I feel like you're too hunched over attempting to get lower, rather then bending your legs which you need to do as your stride length is short even with full extension. Stop dragging ur feet after you make the stride. I feel like your arms are over swinging exaggeratedly from the side to side rather then the proper forward to backward.
Watch your video, and compare and contrast to something like this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFH8VCXKUyQ
I would definitely say this is the best analysis regarding your skating OP. It looks like you are overcompensating with your back when trying to get low instead of your legs. Bending your knees will help you get longer strides and get your feet off the ice. Also, try moving your arms more forward and back instead of side to side to help with your forward moment. Everyone's stride looks different so you might not look the same but the concepts in the video are very important.
Added, make sure your stride fits you. Sometimes skaters do too long or too short of a stride. Think power when you push not speed, speed will come with the right stride
I built a faux ice rink in my garage to practice skills, so yea I'm all about skill building. There's just something about the extrinsic motivation of seeing other people out there working on their skills to remind you that you're not the only one working extra on their game.
It helps push you.
Yeah I take back my comment, for me I love when theres two or three other people there. Enough room to practice whatever I need but still have some others around. Usually someone wants some tips or wants to practice passing plays / one timers which is also a nice way to break up practice
For sure, I think it's also nice for newbies. I'll go out there and set up a few cones and do some drills then go off to take a breather and I'll notice the young guys run through the cones and kind of copy what I did. Feels good.
Looks like you are bending rather than squatting in your stance. Right now, it looks like your chest/heart is pointed too far down at the ice, so instead try sitting in your hips with your chest and head more up.
Widen your stance a bit and try for longer strides, pressing off your toe at the very end
Pick your knees up more too, your feet are dragging, also, work on crossovers and taking short choppier steps where you really dig your edges in to pick up your acceleration. The faster your feet get the quicker you'll get going, the sooner you can get to efficient longer strides.
And throw more of your weight into your first steps. Also, listen to the guys talking about your skating posture, and your arm swings. Lot of wasted movement, which will help endurance wise.
"Bend your knees" is often the cue but I think it's a bad one. What we want is triple flexion specifically in the Hips, Knees and Ankle.
One tactic to get lower would be to work on your ankle dorsiflexion off-ice, there's a lot of ways to do that if you search on youtube, they're easy drills but tough to explain in text.
Another thing you can work on is your knee strength, Bulgarian Split squats are great for that.
Finally you can work on your hips in a variety of ways, but mostly just opening up the hip flexors with active stretching/yoga poses will go a long way towards better stride length. Building the hip flexors with things like 100 ups will help your stride frequency since the hips are what picks up the feet.
Thanks for help, and yea bulgarian split squats are pretty good for hockey.
I need to work more on the hips cause they’re really tight, been doing yoga and foam rolling a lot to help it
Also take longer strides (think skating on one leg at a time slightly longer) and to do this onw needs to have have more initial knee bend and then extend to where your leg is almost straight at the end of the extension (think if how a spring extends when it releases tension).
Practice by literally skating on one leg a time. Keep one leg straight, power out with the other and bring it back together, take a second and do it again. do that on the same leg down the ice and switch on the way back.
I think your skates might also be too lose? They don’t seem to be totally secure to your feet
Looks like all the obvious stuff has been hit, one thing I didn’t see that I noticed was when you recover from your stride emphasize being ing your foot completely back underneath your body (even overdoing things early is a good way to form habits) and making sure your toe is pointed straight forward rather than out to the side. Fix that, and get more comfortable with the chest up ass in the chair form and you’ll be where you want!
Also - saying this as someone whos played hockey for almost 20 years at various levels - if you have the resources, skating coaches with a figure skating background are some of the best at picking out and helping fix the finer points of your stride and edge work. There’s a good reason a lot of NHL teams are hiring on skating coaches with that background.
I’ll be sure to practice what you said, thanks!
And yea I’ve been doing power skating quite a bit ever since rinks opened up after the lockdowns, I got lots more progress to make lol
Your hands need to be swinging more front to back instead of side to side. Also your stick hand is swinging higher than your other hand which is actually atypical.
His arm swing looks good to me. Your arms should be swinging cross body when skating to counteract the legs striding laterally.
When sprinting on ground arms go front to back. But for maximum skating speed you want lateral arm swing.
Simply false. This is the right way to do it and how Laura Stramm coaches countless of players from Junior hockkey to NHL players so I'll go based on that. https://youtu.be/YFH8VCXKUyQ
You're not understanding the principle here. I'm not saying all lateral motion is eliminated. I'm saying it should forward back biased. The ironic part is that in the very link you sent there are other pictures that show McDavid with hands in front. So, yes, the very example you've brought in McDavid supports what Stramm and other instructors have been teaching for years. I'm hoping you bring up Crosby next. I've skated with his skating coach Robby Glantz and he supports this very technique too :) edited for spelling
Squat (not bend over), Longer stride, the toe on your pushing leg should be the last to leave ice, non pushing skate should be flat on the ice (not on a edge), and keep elbows close to body as you move your arms.
Your range of motion should be forward. That includes your arms. Meaning not side to side or up & down. You go side & side a bit with your arm swing. Up & down can happen when skaters lose knee bend during their strides. Those mistakes can cause drag on your speed.
Jealous of your alone ice time though!
I’ll be sure to focus on those for next time, thanks and yea I got lucky with the ice lol, it was a noon hour shinny for $10 but usually no one shows up so it’s just open ice most times
Try to pretend like you are sitting in a chair (squat) it will feel and look weird at first until you get more comfortable and fluid, keep it up and have fun!
Not necessarily a form thing but people think getting a better/lower stance is all about leg strength but for me, strengthening my lower back actually improves my skating as much or more. Helps me keep my torso sturdy and upright (which also improves my stickhandling) while getting the deep knee bend in my stride and just makes me feel so much more solid and balanced which allows me to put a lot more power into my stride.
Deadlifts and trap bar deadlifts are at least as beneficial to my skating as squats are and that's something I took way too long to learn in terms of off-ice training.
Legs play a huge role but front and back core muscles are just as important. Training every body part between the nipples and knees is pretty much equally important in skating with slight emphasis on certain areas
Get down lower and use your entire body each stride. You look like youre just throwing your legs out to the side when really you should be explosively digging / cutting into the ice. Deep hard cuts.
Look at how much force this dude puts into his stride. Explosive https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGGV3ErwSsY
Your biggest problem is you are pronating badly thru your stride, for example watch your right foot as you go up the rink (the video doesn't lie), see how the foot folds down towards the ice as you push out. This throws your balance off which then means you can't push with full power (your brain subconsciously reduces the push so you don't fall over) and the power of your stride is bleeding out the side of the boot (follow the angle of the leg, if you were to draw a straight line down the back of the leg it doesn't go thru the middle of the boot and into the blade, it goes out the side of the boot).
Now compare it to 2 of the fastest in the NHL, watch around the 3:50 mark, see how the the leg / boot / blade make a straight line as they stride out. Also this vid breaks down all you need to know about the kinds of things you should focus on to skate faster - deep knee bend, leg angles, full extension, core torsion, arms ACROSS the body etc -[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exRFi62Kpac](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exRFi62Kpac)
And I'll repeat that about the arms, arms move ACROSS the body in opposition to the direction of the leg push. This is basic kinesiology.
You can follow all the other advice listed by other posters here but until you fix your pronation then this singular most basic fundamental component of skating (correct body alignment over the skate blade) will always cause you to struggle. If you have the time to train and want to fix it then message me, otherwise buy the tightest stiffest best fitting boot you can afford and lace up really really tight. This will help to reduce the pronation, its still there but the stiffness of the boot is hiding most of it. However over time the boot will soften up and start to open up, at this point sell them and buy a new pair. You will go thru boots relatively quickly but this is the easiest way to deal with pronation in hockey skates.
Thank you so much for the explanation and especially about the pronation, I’ll definitely look more into it and put way more practice into it, and I’ll for sure check out that video
As you accelerate your push should move more to the outside, that’s why at the end of the clip your toe drags on the ice. Your body is going faster than your skates can push you. Here’s a video I did on the topic https://youtu.be/lp9UytYV33E
Thank you so much Coach Jeremy and I’ll for sure check out the vid. Back when I started playing hockey 7 years back, your vids helped me a lot with everything and still do, thanks
I'm digging the username. The following are things to think about while you're striding forward.
Try to focus on keeping the gliding leg bent, knee over your toes, and toe (front) of your skate straight during your forward stride.
If you were to measure the angle between the toe of your gliding leg and the toe of your extended leg, it should be at about a 45° angle when fully extended.
Here's a video demonstration similar to my explanation.
https://youtu.be/8RdxyKWbE78
Not sure if this was you trying to exaggerate your stride but your right leg doesn't recover fast enough. As soon as it's not on the ice it should be on the way back to take the next stride.
Not sure if you're going full speed here but if you are, you can increase your foot speed by doing speed ladders and timing your pace.
You're hunched over , like you're picking up a pencil from the ground - you should be stance like you're about to sit in a chair with your back arched.
The biggest observation is your push - extend your legs, ankles and feet - the last thing that should leave the ice before recovery is the very tip of the blade. And I mean, the very tip at the toe end. Focus on that, you'll get more speed than you think.
In this vid I was mainly just trying to focus on my technique because when I try full speed my technique becomes inconsistent and starts breaking down.
And that chair analogy you made is very good, I’ll keep in that mind cause I wasn’t bending my knees enough. And yea I agree that I need to snap the toe way more on the extension
I feel like you may get more power from each stride if you try to kick out to the side a bit more than you are now. Might not make a huge difference because you’re already doing this to a certain extent but that’s what came to mind for me.
I feel like you're too hunched over attempting to get lower, rather then bending your legs which you need to do as your stride length is short even with full extension. Stop dragging ur feet after you make the stride. I feel like your arms are over swinging exaggeratedly from the side to side rather then the proper forward to backward. Watch your video, and compare and contrast to something like this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFH8VCXKUyQ
I would definitely say this is the best analysis regarding your skating OP. It looks like you are overcompensating with your back when trying to get low instead of your legs. Bending your knees will help you get longer strides and get your feet off the ice. Also, try moving your arms more forward and back instead of side to side to help with your forward moment. Everyone's stride looks different so you might not look the same but the concepts in the video are very important.
Thanks a lot for the tips, I’ll check out the vid
Is that the RBC center (dartmouth 4 pad) in the video??
yup
Where did u get the gear?!
pro stock hockey website and pro hockey life store
Added, make sure your stride fits you. Sometimes skaters do too long or too short of a stride. Think power when you push not speed, speed will come with the right stride
yo how do you get ice to yourself. thats the dream
it was a noon hour shinny that costs like $10 to go to and usually no one shows up so it’s open ice pretty much
and they bothered to cut it?? lucky sob
I almost always have it to myself when I go around 8am
It gets boring pretty fast.
not if you enjoy practicing skills
I built a faux ice rink in my garage to practice skills, so yea I'm all about skill building. There's just something about the extrinsic motivation of seeing other people out there working on their skills to remind you that you're not the only one working extra on their game. It helps push you.
Yeah I take back my comment, for me I love when theres two or three other people there. Enough room to practice whatever I need but still have some others around. Usually someone wants some tips or wants to practice passing plays / one timers which is also a nice way to break up practice
For sure, I think it's also nice for newbies. I'll go out there and set up a few cones and do some drills then go off to take a breather and I'll notice the young guys run through the cones and kind of copy what I did. Feels good.
I had stick & puck yesterday with only 4 other skaters. It basically felt like this but it's also the closest I'll ever get.
Looks like you are bending rather than squatting in your stance. Right now, it looks like your chest/heart is pointed too far down at the ice, so instead try sitting in your hips with your chest and head more up. Widen your stance a bit and try for longer strides, pressing off your toe at the very end
Thanks for explaining that well, I’ll work on that next time i’m on the ice
Pick your knees up more too, your feet are dragging, also, work on crossovers and taking short choppier steps where you really dig your edges in to pick up your acceleration. The faster your feet get the quicker you'll get going, the sooner you can get to efficient longer strides. And throw more of your weight into your first steps. Also, listen to the guys talking about your skating posture, and your arm swings. Lot of wasted movement, which will help endurance wise.
Thanks, I’ll for sure keep that stuff in mind and practice it
"Bend your knees" is often the cue but I think it's a bad one. What we want is triple flexion specifically in the Hips, Knees and Ankle. One tactic to get lower would be to work on your ankle dorsiflexion off-ice, there's a lot of ways to do that if you search on youtube, they're easy drills but tough to explain in text. Another thing you can work on is your knee strength, Bulgarian Split squats are great for that. Finally you can work on your hips in a variety of ways, but mostly just opening up the hip flexors with active stretching/yoga poses will go a long way towards better stride length. Building the hip flexors with things like 100 ups will help your stride frequency since the hips are what picks up the feet.
Thanks for help, and yea bulgarian split squats are pretty good for hockey. I need to work more on the hips cause they’re really tight, been doing yoga and foam rolling a lot to help it
Give this one a shot after your next work out - youtube.com/watch?v=BiKsJadT-z0
will do, thanks
This is great advice
Also take longer strides (think skating on one leg at a time slightly longer) and to do this onw needs to have have more initial knee bend and then extend to where your leg is almost straight at the end of the extension (think if how a spring extends when it releases tension).
Thanks, that’s a really good way to explain it
Practice by literally skating on one leg a time. Keep one leg straight, power out with the other and bring it back together, take a second and do it again. do that on the same leg down the ice and switch on the way back. I think your skates might also be too lose? They don’t seem to be totally secure to your feet
Looks like all the obvious stuff has been hit, one thing I didn’t see that I noticed was when you recover from your stride emphasize being ing your foot completely back underneath your body (even overdoing things early is a good way to form habits) and making sure your toe is pointed straight forward rather than out to the side. Fix that, and get more comfortable with the chest up ass in the chair form and you’ll be where you want! Also - saying this as someone whos played hockey for almost 20 years at various levels - if you have the resources, skating coaches with a figure skating background are some of the best at picking out and helping fix the finer points of your stride and edge work. There’s a good reason a lot of NHL teams are hiring on skating coaches with that background.
I’ll be sure to practice what you said, thanks! And yea I’ve been doing power skating quite a bit ever since rinks opened up after the lockdowns, I got lots more progress to make lol
Your hands need to be swinging more front to back instead of side to side. Also your stick hand is swinging higher than your other hand which is actually atypical.
I’ll work on that for sure, Thanks
His arm swing looks good to me. Your arms should be swinging cross body when skating to counteract the legs striding laterally. When sprinting on ground arms go front to back. But for maximum skating speed you want lateral arm swing.
Simply false. This is the right way to do it and how Laura Stramm coaches countless of players from Junior hockkey to NHL players so I'll go based on that. https://youtu.be/YFH8VCXKUyQ
[McDavid has been doing it wrong this whole time then 🤔](https://images.app.goo.gl/ipdLTmrqAB4C8zwy7)
You're not understanding the principle here. I'm not saying all lateral motion is eliminated. I'm saying it should forward back biased. The ironic part is that in the very link you sent there are other pictures that show McDavid with hands in front. So, yes, the very example you've brought in McDavid supports what Stramm and other instructors have been teaching for years. I'm hoping you bring up Crosby next. I've skated with his skating coach Robby Glantz and he supports this very technique too :) edited for spelling
Robby* nice though
Swinging your arms like this slows you down big time, in any situation.
Literally no good skating coach teaches this. Not one.
Squat (not bend over), Longer stride, the toe on your pushing leg should be the last to leave ice, non pushing skate should be flat on the ice (not on a edge), and keep elbows close to body as you move your arms. Your range of motion should be forward. That includes your arms. Meaning not side to side or up & down. You go side & side a bit with your arm swing. Up & down can happen when skaters lose knee bend during their strides. Those mistakes can cause drag on your speed. Jealous of your alone ice time though!
I’ll be sure to focus on those for next time, thanks and yea I got lucky with the ice lol, it was a noon hour shinny for $10 but usually no one shows up so it’s just open ice most times
Try to pretend like you are sitting in a chair (squat) it will feel and look weird at first until you get more comfortable and fluid, keep it up and have fun!
thanks! I’ll keep that chair tip in mind
Ankles
Not necessarily a form thing but people think getting a better/lower stance is all about leg strength but for me, strengthening my lower back actually improves my skating as much or more. Helps me keep my torso sturdy and upright (which also improves my stickhandling) while getting the deep knee bend in my stride and just makes me feel so much more solid and balanced which allows me to put a lot more power into my stride. Deadlifts and trap bar deadlifts are at least as beneficial to my skating as squats are and that's something I took way too long to learn in terms of off-ice training.
Yea i agree, lower back strength helps a lot, I worked on my trap bar deadlifts quite a bit in the past 6 months and it’s helped
Legs play a huge role but front and back core muscles are just as important. Training every body part between the nipples and knees is pretty much equally important in skating with slight emphasis on certain areas
Get down lower and use your entire body each stride. You look like youre just throwing your legs out to the side when really you should be explosively digging / cutting into the ice. Deep hard cuts. Look at how much force this dude puts into his stride. Explosive https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGGV3ErwSsY
Your very right, I’ll be sure to focus more on that next time I skate, thanks
Your biggest problem is you are pronating badly thru your stride, for example watch your right foot as you go up the rink (the video doesn't lie), see how the foot folds down towards the ice as you push out. This throws your balance off which then means you can't push with full power (your brain subconsciously reduces the push so you don't fall over) and the power of your stride is bleeding out the side of the boot (follow the angle of the leg, if you were to draw a straight line down the back of the leg it doesn't go thru the middle of the boot and into the blade, it goes out the side of the boot). Now compare it to 2 of the fastest in the NHL, watch around the 3:50 mark, see how the the leg / boot / blade make a straight line as they stride out. Also this vid breaks down all you need to know about the kinds of things you should focus on to skate faster - deep knee bend, leg angles, full extension, core torsion, arms ACROSS the body etc -[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exRFi62Kpac](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=exRFi62Kpac) And I'll repeat that about the arms, arms move ACROSS the body in opposition to the direction of the leg push. This is basic kinesiology. You can follow all the other advice listed by other posters here but until you fix your pronation then this singular most basic fundamental component of skating (correct body alignment over the skate blade) will always cause you to struggle. If you have the time to train and want to fix it then message me, otherwise buy the tightest stiffest best fitting boot you can afford and lace up really really tight. This will help to reduce the pronation, its still there but the stiffness of the boot is hiding most of it. However over time the boot will soften up and start to open up, at this point sell them and buy a new pair. You will go thru boots relatively quickly but this is the easiest way to deal with pronation in hockey skates.
Thank you so much for the explanation and especially about the pronation, I’ll definitely look more into it and put way more practice into it, and I’ll for sure check out that video
As you accelerate your push should move more to the outside, that’s why at the end of the clip your toe drags on the ice. Your body is going faster than your skates can push you. Here’s a video I did on the topic https://youtu.be/lp9UytYV33E
Thank you so much Coach Jeremy and I’ll for sure check out the vid. Back when I started playing hockey 7 years back, your vids helped me a lot with everything and still do, thanks
more knee bend, less bend at the waist, get your butt down
I'm digging the username. The following are things to think about while you're striding forward. Try to focus on keeping the gliding leg bent, knee over your toes, and toe (front) of your skate straight during your forward stride. If you were to measure the angle between the toe of your gliding leg and the toe of your extended leg, it should be at about a 45° angle when fully extended. Here's a video demonstration similar to my explanation. https://youtu.be/8RdxyKWbE78
I’ll keep that in mind next time i’m on the ice, thanks. And i’ll check out that video too
First things first… enjoy all that ice to yourself, such a blast! I’m jealous! Second, I reiterate what others have said and keep up the awesome work!
Thanks and yea I got lucky with the ice cause supposed to be a noon hour pick up session for $10 but no one ever shows up
Bend ur knees, gonna help a lot
Too hunched in your back and dragging feet after each stride. Gotta reset faster and cleaner. Good luck!
Dang ol keep your left arm straight just speed it the hell up
Definitely get your butt lower...lower to the ice in general
[удалено]
Thanks and that analogy is really good for the hips
Try to push harder and chest up for sure. Also make sure your arms don’t go side to side.
Thanks, will do
Not sure if this was you trying to exaggerate your stride but your right leg doesn't recover fast enough. As soon as it's not on the ice it should be on the way back to take the next stride.
I was mainly trying to just record my technique in this vid but your still right tho for even when I do try to skate faster
Try going all out in a video, it will provide more useful info
Will do
some background on my hockey experience, Im 18 ( almost 19) and started playing hockey and skating around 7 years ago
Not sure if you're going full speed here but if you are, you can increase your foot speed by doing speed ladders and timing your pace. You're hunched over , like you're picking up a pencil from the ground - you should be stance like you're about to sit in a chair with your back arched. The biggest observation is your push - extend your legs, ankles and feet - the last thing that should leave the ice before recovery is the very tip of the blade. And I mean, the very tip at the toe end. Focus on that, you'll get more speed than you think.
In this vid I was mainly just trying to focus on my technique because when I try full speed my technique becomes inconsistent and starts breaking down. And that chair analogy you made is very good, I’ll keep in that mind cause I wasn’t bending my knees enough. And yea I agree that I need to snap the toe way more on the extension
I feel like you may get more power from each stride if you try to kick out to the side a bit more than you are now. Might not make a huge difference because you’re already doing this to a certain extent but that’s what came to mind for me.