Off-Ice Skating Strength Exercises

If you look at the game in the NHL today and compare it to the pre-lock out years you will find it has gotten much faster due to the rule changes.  With that being said, players and prospects ability to skate has become a very important physical quality that scouts and coaches look for.  Players who can skate and posses a high skill level enhance team speed both for offensive purposes and defensive purposes.  Now at the youth levels you cannot base your whole training program off of what NHL'ers do, but you can look at the strength and speed qualities that each player exhibits and work towards developing them in your game. 

One of the performance qualities a young hockey player or even a pro-level player can implement in their training program is low positional strength.  Low positional strength will transfer to on-ice skating posture and provide the athlete with the endurance to sit with depth during all phases of skating.  Speed is a highly sought-after quality in athletics.  The drills and exercises contained in this article will focus on the improvement of skating technique and on-ice speed.  Efficient skating technique and deep knee bend is one way a skater is able to produce power and force on the ice.  The combination of low-positional exercises and leg strengthening exercises will help the hockey player become a faster skater and more efficient skater.  Many of the drills used to improve these qualities are speed skater postures and skating technique poses that are demanding on all the muscles of the lower body.

When you look at how to implement low positional skating exercises into your training program you will find it will be very easy because each exercise uses minimal equipment and can be done within a limited amount of space.  In a large team setting you can utilize these exercises before or after practice and organize the players into partners or groups of three for an appropriate work to rest ratio.  The majority of the time hockey rinks do not have ideal training areas for a team to perform a warm-up let alone a team workout.  The skating exercises we are discussing can be done in the locker room or even in a corner of the rink.  These exercises are not plyometric in nature and do not focus on "jump training", cutting or landing.  That being said, the landing surface areas are not a major concern for the athletes because they do not experience the pounding associated with jumps or quick change of direction drills.  It should be noted for technique purposes and facilitation of these drills that for most of these skater posing exercises, the athlete will remain stationary.

Exercises for low positional skater strength

• 3-point skater touch 3x5ea: This exercise is the most basic and the foundation of all other posing exercises. If the athletes cannot maintain depth and posture they are not allowed to progress to the next level of exercise. This exercise is a simple heel reach and touch forward by flexing the quad to straighten the leg. You will then return the working leg back to the starting position and repeat. The next movement is a reach laterally with a toe touch and return to the starting position. And the final step is straight back, activating the glute, touching the toe and returning back to the starting position.
• Val-Slide AB--ADDuction skater 3x8ea: For this exercise you need a piece of plastic material similar to a furniture mover which you will put on the floor for your foot to slide on. On a slick flooring surface you may use a thick sock or towel. We use a plastic disc called a "Valslide" which is cost effective and very portable. This exercise mimics the skating stride by reaching the leg out laterally (Abduction) and then returning it to the starting position only to move right into a cross behind movement (ADDuction).
• Low walks-Forward and Backwards 3x10yards: This exercise is similar to lunges both forward and backward. The difference between the two and how this exercise transfers to skating strength is the low depth you will remain at for the entire set. In the low position, you should be in single leg stance for most of the time. As you step, briefly switch to double leg stance and then into single leg stance with the opposite leg forward. You do not want to see "bobbing" up and down as the athlete walks. You also do not want them to touch their back knee to the ground. Make note of the athlete's posture during these exercises. The spine should be straight as possible with no truck flexion at any segment. This will help create a strong back and injury free athlete.
• Crossover walk 3x10yards: With Crossover walk we want the athlete to stay low and have great posture throughout the movement, similar to our "Low walk" exercise. The difference here is that we are moving laterally and crossing over our steps. The cross leg is important, but the leg "back" or the one being crossed over is equally important because it should help push you into the next step. You hear on-ice coaches say when turning on ice to get that back leg to push as you crossover during a turn because it helps to skate faster. This is exactly what we are trying to mimic here.
• Lateral skater reach shuffle 3x6ea OR 3x:10sec: This exercise is the most advanced in the progression. It requires strict posture, depth, leg strength, and coordination. There is a hopping effect to its execution. You begin in low position with one leg reaching laterally and the stance leg underneath you. You then hop and switch the position of the stance leg into reaching and the reaching leg into the new stance leg. You repeat for a given amount of time. Your "hop" is not very high and you should not "bob" up and down. The athlete needs to remain in that athletic skating position for the given amount of reps or work time. If you have athletes who lose technique when performing the exercise for time, then prescribe repetitions and have them pause after each "reach out." Once they master the stability of the step out then you can add tempo.

If you have your team training regularly during the off-season and in-season there are some strength exercises that can complement low skating position training.  During exercises like Plyometrics and Knee dominant movements (Squats, lunges and step-ups) be sure that the athlete is landing stable in an athletic position.  They also need to perform the downward phase of all leg exercises until the top of the thigh is parallel to the floor.   Now I know what you are going to say..... "That will hurt my knees!"  I have come to believe that poor technique during squatting movements and using heavy external loads with poor technique can increase the chances of injury during squatting movements.  Intelligence and proper technique executed during leg training programs will drastically lower your chances of injury and increase your strength development.  As a coach, be sure to teach your athletes proper technique when performing lower body strength movements and do not progress or add heavier loads until technique is perfected. 

Implementing low positional skating exercises into your yearly training program will improve posture, leg strength and skating efficiency.  The combination of these exercises with a Lower body training program will make significant increases in on-ice speed and conditioning levels.  During the off-season these exercises can be performed two to three times per week.  During the in-season these exercises can be performed once or twice per week.  Skating speed is a significant performance quality to have as a hockey player.  The simple addition of these low positional exercises will help the athlete to see improvements during all on-ice movements.