Interview with Northeastern S&C Coach Sarah Cahill

In this interview, HockeySC sits down with Sarah Cahill. Sarah is a Strength and Conditioning Coach at Northeastern who, among other teams, works with the Women's Ice Hockey Team. She is also an Assistant S&C Coach with the US Women's National Hockey Team. In this interview, Sarah weighs in on some of her experiences training female hockey players, including in-season training templates and progressions, exercise selection, and setting standards for female athletes. Enjoy!

The secret behind my in-season training program is constant communication with the athletes, trainers, and coaching staff.  I've learned over the years that the best plan means nothing if executed blindly.  If I haven't seen the team for a weekend because of an away game I always get a hold of the Captains on Monday and ask for their insight on how the weekend went.  I also speak with the trainer and coaching staff to get any and all updates. 

A typical in-season training session will last 75 minutes until after Christmas break.  All sessions for the remainder of the season will run forty-five minutes to an hour because efficiency of time is crucial with more games and travel. 

The question I always ask myself during every training session is what did the athletes do that day and how can my program best compliment that day's work?  For that reason I always ask my athletes a series of readiness questions when they arrive to provide me with as much information as possible before their training session.  An example of some of these questions are how many hours of sleep did you get the night before, or what is your pre-lift heart rate.  If I notice unusually high heart rates or a lack of sleep I may modify the athletes' lift that day or at least have a conversation explaining the importance of proper hydration and sleep.  The questionnaires are all entered into a spreadsheet and tracked the entire season.  At the end of the season I will sit down with the coaches and look at injury/illness rates and the athletes' answers to these questions to search for any interesting correlations between lack of sleep and injury or illness.    

After filling out the questionnaire the athletes grab a foam roller and roll for ten minutes. I'll have the athletes hold the roller on trigger points on the muscle and then have them move through specific ranges of motion. After rolling out I choose an athlete to lead the team through a series of in-place stretches and always try to include an active hamstring, hip flexor, adductor, and lateral hip rotator stretch.  Some of my favorites are the stationary spiderman with t-spine rotation, brettzel, pigeon stretch, and kneeling single-leg adductor rocks.  I always try to remember to think three dimensionally when stretching to avoid only hitting the frequently stretched parts of the muscle.  During a half-kneeling hip flexor stretch moving the back foot slightly out or slightly in allows for a completely different stretch of the hip flexor group!

Once the athletes have finished stretching they'll perform a dynamic warm-up and activation exercises.  The activation exercises will compliment the primary exercise of the day and include what I consider the most important and greatest bang for your buck exercises.  I only see my athletes for such a short amount of time that I have to always be thinking what is the best use of every minute I have with them.  The activation exercises will always include a mobility exercise, anti-rotational core, and a stability exercise.  For example if we are benching I'll start with a variation of Y's T's and W's, or a pec mob  If the primary lift is an Olympic movement I'll start with thoracic mobs or extension, lat stretches, or hip mobs.  If the primary lift is a squat I'll start with hip or ankle mobs, or an anti-rotational core. 

Once they are finished with activation work I hand out their sheets and they all divide into assigned lifting groups to begin their lift.  In general the template looks something like this on Day 1:

A1)  Olympic Lift Variation
B1)  Lower Body Push Primary
B2)  Upper Body Pull Primary
C1)  Anti-Rot Core for time
C2)  Upper Pull Secondary
C3)  Lower Body Push-Secondary

And on Day 2:

A1)  Olympic Lift Variation
B1)  Upper Body Push Primary
B2)  Lower Body Hip Dom Pull Primary
C1)  Anti-Rot Core for reps
C2)  Upper Body Push Secondary
C3)  Lower Body Knee Dom Pull Secondary

My training phases usually last four weeks and follow a Prillepin periodization scheme with each week changing in reps and intensity.  In between training phases I like to have a week of circuit training to allow for restoration of tissue quality.  The short in duration high intensity circuits are best because they're fun for the athletes, incorporate team building which is key in-season, and because of their short duration allow for complete recovery a few hours after completing them.  The circuit usually only lasts about 10-15minutes.

2) How do you anticipate this will change as the season progresses?

As the season progresses the workouts will change from strength building to speed and power development and maintenance.  Speed will be our main focus in the weight room therefore the sets and reps will be low.  We will incorporate tendo-units and a few complexes of strength and power exercises into our training.  During this phase of training the involvement of stretching, mobility, and tissue work will remain a high priority to best compliment on-ice demands.    

3) Do you take any specific precautions with regards to avoiding certain exercises or including others in the name of injury risk reduction?

With hockey players, I tend to avoid bilateral squats with the bar, heavy weighted hip flexion exercises (supine keiser hip flexion, standing keiser hip flexion), and any form of crunching unless it is a straight leg sit-up variation.  Hockey players are frequently living in a hips flexed, low back extended position, and as I mentioned above, I want to ensure that I'm not pushing them further toward an unwanted position. If an athlete lives in extension and they load a bar on their back to squat, the load will drive them further into extension, and make it more likely that they'll suffer an injury.

I prefer single leg squat variations, trap bar deadlift from technique boxes, or a goblet squat to help facilitate a neutral spine.  I prefer to train the psoas as a stabilizer rather than a hip flexor because of it's attachment to the lumbar spine and it's overuse as a hip flexor and external rotator among hockey players Therefore I typically won't do weighted hip flexion exercises in-season.  I also find when doing these movements the athletes are able to easily cheat them as they require more intimate coaching, which can be difficult with a group of 25 training at one time.  Crunches frequently involve the hip flexors and athletes love to do them.  Because this movement tends to reinforce the very posture we're trying to reverse, I'll choose a plank, roll-out, or side bridge over a crunch any day.

4) What do you think the biggest differences are between training male and female hockey players?

I love every minute training both male and female hockey players, but I'll focus this answer on what my experience has been working with women's teams.  I recently read an article about the difference between male and female job applicants in the workplace.  The article explained that when a man is applying for a job he will send his resume out if he feels he has met 5 out of 10 of the criteria for that job.  A woman applying for the same job will only send her resume if she is confident she meets 9 out of 10 of the criteria.  This leads me to my next point which is many of my women's hockey players are extremely hard on themselves.  They are usually their own toughest critics.  Keeping that in mind it's important to give female athletes feedback and to show them tangible evidence that they are improving.  For example, if during testing an athlete cannot perform 1 chin-up and after training is able to perform 5 chin-ups that athlete will leave your weight room with more confidence and better buy-in. Female athletes have untapped potential and are used to having people tell them they can't do something.  Once you teach them what they can do the sky is the limit.  Rather then telling them a good goal is to perform 1 chin-up, try telling them a good goal is to perform 1 chin-up with a 25 pound plate attached to their waist.  They might look at you like you are crazy but at least they will know what is possible.  I have witnessed many strong female athletes achieve what I previously thought were impossible tasks.