another coach provided the below feedback. Coach Phil Campbell has some great feedback for hockey/skating athletes around their hamstrings tightness. Many youth coaches do not know about this ...and could be helpful.
One thought that may be beneficial for your hockey athletes and parents of young hockey players. When I worked with a national championship winning inline college team at Bethel University, I observed almost all of the hockey athletes had extremely tight hamstrings. Most couldn’t touch their toes without significantly bending their knees. For a speed and strength coach, this is a priority to address quickly.
When I studied the specific movements of skating in hockey, the observation was hockey athletes rarely fully extend their knees. Unlike other sports, I would classify hockey as a sprint sport needing supreme anaerobic conditioning, and when your line is in, it’s a near all-out speed-burst sport followed by a seated rest. The speed of the game due to line rotations to keep athletes fresh makes hockey perhaps the most exciting sport of them all to watch for spectators.
When skating fast, the body is in the universal athletic position with knees and low back bent forward, and when your line is resting, athletes are seated with knees bent. This translates to tight hamstrings unless athletes are spending time several times a week working on a corrective hamstring stretching program. While hockey skating appears to be quad dominate during a forward sprint to the puck, the glutes and hamstrings are actually the primary movers propelling the body.
Whether sprinting on a track or sprint skating forward in hockey, tight hamstrings are known to restrict movement in full speed movements. Supreme flexibility however, doesn’t translate to skating faster, but strong hamstrings and glutes that are capable of full range of motion clearly improves speed. Typically, the fastest athlete on a high school football team will have the strongest and the tightest hamstrings. But when they improve flexibility, they fly, and become even faster.
Adding ten minutes of static stretching with 30-second stretch holds AFTER practice, not before, AFTER PRACTICE resulted in significant measurable improvement in just two weeks. Using the easy, self-measurement of “sit-and-reach” with knees straight initially measuring and having athletes also estimate their inches short of or passed their toes for a 3-second hold position so athletes can see their improvement, the average gain for Bethel athletes was well over 4 inches in two weeks. When athletes can physically see measurable improvement quickly, compliance increases. They are asked to self-measure their improvement at the end of every stretching routine.
Head Coach Matt Swinea bought in, and the athletes he recruited bought in to the training strategic plan that included flexibility, fast-fiber strength, and Sprint 8 during practice or in the gym to achieve supreme anaerobic conditioning (for an anerobic sprinting sport). The results speak for themselves. These were new Bethel students recruited for a brand new roller hockey team offering partial scholarships. This team won the D-1 National Championship in Salt Lake City in 2012.
another coach provided the below feedback. Coach Phil Campbell has some great feedback for hockey/skating athletes around their hamstrings tightness. Many youth coaches do not know about this ...and could be helpful.
One thought that may be beneficial for your hockey athletes and parents of young hockey players. When I worked with a national championship winning inline college team at Bethel University, I observed almost all of the hockey athletes had extremely tight hamstrings. Most couldn’t touch their toes without significantly bending their knees. For a speed and strength coach, this is a priority to address quickly.
When I studied the specific movements of skating in hockey, the observation was hockey athletes rarely fully extend their knees. Unlike other sports, I would classify hockey as a sprint sport needing supreme anaerobic conditioning, and when your line is in, it’s a near all-out speed-burst sport followed by a seated rest. The speed of the game due to line rotations to keep athletes fresh makes hockey perhaps the most exciting sport of them all to watch for spectators.
When skating fast, the body is in the universal athletic position with knees and low back bent forward, and when your line is resting, athletes are seated with knees bent. This translates to tight hamstrings unless athletes are spending time several times a week working on a corrective hamstring stretching program. While hockey skating appears to be quad dominate during a forward sprint to the puck, the glutes and hamstrings are actually the primary movers propelling the body.
Whether sprinting on a track or sprint skating forward in hockey, tight hamstrings are known to restrict movement in full speed movements. Supreme flexibility however, doesn’t translate to skating faster, but strong hamstrings and glutes that are capable of full range of motion clearly improves speed. Typically, the fastest athlete on a high school football team will have the strongest and the tightest hamstrings. But when they improve flexibility, they fly, and become even faster.
Adding ten minutes of static stretching with 30-second stretch holds AFTER practice, not before, AFTER PRACTICE resulted in significant measurable improvement in just two weeks. Using the easy, self-measurement of “sit-and-reach” with knees straight initially measuring and having athletes also estimate their inches short of or passed their toes for a 3-second hold position so athletes can see their improvement, the average gain for Bethel athletes was well over 4 inches in two weeks. When athletes can physically see measurable improvement quickly, compliance increases. They are asked to self-measure their improvement at the end of every stretching routine.
Head Coach Matt Swinea bought in, and the athletes he recruited bought in to the training strategic plan that included flexibility, fast-fiber strength, and Sprint 8 during practice or in the gym to achieve supreme anaerobic conditioning (for an anerobic sprinting sport). The results speak for themselves. These were new Bethel students recruited for a brand new roller hockey team offering partial scholarships. This team won the D-1 National Championship in Salt Lake City in 2012.
We get comments from different sources. Not just here. this one is worth re-sharing.
Coach Doug writes:
Hi Greg,
Another great piece.
I’ve seen high level players who have had their careers cut short.
Our son was one of them.