefits of why performing box jumps correctly will improve your lower body power and breakaway speed we need to know the difference between jump training and plyometric training.

Jump Training vs Plyometric Training

Jump training and plyometric training are both types of exercises that involve explosive movements aimed at improving athletic performance. However, there are some subtle differences between these two types of training.

Jump training typically refers to exercises that solely focus on jumping as a means of enhancing lower body power, explosiveness, and overall athleticism. These exercises focus on improving vertical or horizontal jumping ability by performing various exercises such as jump squats, box jumps, broad jumps, lateral bounds, linear bounds, and other variations of jumps or bounds. All these variations can be performed either single or double-legged. These exercises typically involve using a combination of body weight and/or external resistance to strengthen the lower body muscles involved in jumping and bounding.

Plyometric training, on the other hand, involves a wider variety of exercises that aim to improve overall power, force, speed, and agility. Plyometric exercises also involve jumping, hopping, bounding, and other explosive movements. While a lot of the exercises may be similar as jump training exercises the biggest difference is that plyometric training utilize the stretch shorting cycle at a faster rate than jump training. The stretch shorting cycle works by rapidly stretching and contracting muscles involved in the particular movement (ie. depth jump). Plyometrics are also classified as either “slow” or “fast”. A “slow” plyometric exercise has a ground contact time (how long you spend on the ground) greater than or equal to 0.251 seconds and a “fast” plyometric exercise has a ground contact time of less than or equal to 0.25 seconds. The goal of plyometric training is to improve the body’s ability to generate force quickly and efficiently, which can enhance athletic performance and increase your breakaway speed.

In summary, while both jump training and plyometric training involve explosive movements, jump training is a subset of plyometric training and focuses solely on jumping exercises to improve the total amount of power produced, and how quickly this is done isn’t as important, while plyometric training focuses on producing power as quickly and reactively as possible.

How the box jump can help

Box jumps are a highly effective exercise for improving lower body power due to several reasons. Firstly, in order to perform a box jump, the body needs to recruit fast-twitch muscle fibers in the legs, such as the quads, glutes, and calves. These muscle fibers are responsible for generating a high level of force in a short amount of time, which is essential for executing the explosive movement required for the jump. By regularly training the body this way, it can produce more force and power more efficiently and thus improve your speed when skating, this will ultimately lead to improved performance on the ice.

Secondly, box jumps can help your breakaway speed by increasing muscle activation in the lower body like the quads, glutes, and calves. And over time, these muscles will improve their strength and power, becoming more effective at generating the force needed for skating fast.

Thirdly, box jumps utilize the stretch-shortening cycle, which involves a rapid eccentric (lengthening) contraction, isometric contracting (stopping), followed by a concentric (shorting) contraction. This entire process helps improve lower body power by allowing an explosive movement to occur. By becoming more efficient at the stretch-shortening cycle, the body can generate more power and improve overall athletic performance.

In conclusion, box jumps are an important exercise for improving lower body power due to their ability to recruit fast-twitch muscle fibers, increase muscle activation, and utilize the stretch-shortening cycle, ultimately leading to improved speed and performance on the ice.

Why the height doesn’t matter

When jumping on a box, it’s all about how high the hips get off the ground, not how high you can lift your feet up in the air. Vertical height is measured by hip displacement not how high you can lift your feet while in the air. When standing on the ground measure the height of your hips and then when you jump in the air measure the hips at peak height, this difference is how high you actually jumped, the height of the feet has nothing to do with it. The reason we use a box with our training is to reduce the landing forces (stress) and soften the land.

We want to reduce the amount of landing force because the body can only handle so much stress (ie. lifting weights, jumping, sprinting, running, etc..) in a training session and we don’t want to always waste it on landing. Landing forces can affect performance, if the body absorbs too much during a session it will start to decrease its energy and power output. The other thing we need to be aware of is the risk of injury component. Each and every time we jump and don’t land on a box the joints of the ankles, knees, and hips take on some of that force and over time this can cause some wear and tear on these joints.

So in order to get the most out of a power training session we must incorporate the box with our jumps. By choosing the appropriate size of box for our box jumps we can focus on the jumping part of the exercise and not be worried about trying to lift our feet up as high as possible to land on the box. Performing box jumps this way will allow us to get more jumps in a training session because there is less stress on the body because it doesn’t have to land on the ground after each jump.

Watch the video below to learn more. 👇

Conclusion

Jump training typically refers to exercises that solely focus on jumping to enhance lower body power, explosiveness, and overall athleticism.

Plyometric training utilizes the stretch shorting cycle faster than jump training. Plyometrics are also classified as either “slow” or “fast”. The goal of plyometric training is to improve the body’s ability to generate force quickly and efficiently.

Make sure you choose the appropriate box height to allow you to focus on the jump part of the box jump and be worried about the landing part. Also, incorporating the box into your power sessions will allow you to get more jumps in because you’re reducing the amount of stress the body has to deal with so you can produce more power longer.

A Simple Way To Build A Stronger Stride!

by Travis Martell | Apr 28, 2021 | Educational

A Simple Way To Build A Stronger Stride!

Without Needing To Be On The Ice

There are many ways to improve your skating stride in the gym or even at home. I find too many players feel they need to be on the ice in order to improve their skating. While it does help to be on the ice it’s not always necessary.

Today, I’m going to go over one simple way you can improve your skating stride at home.

With the way the game is going, skating might be arguable the most important skill to have to be an effective hockey player.

As I previously mentioned, lots of players try and improve their skating on the ice, this makes sense. However, they’re missing out on a key component and that’s a strong core.

The stronger the core, the stronger the stride. And that’s because there is less movement with the body when skating which helps put all that force and energy into the ice with each stride.

The first step in developing a strong core is by perfecting the plank. Focus on tucking those hips (stack ribs and hips). Keep your back flat (neutral spine) and build up to a 60s perfect plank. Quality always beats quantity.

Watch the video below

Should Hockey Players Train CrossFit (Part 4)

by Travis Martell | Aug 12, 2019 | Educational

Should Hockey Players Train CrossFit (Part 4)

Part 4 of Should Hockey Players Train CrossFit?

If you haven’t read the first three parts of why hockey players shouldn’t train CrossFit, I would suggest doing that first. Here are the links for Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

The first three parts of this series of articles shouldn’t have been overly complicated and the concepts should have been fairly easy to grasp. During the last part, I’m going to get into the specifics of conditioning and why you need to STOP doing CrossFit and that this style of training is preventing you from becoming the best hockey player possible.

POINT SIX: Energy system development

The last thing I want to cover is the energy demands hockey players need and how CrossFit doesn’t fulfill these needs. Hockey is very anaerobic (short bursts) with an slight undertone aerobic (longer durations) demand. The reason you need a little aerobic capacity is that this will help improve recovery between shifts and also between games and or practices. The most important system hockey players need is the anaerobic system. Making sure hockey players don’t develop their aerobic systems too greatly, they must keep their endurance work (with & without weights) to a minimum. Performing high volume of repetitions in the gym or on the track will promote too much endurance adaptation and diminish the development of strength, power, and speed. You can’t develop power and or speed with too much volume.

Muscles respond very well the stimulus presented to them. If you want to get stronger, then make sure you present your muscles with heavy enough weights to obtain that response. Power and speed are no different. Since hockey players require so much power and speed during a game, we as strength and conditioning coaches must provide the correct type of stimulus during training to the athlete in order to get the correct adaptation.

Since CrossFit and the style of training that requires the athlete to perform as many repetitions (doesn’t matter the exercise) as possible in a certain time frame (greater than 120s) will actually train more of the aerboic energy system than the anaerobic system. This is because it’s impossible to train at 90-95% of your max for that duration. If you think you can, ask yourself this question. “How long does it take me to sprint 50m?” Or even better yet, actually sprint 50m. Why 50m? most sprints in hockey are short in nature and 50m will really showcase how strong your anaerobic alactic system is. Once you have this number, multiply it by 10 and see if you can sprint 500m in that exact amount of time. For example, if you can sprint 50m in 5.5 seconds, you’d multiply 5.5×10 and then see if you can sprint 500m in 55 seconds.

Chances are you can’t perform the above example and if you can it would actually mean that you’re not as explosive and powerful as you could be. The body uses different fuels depending on the demand it is presented with. Without getting too complex, I’m going to break it down like this. Anything done at maximal or near-maximal effort (less than 20 seconds of work) will develop the anaerobic alactic system. From 20 seconds to 120 seconds it’ll shift to the anaerobic lactic system, and from 120 seconds and beyond the aerobic system is the primary system involved.

It doesn’t matter if you’re running, sprinting, or using weights as your stimulus. The energy system will adapt to the duration of the stimulus that it’s being provided. When looking at the average National Hockey League player, he has about 7-12 shifts per period lasting 60-90 seconds. But within that time frame, the player will only be skating at a max effort of 90-100% for 4-10 sprints which covers distances between 15-26 meters. That means, they’re only skating hard for 12-30 seconds of the total shift (60-90s). When looking at this data, it would make the most logical sense to train within this time frame when performing weight lifting exercises but more importantly when performing speed, acceleration and conditioning drills.

SUMMARY

Let’s sum the four parts up and everything that we’ve learned.

If you want general results then train without specificity but if you want precise results than make sure your training is accurate to your goals and having specific intent that coincide with the demands of hockey.
Training for CrossFit is very specific to the competency of CrossFit and the transferability to hockey isn’t that great.
Fitness variables compete with one another, so when you train for power you’ll get powerful and when you train for endurance you’ll be able to go longer but you can’t train for maximal power and endurance at the same time.
It’s impossible to train the mechanics of fast-twitch muscle fibers while at the same time trying to enhance the fatigue resiliency of the slow-twitch fibers. Performing this style of training as they do in CrossFit will develop a poorer specialized athlete.

Hopefully, this all made sense and that you’re on the same page as me and you can see that it’s very counterproductive for hockey players to train this style if they want to become the best possible player they can become.

Should Hockey Players Train CrossFit – Part 3

by Travis Martell | Jun 3, 2019 | Educational

Should Hockey Players Train CrossFit – Part 3

PART 2 OF SHOULD HOCKEY PLAYERS TRAIN CROSSFIT?

If you haven’t read the first two parts of why hockey players shouldn’t train CrossFit I would suggest doing that first. Here are the links for Part 1 and Part 2.

The first two parts of this series of articles shouldn’t have been overly complicated and the concepts should have been fairly easy to grasp. Over the next two parts, I’m going to get into the specifics of power, strength, and conditioning and why you need to STOP doing CrossFit and that this style of training is preventing you from becoming the best hockey player possible.

Let’s dive in!

POINT FOUR: Power development

Both the Olympic lifts, the hang clean and power clean are great exercises to develop power. Typically hockey players who are more powerful are also faster skaters because they can produce more power with each stride thus creating more propulsion on the ice. It’s imperative for hockey players to add these exercises or similar ones to their training program if they want to become faster skaters. But when you look at the complexity of these Olympic lifts, it can actually take a long time to learn how to perform them in a safe but effective manner. That’s why high-level Olympians take years to learn the movement before they actually start to load them.

When it comes to CrossFit, not only will they start to perform these complex exercises too soon they’ll also perform them with a high number of repetitions. And due to the technical nature of Olympic lifts and their effectiveness to develop power, it’s actually counterproductive to perform these exercises with high volume (lots of repetitions) and more importantly extremely dangerous. What starts to happen is that the proper sequencing of the proper speed and timing of the muscles start to alter. When this occurs, the benefit of developing power from the use of hang/power clean or a similar power exercise is virtually eliminated. This alone should make you want to stop performing these exercises with high volume and reconsider the style of your training because, at the end of the day, you should want to become as powerful as possible on the ice.

POINT FIVE: Too much risk

Continuing with the detrimental effects of performing high repetitions of the Olympic lifts and other power exercises (like the box jump) and why it’s not the most intelligent way to train. We need to understand that every exercise poses some type of risk when performed incorrectly. Each time we train and decide to do a certain exercise we must weigh out the risks and the rewards of that given exercise. After the decision is made of what the exercise will be and how many reps and sets will be performed the rewards better outweigh the risks by at least 10 fold. When we look at CrossFit and how they prescribe their Olympic lifts and other power exercises, they choose to perform them with very high repetitions. In point four you learned that power development is completely negated when high reps are performed.

With performance aside, let’s look at the risk this style of training imposes on us. It doesn’t matter how big, strong or powerful you are if you’re getting hurt along the way. You cannot perform at your best, whether that be on the ice or in the gym if you’re hurt or even battling small nagging injuries. It’s pretty simple to know what happens when performing any exercises for too many repetitions. Fatigue sets in! And when this happens with lifts like the Clean, Squat, Deadlift, or any other complex lift it causes deterioration of lifting form and thus increases the probability of disc bulges and herniation due to the extra stress placed on the spine.

Another thing to think about is how CrossFit sessions are set up. A lot of times the athlete will perform a set of burpees (click here to watch) before a complex lift like a Clean, Squat or Deadlift. While this may seem fine on the surface it’s actually detrimental on two levels. The first reason is that it has caused fatigued prior to a very complex exercise. This fatigue alone will increase the chances of a possible injury. The second reason and a little more complex is what the burpees will do to the spine. The burpees will replace disc toughness with flexibility and also soften the matrix holding the collagen fibers together. This combination will result in a more potent injury risk scenario due to less stiffness for the spine. Combine the decreased stiffness in the spine and the fatigue caused by the burpees and we have ourselves a high-risk situation.

The next risk factor is something that happens to the body at a global level. When we train longer than 10 seconds for one set of exercise we start breaking down glucose (sugar) for energy. In order for this process to happen the body must have oxygen present. With the presence of oxygen and the breakdown of glucose the body starts to create and accumulate harmful by-products (i.e., free radicals). When we don’t allow the body to fully recover between sets, this accumulation of by-products inhibits the body’s ability to balance the oxygen and the free radical ratio which may cause damage to the body and this is classified as oxidative stress. Don’t think that it’s extremely harmful and we should never train this way but when every training session causes this to happen it can lead to too much breakdown of the body and the results will be a decrease in performance and increase in the possibility of injury down the road.

Like I just said, this style of training is an important part of a holistic development plan, especially during certain times of the year. But it’s only a part of the equation and you’d be missing large pieces of the performance puzzle if it’s all you choose to do when it comes to your training.