Have Your Best Hockey Off-Season Yet!
Once the season is over it’s likely you’ll want to take a break and chill out after a long tough season. Although we do suggest two weeks off to let the body recoup and fully revamp, you don’t want to take too much time off as that can lead to poor off-season habits. We’ll show you the top mistakes we see in the off-season and how to stay focused to ensure your best hockey off-season yet!
Top 3 Hockey Off-Season Mistakes
#1. Doing Random Programs
It’s tempting to find a random program online and think it’s going to work for you or be best for your development. Although it could work for you, results will usually be limited and exercise selection may not fit your specific needs or goals. Also doing multiple different programs is usually a bad idea. They may not blend together and maximize your development or even worse lead to overtraining or injury.
#2. Not Staying Consistent
It’s likely your enthusiastic at the beginning of the offseason and want to go as hard as you can… but then motivation or your body’s ability can’t keep up with the overly intense programming leading to inconsistency in training schedule. It’s important to understand where your body needs to start out and progress your body properly through the long off-season of training. This will allow for you to stay on a consistent schedule leading to maximized results!
#3. Doing Too Much
Doing too much or too many different things is more typical than you would think. Hockey is a tough sport to train for, there are a lot of specifics to focus on as well as on-ice training and techniques. It can be easy to try to do too much of everything in the off-season, thinking more is better. It’s important to find the sweet spot of the appropriate amount of time on the ice and in the gym.
How to Stay Focused and Have Your Best Off-Season Yet!
Focus on Development
It’s important that you focus on developing and becoming a better player in the off-season. This means sticking to a consistent program that has your goals and body in mind! Working around injuries and adjusting the program as you progress or as your body changes is what truly creates results in the off-season!
Schedule for Consistency
You have to create a schedule that you can stick to and that your body can endure all off-season. It’s okay to work in lighter workouts and de-load weeks as needed but missing multiple weeks in a row or just working out here and there because the program isn’t sustainable isn’t going to make you the best hockey player you could be this off-season. Consistency compounds your results!
Focus on Progressing Your Development Not Just Doing the Most Things
Getting the best results isn’t always directly tied to how much you’re doing. Excessively training in the gym and on the ice can lead to diminishing returns or potential injury. Also doing a bunch of different programs, skate clinics or camps without a specific development plan in place can also lead to lackluster results as they may not all coincide with each other. Develop and build your foundation of movement instead of just doing a lot of random things.
Creating a strong consistent training program that caters to your goals and body’s needs is what will create the best off-season for you. Scheduling a consult with a Hockey Performance specialist for a movement assessment would be a great start to understanding what type of program would be best for you to start maximizing your results this off-season!
Written by:
Rob Jost – NSCA-CPT, ACE-CPT
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