Two Broken Toe Caps on one Deflection

[Cosmic 178]

I am not sure if I deflected a saucer pass or a wrist shot, but it shattered my left toe cap. As I was skating off the ice, I noticed the right toe cap had been shattered as well. The right cap may have gotten busted on that play, or it may have busted earlier. I haven't a clue. I just noticed 2 busted toe caps simultaneously, so my night was cut short. These were not my skates, I was borrowing them from a guy I know, while I wait for mine to be hauled in from overseas. These skates probably have hundreds of hours of wear on them, and had not been used in 2 or 3 years. This, I have since learned, is a perfect formula for shattering the toe caps. Otherwise, the skates fit great. The guys that I played could not believe that I had not played in 17 years (I did not tell them that I actually only played 2 years when I even did play- 1988 and 1996). I think that they seemed to think I was like a once or twice a week mangler. So yea, a good first night to hopefully a nice few of decades of skating.

[sickwilly 37]

Welcome back to playing! Sounds like it went well, other than the bizarre skate issue.

[Cosmic 178]

Welcome back to playing! Sounds like it went well, other than the bizarre skate issue.

Yes indeed, went as well as I could have hoped. The knee felt great. No wipeouts or anything crazy. +1 on the night during the 4 minutes of scrimmage (they had me on D and I had nothing to do with the goal) ... I probably skated for a good solid 1 hour + a couple of minutes, prior to the freak occurrence with the boots, just doing the drills that these guys do to get warmed up- passing/skating/deking stuff.

[sickwilly 37]

The only toe cap I've had break in 30+ years was a pair of CCM Externos. E60s, I think. Loved the skates before that, and they weren't that old.... It was on a slapper that also broke one of my toes, though.

[Cosmic 178]

The only toe cap I've had break in 30+ years was a pair of CCM Externos. E60s, I think. Loved the skates before that, and they weren't that old.... It was on a slapper that also broke one of my toes, though.

These were Eastons.

And yea, craziest thing to me, with hockey gear, is that the toes are still injury prone. I mean, we have all this gear al over us, so that if we take a shot at us head on, we are pretty much all good to go, except on the toe (which happens to be right on the trajectory of where a good slapper from the point ought to be sailing along). One would think, that someone would have come up with a fix for this by now. I saw on a marketing vid for TackiMac that it was Gretzky who wanted a drip that would slow down the damage to the palms. And I think Ken Belanger started shot blockers (or made his contribution through that entity). But no one has demanded that the toe issue be looked at. I mean, is it that difficult to just double layer the plastic? Sure, performance might fall off a bit, but so does my performance when I wear a full cage.

I was lucky that my toe did not get mangled. It did hurt a bit right afterward, but not as bad as when I have stubbed my toe on furniture. And the pain went away quickly. I do not recall the pass/shot being particularly hard.