| Speed training drills are often times not incorporated | | | | impacts. |
| into hockey practices. There will always be skating | | | | Secondly, watch how the pros do it. In the NHL skills |
| drills, but speed is often something simply attributed to | | | | competition, the fastest skater competition tends to |
| nature. The thinking goes that any player who isn't | | | | feature some of the same faces each year. One thing |
| naturally fast, probably won't ever be. This is | | | | you'll notice if you watch them is they all have a similar |
| completely wrong. Like anything in sport and fitness, | | | | strategy. They'll start off with very short, powerful |
| speed can be improved through proper training and | | | | strides to get them up to speed as fast as possible, |
| practice. Here are some tips to help in that | | | | but once they've reached speed, they stop taking the |
| improvement. | | | | short, bursting strides, and transfer into longer, |
| Firstly, form is of great importance to speed, and a lot | | | | smoother ones. This is something many players ignore, |
| of players don't skate at their maximum speed purely | | | | instead opting to keep their feet moving as fast as |
| because of bad form. If form has been identified as a | | | | possible, as if they were running on the ice. This is a |
| problem, it's time to hit the power skating classes. No | | | | mistake. Start your strides short, get up to speed, and |
| one is too old for power skating if their stride is in need | | | | then maintain the speed by smoothing and lengthening |
| of some tweaking. The simple corrections to minor | | | | your stride. |
| imperfections in a player's stride can have huge | | | | |