Would you attend "practices" as an adult?

[JAG 20]

I like to play... a lot.  I'm on 2 teams in 2 different divisions, and I sub for a team in a 3rd division, which has me playing about 3-4 nights a week (extra if someone else asks me to sub).  I'm not a great player, but I'm pretty good.  And in my area, the difference in skill between Div 1 and Div 3 is really big.  I'm one of the best players in Div 3, and I'm in the lower percentile in Div 1.  

All that to say... It's pretty clear that the majority of people in Division 3 (and 4 and 5) never played growing up.  They never had skating instructions, shooting, passing, or positioning instructions either. They never had a coach screaming in their ear about positioning or breakouts, or giving tips on how to handle the puck better.  I see so many mistakes that can be easily fixed if given the proper instruction.  But you can't just go up to people telling them how much they suck... even if you do it in the nicest ways, it never comes off well.  

I have recently been thinking about holding adult league "practices", where anyone can come out to the rink, and we run drills.  It could either be a little of everything, or each night we focus on specific things.  This would be a little more advanced than a learn to play kind of class, where it goes into a bit more detail and refines the skills they learned in their beginner class.  

I don't know.  I'm not sure if anyone would even be interested in such a thing.  I love the idea of it.  I would love to just get out on the ice and run drills for myself!  So I have to imagine other people would want something like this too.  What do you guys think? If someone at your local rink offered something like this, would you do it?  

[EJB 488]

Our rookie league runs practices about 8-10 times a year with good turnout.  It's usually run by our local ECHL head coach.

That said, they are included in the fee for the rookie league.

A guy I know that runs a private skate I play in has tried to set up some "rookie practice sessions" for approx. $25 a session and it's been pretty hit and miss.

[kmfdm86 112]

If the price is right, I would definitely do it. I'm a terribad ice skater so I mostly stick to inline, but I'd even do inline practice. I'm not greathe, I played on and off again as a kid. But any sort of practice time is always good in my eyes.

[IPv6Freely 2092]

100% yes if it were offered.

[beerleaguecaptain 999]

I do this several times a year - usually between seasons when my teams are off due to time constraints.  I would do it more often if I could.  

 

[badger_14 601]

There's a group around here that holds both novice and intermediate/advanced clinics.  You can pay for a 10 week session, or pay walk-on/per week.  Lots of people do it.  If the coach to player ratio is sufficient, you can probably host a fairly mixed group and handle them alright.  A lot of places around here will do a clinic (practice) that's a skills session followed by a controlled scrimmage.  I used to attend the clinics as a skater and then as a goalie (conveniently, the goalie clinic was held right after the pickup skate).  I think people will pay (reasonably) for a good on-ice product - organized, planned, active. 

[qmechanic 17]

I've always played on teams that have practices.  I'm not going to make much progress in hockey playing games where I hardly touch the puck.

[dankwelp 3]

The team/club I play with here in South Korea has 45 minutes to an hour of practice every Sunday night, followed by an hour long scrimmage with another hour of scrimmage on Thursday nights. We're well outside of Seoul so there aren't nearly enough guys to have a full blown league, and the nearest teams are a 2.5 hour drive from us. As you can imagine our new guys that have usually never skated before progress quite a bit faster than what they would back in the states playing in a rookie league. Our new captain/club president ditched the A team/ B team mentality when he took over last year, and though we usually try to keep the line pairings fair during the scrimmage we often have nights where there's no choice but to roll a rookie on a line with a guy that played in university or high school. Luckily players aren't nearly as pretentious over here and it's a good chance to coach up the guys on positioning, and it relaxes the games quite a bit. It's a lot more fun/challenging to set up your rookie for a goal than just picking out the weak link(s) and going Gretzky on some poor rookie. For those of us from North America the practices are super laid back, and concentrate on the basics of power skating, passing, breakouts, and 5 on 5 puck cycling/defensive zone positioning.  Our last captain/president tried running practices like a pissed off Herb Brooks, as you can imagine the numbers were pretty low on practice nights. 

 

[puckpilot 312]

I know teams that hold practices regularly.

One of the teams I used to play on, we used to hold practices before the season and before play offs. 

For myself, I hit the rink at least once a week to work on my skills for a few hours. I work on my puckhandling, edging, etc.  I love working on stuff and getting better.

If one of my teams wanted to hold a practice, I'd be up for it, as long as everyone else treated it with enough seriousness.

[marka 526]

Howdy,

There are a couple adult classes around here and I do one now once a week.  I really like the ability to work on stuff outside of games as a new player.  It would be even better if it was a regular team that also played games together.

For me as someone that didn't grow up playing hockey, one of the things I miss most is strategy / rules of thumb / whatever that you learn by playing with a coach.  I would LOVE to join a team that had regular practices.

Mark

[badger_14 601]

I think it would be harder to have an adult team that practiced (that is, 1 league game and 1 practice) with each other as a team, simply due to time and logistical constraints.  I think it would be nice, though, because versus a clinic you get to learn how your own teammates play.  The guys I played for in a tournament this summer hos regular scrimmages (all are welcome including dropins) and play in a league, and play in a few tournaments.  They usually do very well and I think a lot of that is from the scrimmaging they do together.  

[fatwabbit 93]

We have a practice session for the appropriate level once every 2 weeks, held on a Sat morning at 615-730. If you are there early enough, the ice is normally done about 5-10min before training starts, so you could essentially have another 5-10 min to yourself and a few others just before we start doing drills. 

Its run by some volunteers, and some from the higher Divisions. Overall objective is to improve yourself, and it depends on what you want to achieve from it. While some might feel that the drills are trivial and boring, a few of us just want to get the basics right to play better.

The turnout is normally about 20 skaters from various teams around the league, which is pretty good. You get to mingle with others that you typically might not have a chance to play with, and its pretty good banter as well. You occasionally get a few knobheads who think they should be giving everyone advice, key is just to ignore them and they typically go away.

If they had the trainings in the evenings, I would think they would have an even bigger turnout. Not everyone can wake up that early on a Sat morning, especially when you have kids to then ferry to and from sports etc.

[YesLanges 127]

On ‎11‎/‎23‎/‎2016 at 6:58 PM, JAG said:

I have recently been thinking about holding adult league "practices", where anyone can come out to the rink, and we run drills...What do you guys think? If someone at your local rink offered something like this, would you do it?  

Count me in and just let me know when/where you get anything started. I hate the fact that nobody in my league ever practices or bothers to attend clinics. Nothing but crickets anytime I suggest it. Just drove out to Port Washington last night for their Wed clinic and I go to as many as I can every summer in Elmsford anytime I don't have a game-schedule conflict.  Where do you normally skate?

[JAG 20]

Thanks for the responses, guys.

To be clear, on my previous team in NYC, we held practices before every season, just to get everyone on the same page, and also to have another excuse to have some beers.  On top of that, I always go to a stick & puck session about once a week to work on stuff myself.  Occasionally, I would mention to my teammates (on lower division teams) that I was going, and offered to run drills for whoever came with me.  This was successful about 5 or 6 times, as I had 3-4 guys show up each time, and we had a lot of fun running drills.  

The reason I posted this was to reach out beyond people on my teams.  My purpose is to let everyone in the lower leagues aware that they could come out and skate and hopefully learn something.  I would open it up to everyone.  And I am not looking to make any money doing this (just enough to cover the cost of ice time).  To put it this way... if there was already someone holding these types of practices, I'd pay to go to them myself.  

I'll bring this up to the rink, and see if I could get a discount on ice time if I can guarantee a certain number of skaters.

[YesLanges 127]

What rink you thinking of?

[Dizzyg12 27]

I actually play in a "novice" league.  I didn't start playing organized Ice until 2 years ago (at age 38).  I played inline for 20+ years including collegiate and pro (Used to be PIHA not sure if that still exists).  In any case I had to start somewhere to get used to being on ice skates.  The position and puck/stickwork wasn't an issue.  The league runs 18 weeks and has 5 legit skills practices for all levels.  Followed by a few weeks of scrimmages and team practices.  We have a draft every fall so you're on new team every year which makes it more fun and keeps one team from dominating all the time.  We get coaches too.  It's a lot of fun!  I also now play in the C league at the same Rink so the improvement that can be made from practicing is evident from me first hand.  

Once you're comfortable you don't have to do the practices but it does help.  Some people have never been on ice skates in their life and by the end of the season they are so much better.  

So yeah put me down for practice times! I'll never be a superstar especially at 40 but I'm competitive enough with myself to want to get better at something every time on the ice.  

[JAG 20]

On 11/26/2016 at 8:56 PM, YesLanges said:

What rink you thinking of?

I'm actually not in NYC anymore.  But when I was, I was skating a lot at City Ice Pavilion in Queens. 

[YesLanges 127]

I know WSA in Elmsford might have some open ice but what rink do you have in mind for the clinic?

[JAG 20]

On 12/5/2016 at 6:20 PM, YesLanges said:

I know WSA in Elmsford might have some open ice but what rink do you have in mind for the clinic?

Sorry I wasn't clear.  I'm in NY at all anymore.  I'm in the mid-west.  

[YesLanges 127]

I really like clinics, but I ain't driving that far. For anybody in the NYC area, the rink at Port Washington has a 9:30-11:30 clinic every Wednesday night. I'll be there tonight.

[Troubadour 46]

In a heartbeat honestly. I would honestly pay as much as I pay for a league just to have practice ice that was promised to not turn into shinny or drop-in.

 

I've tried to organize something like 3-4 times now and everyone drops out when money comes up.

[JAG 20]

21 hours ago, YesLanges said:

I really like clinics, but I ain't driving that far. For anybody in the NYC area, the rink at Port Washington has a 9:30-11:30 clinic every Wednesday night. I'll be there tonight.

I heard about that, but had no other information.  If I end up back in NY, i'd very much like to attend them.  

[YesLanges 127]

I bailed last night to skate at WSA this afternoon (sticks & pucks); but found out that WSA is now running an adult clinic on Thursday nights. It's $35 for an hour session from 9:20-10:20. I'm definitely doing that anytime I don't have a game the night before, and maybe even if I do. http://www.skatewsa.com/page/show/265585-adult-clinic

[WaukeshaTG 2]

I would.  I find that when winter comes along and I only play in one league, I can notice that I lose a step.  Coaching kids, while ice time, just isn't the same.

[Deerok 3]

JAG,

 

if you are in Chicago let me know.  I would love to do these sessions.  I played at City Ice and Chelsea Piers a long time ago, and would often attend the early morning "Ronnie's Ice" sessions.  City Ice had some early morning sessions as well.  Ice time is a bit of a challenge in the city (can't do suburbs during the week).