Daily Training Tip #441

The intensity of  each of your workouts needs to be at a peak levels. When a coach walks into the room or when your teammates walk into the room or when you idol walks into the room, typically athletes pick it up a notch. Don't wait for someone else to watch you work hard, make sure your intensity is always high!

Daily Training Tip #440

We received some big, heavy tires this spring. We've been excited to incorporate them into the schedule. Once the weather finally cleared up, we were able get out on the dryland court and have some fun yesterday.


Flipping tires is a great way to build explosive power. It is a good match between strength and speed. It incorporates your entire body and incorporate multiple at the same time, which is a great way to build teamwork.

Daily Training Tip #439

I've covered this before, but one of your goals of your off-season training program needs to be to correct muscular imbalances. Sometimes muscular imbalances happen, the key is correcting them so they don't interfier with your performance. It's simple to correct, you need to train/develop both sides of your body equally!

Daily Training Tip #438

There is a 96% correlation between your off-ice sprinting speed and your on-ice skating speed. Which means, the faster you sprint on dry land, the faster you skate on the ice. So improve your sprinting speed today!

Daily Training Tip #437

Something as simple as breathing can affect your performance. Breathing is an important component in the training process. Breathing at the proper time helps with that "extra boost" during workouts or competition. Rule of Thumb; Exhale during the Hard Part. If you always breathe out during the hard part you will increase your improvements and lessen you chance for injury.

Daily Training Tip #436

There are a lot of technical points to the jumping you complete during plyometric training. However, if you focus on a few, your development will be much greater.


1) Minimize your time on the ground. By doing this, you will focus on landing and exploding up again right away. Stay off the ground as much as possible.

2) Minimize the amount of noise you produce when you land. Land softly. There are a lot of components to your landing, however, focusing on landing softly will help you develop the proper landing skills.

And

3) Snap your knees to your chest during flight. This incorporates your hip flexors and helps you clear your obstacles.

Daily Training Tip #435

Technique is a very important part of your off-ice training. Your technique needs to be your main focus while training. Once your technique is good, then and only then can you increase your weight.

Daily Training Tip #434

The proper work to rest ratio is very important to your development. Work/Rest Ratio is the amount of time it takes you to complete an exercise compared to the amount of rest you take in between exercises. You might hear something like 1:2, 1:3, 1:4, etc. While everyone's training goals are different, everyone's work/rest ratio is different as well. For hockey players, different work/rest ratios are used for different exercises. Make sure you study up on this and make sure you rest the proper amount of time.

Daily Training Tip #433

One training piece that most people forget about is training all your movement groups together on the same day and during the same training schedule. You should be lifting, jumping, skating and sprinting all on the same day. This allows all of your muscle movement groups to grow together at the same time.

Daily Training Tip #432

One Thousand Sit-Ups A Day, Keeps The Doctor Away!


Completing 1,000 sit-ups each day is the single most easiest thing you can do to improve your athletic ability. Every single athletic movement, originates in your core. So improving your core (by doing sit-ups) will improve all aspects of your game.

In terms of development, your core is a non-fatiguing area, which means you can train and develop it on a regular daily basis.

Start training today!

Daily Training Tip #431

As you progress through your off-season program, make sure you are getting enough one-leg work. Hockey is game that is played 80% of the time on one leg. Your training needs to mimick those movements in some way. Complete one-leg strength exercises as well as one-leg power exercises.  

Daily Training Tip #430

Ladder Drills are a great way to improve your foot quickness (or cycle speed). There are thousands of ladder drills to work with. The main thing is your head needs to tell your feet to move and then your feet actually need to move. Fairly simple to accomplish with repeated work!!

Daily Training Tip #429

What you do in the weight room when no one is looking defines you as a person and as a player. Great players are paying a price when others are around and are paying even more of a price when others aren't around.

Daily Training Tip #428

According to Mitch McLain, using a weed whip for two straight days is a great shoulder workout!


I'm not exactly sure if the research has been done to back Mitch up, but he is onto something. Using a weed whip, using a push mower, weeding your garden, being active outside, etc is a great way to fill your "active rest" days. Too many people just sit on the couch or have someone else do the work. Get off the couch and do it yourself! There are lots of ways to burn calories and stay active.

Don't tell Mitch, but he's missed so many spots with the weed whip, he has to do it again today!

Daily Training Tip #427

A new study found that short dynamic warmups are the best thing to do to get ready for competition or a workout. Numerous stretching and warmup tatics were studied and a short dynamic warmup came out on top in preparing  your body for action.

This is no news to MHC, we've been doing this for years!

Daily Training Tip #426

Sometimes injuries do occur. When they do, follow your doctor's orders exactly. It will probably benefit you to get multiple points of view from different doctors, but follow what they say. They are experts and know what is best. Follow their rest guidelines and their rehab guidelines. You'll be back on the ice in no time!

Daily Training Tip #425

Another great entire body circuit is completing a weight plate circuit. You should be completing a weight plate circuit once every other week. They are designed to improve the strength of the entire body. Make sure you use the correct poundage of weights.

Any weight plate will work, however, grip plates work very well for this workout. Pictured below are the new grip plates that were purchased by one of MHC's favorite campers. Thanks #74!

Daily Training Tip #424

Complete various physical tests on a regular basis, so you are able to track your improvement. Nobody cares about the orginal scores you received the first time. However, if no improvement is shown after training, then you need to rethink and recalculate what have you have been doing.

Daily Training Tip #423

If a group workout is suppose to start at say noon, you need to be ready to go by noon. So that means you need to arrive at the gym at least 15 minutes early and get warmed up so you are ready to go. If you're right on time, you're usually late!

Daily Training Tip #422

A new study just proved (again) that low-fat choclate milk beats all recovery drinks in terms of helping your body recover after a workout or competition.


Drink Milk!!

Daily Training Tip #421

You can't focus  your training on one area. You need to target your entire body. You need to build symmetry and balance. You need to work on areas that are more prone to injury. You need to pay one heck of a price!

Daily Training Tip #420

When starting your plyo workouts again this off-season, make sure you focus on a few things.


1) Before take off; bend your knees as deep as you can, keep your chest up, keep your head up.

2) During flight; snap your knees up towards your chest, keep your chest up, keep your head up.

3) On landing; land lightly on the balls of your feet, flex ankles, flex knees while keeping chest and head up.

4) Focus on landing on the ground and exploding up in the air as quicly as possible, keeping your ground contact time down to a minimum.

Daily Training Tip #419

Walking/Running backwards is a low impact, high quality workout, that all athletes should add to their monthly program.


Walking/Running backwards can be incorporated into the sprinting days of your workout or can even be added into your warmup or cooldown. Moving backwards helps build your hamstrings, which are sometimes overlooked by hockey players. Moving backwards also helps build the stabilizing muscles of your knees.

Daily Training Tip #418

A big buzz work in today's training world is "First Step Quickness." Well First Step Quickness is nothing more than the proper combination of explosive power and quickness (or foot cycle speed). Both of these are easy to improve on.


MHC has developed a workout that includes the proper work/ratio and explosive power/quickness ratio.

Daily Training Tip #417

There is no such thing as an off day. There are "active rest" days.


Some days/some workouts are more intense than others. Some are less intense and seem easier. Some days are built with no workouts. Those days are not for sitting on the couch. They are for "active rest." Active rest is playing backyard basketball, going for a jog, roller blading, anything active.

You will get more out of your workouts if you have active rest days instead of "doing nothing days."

Daily Training Tip #416

If you're not making mistakes, then you must not be doing anything. The key that makes people successful is to learn from mistakes and turn those mistakes into successes.


Same thing holds true in the gym. There is so much to be doing and so much to be done off the ice, that you are bound to make mistakes. Learn from those mistakes. Lean on other successful people. Always work towards excellence.

Example; Olympic Lifts. Olympic lifts take a long time to master. You need to be working on perfecting them on a daily basis. You will make thousands of mistakes while trying to perfect them. Just keep working!

Daily Training Tip #415

Soreness is part of the working our process. At one time or another, possibly more, you are going to get sore. The key is overcoming that soreness.


There are numerous ways to overcome soreness. I reccommend working through it. You might have to alter your workout slightly, but work through the soreness. NEVER skip a workout and sit on the couch to over come it. Best thing is to get to the gym and continue working!