VegasHockey

Has anyone tried this? PenaltyBox was pushing this on sale and supposedly sold 1200 rolls in 12 hours according to their IG!?! https://www.smarthockey.com/products/blade-tape Snip/ Gretzky said he’d like to see all players go back to wood sticks instead of using composite sticks so players would have a better feel and control for the puck. (Read here) Everyone knows that isn’t going to happen because the advantages composite shafts have over wood shafts in terms of puck velocity. But what if you could have both? Smarthockey Blade Tape is first major innovation for hockey tape ever augments composite shaft technology with the “feel” of a wood shaft. The patent pending rubber tape has over 40,000 “fingers” to grab the knurling around the edge of an ice hockey puck giving you unbelievable “feel” when receive a pass, stickhandle and shoot without giving up any velocity. In fact, when you shoot, the technology makes it feel like you can pick the puck up and basically “throw” it with unbelievable accuracy (almost like throwing a ball with a lacrosse stick). Additionally, the tape makes it feel like you have “pillows on your hands” because the puck feels so soft. Practice with it for a while and it’s like you have you have the puck tied to a string. It basically sticks to your blade for toe drags, puck extension and tight turns. Unlike conventional cloth tape or electrical tape, Smarthockey Blade Tape is hydrophobic which means it won’t become waterlogged and peel off your blade. Unlike wax, it doesn’t freeze or condense causing it to lose its grip after a few minutes on the ice. And if you start to get ice build up, simply tap your stick on the ice and watch it disappear. Last but not least, Smarthockey commissioned a study by one of the leading optometry schools in the US to understand what colors are hardest to process by the human eye. What we learned was that humans have fewer cones and rods in their eyes to process neon yellow, electric blue and powder grey (Gretzky may not have known it, but he actually had an advantage by putting powder on his black tape). When those colors are moved quickly in front of the human eye it can’t process these colors which causes a blurring effect. Since stick shaft technology has increased the speed at which a puck comes off the blade, goalies are now forced to react to where the puck is going based on where the blade is pointing as opposed to watching the puck (Read here). However, if the color of the tape on the blade of the stick blurs as a player is shooting, it effectively puts the goalie at a huge disadvantage. While Smarthockey Blade Tape might seem pretty ordinary, this might be the biggest innovation in hockey since the curved stick or plastic skate blade. This is a game changer!

Thats crappy. They shouldn't sell it as one thing if it is in fact another. I would be pissed.

So I had a chance to use one tonight since I was a sub on a team and one of the players is a Bauer rep. He uses a slightly stiffer flex than myself, 87, but we use the same curve pattern and he allowed me to retape the stick since he and I use an entirely different tape job. In fact, he uses black tape and I prefer white. He doesn't tape the toe and I do. Anyway... The stick is overall very light but you can feel the weight in the blade due to the reinforcement they must have had to add. The stick shot well, but no better than other sticks I own. It was a nice stick, but again, no nicer than anything else I own either. Honestly, I think the stick would have been better with the new ADV design and the Nexus 2N Pro blade with the advanced carbon layering to lighten the blade composition but still keeping the dampening layer. Overall, the stick is good. Not great. I would rate it the same as nearly any other lightweight top of the line stick. I think there is some promise to the idea of a stiffer top portion of the blade, more torsional rigidity, but they added the hole to as more of a marketing thing. They could easily have accomplished the same thing without making a hole in the stick blade.

And more info here https://puckstop.com/blog/bauer-nexus-adv-stick-technology

I heard the Bower Vapour Flylight is quite a nice stick 😉

I actually had one of Kanes pro stock sticks and surprisingly it's quite light at 447 grams with the buttendz and tape. He uses a very stiff blade and the blade pattern lends itself to being very lightweight as opposed to something like a max height blade for example. He is also a professional athlete compared to us mere mortals so I would imagine he won't notice 20-30 grams of weight. One benefit of a heavier stick is winning stick battles and not having someone easy knock your stick away doing a stick check or stick lift. I think centermen typically use a heavier stick than wingers, same with players who play defense.

The BHL Cup is huge and amazing! I try and go every year but since its happening in my own backyard since I moved to AZ I am even more excited for it this year. They posted the jerseys for this year and they are sickkkkkkk!

Seems they are out of the Pacific Northwest. Has anyone used one of their sticks? Is it just another Chinese "No Name" "All Black" stick? https://coastalhockey.co/

Rekker EK15 came out in 2014 and I used that, then the EK60. Then other brands finally caught up.

They are still making them. https://www.hockeymonkey.com/true-hockey-shaft-ax9-rbs-sr.html?gclid=CjwKCAiAgqDxBRBTEiwA59eEN0v_srlGlUL3QVQ_3wWmN4PgCFOpVfvNkleghtBFM0WLehe5kb2lYBoCNf4QAvD_BwE

I think 390 is the sweet spot for me personally. Anything less starts to feel unbalanced and usually requires me to add some type of counterweight to balance it all out properly.

I agree. In fact, I cut off a large section of the end of my sticks and add a wood plug because the weight balance on many of them is off.

No argument there. LOL

I know of one person who used to work as an engineer for Bauer & CCM who has started his own company selling high-quality one-piece sticks. He has a relationship with factories which has helped but overall it's still an uphill struggle for him to offer a high performance, low weight (370 grams) , product while keeping prices low since he doesn't produce thousands of sticks at a time as the big companies do. For example, he can only offer 5 patterns currently and a mid-kick option because the cost for fabrication per blade pattern template is insanely expensive for a one-piece mold.

Really? It's pretty awesome. Kane Van Gate did some videos on it. https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=kane+van+gate+bhl+cup

I bought a bunch of the Trigger 4 Pro and they all had the retial taper design.

I used to be guilty of doing a single pass after every ice session. It became second nature when I would be unpacking my gear after skating to dry it out to just toss the skates in the sharpener for a single pass.

I've always noticed pro stocks feel stiffer than what they are rated at.

Anyone playing this year? http://bhlcup.com/

$399 is more than $389. According to MAP no Bauer store should be selling the Supreme ADV for $399. Where are you seeing it for that?

It gets a little slippery because it doesn't absorb the moisture. If you want it to get grippy like standard untreated clarino then you want the tan liner. The moisture-wicking fabric liners soak up water but arent a grippy material. I find the skates get waterlogged very quickly, take a long time to dry out, and the liners wear much faster than the tan or grey clarino. One of the guys I skate with applies this (below) to the inside of his skates to make the grey clarino super tacky. He says he washes it off after every few weeks with warm water and soap and then reapplies it. I dont know what is in the product or anything really more than what he has told me. He claims it works wonders and doesn't ruin his socks or skates. YMMV. https://www.doversaddlery.com/tack-up-grip-spray/p/X1-31009/

Agreed 100%

The moisture-wicking liner is not very durable comparatively. If you are wanting a skate to last many years you definitely do not want that option. Also, it's not a grip fabric either, so while it soaks up moisture well I also find the grip is less than the grey clarino too.

More durable but it also doesn't absorb moisture so the skates stay lighter and dont get waterlogged.

Agreed. I travel all over North America and always bring a few sets of steel with me but enjoy going into shops to see which ones are progressive when it comes to profiling and sharpening. It's shocking how many stores I have been to that are clueless when it comes to the art of profiling and sharpening. I have gotten into arguments with shops telling me profiling is all BS and its not needed, its a gimmick. I also had shops tell me "no good players" skate on anything over 1/2" and so they offer only one standard cut, 1/2". I think this is why many stores are slowly adopting machine sharpening like Pro Sharp and Sparx units.