Leaderboard

Howdy, Yes, this one. I'm also new, and like Beardo at 46 I frequently am out on the ice with other folks that could be my children. My advice would be to focus on the people saying positive things and not the ones saying negative things. And as for the ones saying negative things... Beardo has it 100% right. Its not like you're lying to get into a group where you're not supposed to be. If they have a problem with it, _they_ can leave. Mark

Or you could do something really easy, and much more useful like that. lol

I know it. I was talking to someone about the Weekend Warriors camp and explaining how without someone there showing you exactly what to do, you just can't learn as quickly. We haven't been playing since we were kids. We haven't had coaching as we developed, and more importantly we haven't had coaching on modern concepts. there's just so much that we'd never learn if someone didn't directly tell us or show us. I don't even mean monumental changes. Dumb little things have made big improvements in my game. A goalie coach telling me to get a longer paddle because I was holding my hand too low - I stopped getting beat 5 hole. snapping your heels after each movement to set your feet. Lining up with the puck, not the shooter (which like mindblowing to me given my background as a defenseman). Even playing D, little things from the WWHA camp have really improved my game - pivoting towards the middle to receive a breakout pass rather than skating towards the boards, switching to the right side since I'm right handed has made a tremendous difference, going to a lower flex and lie has made my shots and passes harder, how to line up on faceoffs. These are all things, and i'm sure there are many more, that I wouldn't have even known to think about if I wasn't told by a coach. Legends Camp is going to do wonders for you. You're definitely better than when you started. And Legends Camp is going to be like a light bulb going off in your head. The goalie camp I did was pretty far over my level too, but it didn't matter. I was still learning. My warm ups are 3 minutes. I get on the ice as they open the door. Then skate 2 laps to loosen up, and do a little stretching by the boards. One round of shots in a semi-circle each direction. Then I'll stay down while guys are shooting and try to move around on the ice to make the saves. After the horn blows, I'll scrape the crease and do pendulums until the faceoff. It's not much time, but I try to make it most effective for me.

It has to do with the way you drop from your stance. It's actually a progression of the way you used to drop forward onto both knees with your feet behind you. Now you're getting a leg out to the side, which covers more net. But to do that, you drop with all your weight onto one knee, and end up leaning that way. Technically, you need to learn how to drop straight down by bringing both knees together and driving them into the ice. Of course, that doesn't really help explain HOW to get yourself to do that. My suggestion would be to force yourself to work on that whenever you can - during warm ups, during stoppages, between periods, open ice, stick and puck, whatever. Even in warmups, you can just stay down in the correct position with your wegiht centered and both knees down. Then get used to moving your head and torso into the shot from that position. Work on using both legs to kick out from the middle, instead of just your left, and do it without leaning to the opposite side as the leg you kick. You can have the exact same warm ups as now if your team is smart enough to not dome you. Here's a video of Tretiak warming up and all of the exercises he would do. You aren't playing as old of a style as him, especially with the pad stacks and kick saves. But you can see how he is controlling and centering his weight, and then apply that to your technique. The drill he is doing without pads on where he looks like a Bolshevik dancer may very helpful for you to try at home or something. It'll get you to kick with both legs while centering your weight. I used to drop just like you. Then I went to a coach who had me do these "Tretiak-like" drills. We'd just get in a stance and he'd fire a puck to one side. We just were supposed to drop and make a leg save (modern butterfly, not kick save) to each side and get the stick going that direction. then we got up and he did it to the other side. If you have good teammates, maybe you can work it into the end of warmups. The pendulum drill may help too. Drop to your knees with weight centered. Lift one knee and engage the skate blade, then push hard enough to move two feet. After you push, bring your knees back together, and as you are sliding engage the leading skate blade. Use your momentum to bring that knee up and then push back the other way. Do that a few times back and forth. The trick is to keep your body centered, but your weight over the push and then trailing leg. Then use the momentum to load your weight over the other leg for the push, again keeping your body centered. Here are a few videos of what I mean. The last is a third by Maria Mountain without gear on that really breaks down the mechanics of it. It's pretty helpful.

Oldest kid got a concussion two weekends ago playing volleyball...sucks that she got a concussion, but sorta cool that she was going so hard in volleyball of all things. My wifey called me from the tournament in a panic that she was taking the kid to the ER to get her checked out. Hockey coach brain kicked in and I calmly told her, "Keep calm, take her to your mom's, put her in your room, turn off the lights, take away her phone, make sure it's quiet, get her plenty of liquids and let her rest." I sent my better half with her to the neuro specialist the next week and he asked what we did to care for her post-injury. "Kept her calm, took her home, put her in a dark, quiet room, fed her liquids, and let her rest." "Yep," he said. Concussions are scary, but it feels good to not just feel helpless/powerless or conversely tell her, "rub dirt on it and get back out there, ya just got yer bell rung". She went back to school today. We're off to Seattle this weekend for the Lyndsey Fry camp. Lyndsey was cool about giving us a partial refund and will still let the older daughter attend the dryland talks. :) Younger daughter got the invite to attend the Northern Plains District Development Camp in Grand Forks next weekend. :D

Man, CCM has really stepped up their game. First the LE,s for the JetSpeed and Ribcore skates and now these! Depending on how they they fit, I might give CCM another shot. Haven't skated CCM since my 1052's in high school !