Feb

16

2010 Olympic Hockey Medalists

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Last week we had an intern from Quebec start with us at Endeavor. Immediately following his arrival, the Flyers (my team) beat the Canadiens (his team), twice.

Now the olympics are starting. Needless to say, the trash-talking has been rampant. At the risk of losing a great intern…and a bunch of Canadian friends, here are my Olympic medal predictions:

Men’s I’ce Hockey

Gold: Sweden
Silver: Canada
Bronze: Russia

Women’s Ice Hockey

Gold: USA
Silver: Canada
Bronze: Finland

Post your predctions below!

-Kevin Neeld

P.S. You only have THREE more days to sign up for Hockey Training Expert to get the THREE  great bonuses (Breakaway Hockey Speed, Hockey Nutrition 101, Mental Performance Package)! Go to Hockey Training Expert and sign-up now!

Jan

14

Sports Rehab to Sports Performance

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My friend Joe Heiler, the brilliant Physical Therapist behind SportsRehabExpert.com, just sent me an email announcing the final line-up to his FREE “Sports Rehab to Sports Performance Teleseminar.”

Check out this list of presenters!

Gray Cook and Shirley Sahrmann
Robert Panariello
Stuart McGill (bonus interview with Chris Poirier from Perform Better)
Craig Liebenson and Clare Frank
Mike Reinold
Greg Rose
Mike Boyle
Gary Gray
Eric Cressey

I don’t know how he managed to get those names to join forces for this (or why he’s offering this seminar for free), but I’m really excited for the seminar. This list includes the most influential Physical Therapists, Strength Coaches, Chiropractors, and Athletic Trainers in the industry, and they ALWAYS deliver unbelievable content.

Gray Cook, Shirley Sahrmann, Stuart McGill, Mike Boyle, and Eric Cressey have all had a profound impact on the way I train my athletes. In fact, from my desk at Endeavor I can see at least one book from each one of them!

The presentations will begin on January 27th and run every Wednesday night at 8 pm. Joe mentioned that he knew that time may not work for everyone so he’s making all the presentation recordings available for up to 48 hours afterward.

This is one of the few presentations/seminars every year that you MUST be a part of. Last year’s was incredible and the line-up is even better this year! Since it’s free…and you have two days to listen to each presentation, you really don’t have an excuse not to.

Click the link below for more information or to register:

Sports Rehab to Sports Performance Teleseminar

To your continued success,

Kevin Neeld

P.S. Remember that this is a FREE teleseminar! At the risk of offending you, you’d have to be stupid not to register: Sports Rehab to Sports Performance Teleseminar

Jan

11

Dynamic Warm-Ups, Nick Tumminello Style

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On Friday I posted a revolutionary training tip from Nick Tumminello (a personal trainer in Baltimore) that has completely changed the way I write my dynamic warm-ups.

In short, now I pair mobility and stability/activation exercises for each joint within the warm-up, instead of doing all mobility work first and all activation work second.

To give you an example of how this has changed my warm-ups, take a look at an old and new dynamic warm-up:

Old Dynamic Warm-Up:

  1. 3-Way Ankle Mobility (Toes on Wall): (3×5)/side
  2. Rectus Femoris Mobilization: 8/side
  3. Quadruped Rocking: 8
  4. 1/2 Kneeling 2-Way Thoracic Mobility: (2×5)/side
  5. Wall March Glute Activation: 15s/side
  6. Lateral Squat: 6/side
  7. Reverse lunge: 6/side
  8. Overhead Squat: 8
  9. Side Shuffle: 10 yards/side
  10. Long Stride Carioca: 15 yards/side
  11. Butt Kickers: 15 yards
  12. Back Pedal: 15 yards
  13. Penguin Walk (Heel walk): 25 yards

New Warm-Up (after making the change that Nick Tumminello clued me in on):

  1. 3-Way Ankle Mobility (Toes on Wall): (3×5)/side
  2. Penguin Walk: 25 yards
  3. Rectus Femoris Mobilization: 8/side
  4. Reverse Lunge: 8/side
  5. 2-Way Hamstring Mobilization: (2×5)/side
  6. Yoga Push-Up: 8
  7. Inverted Reach: 8/side
  8. Prone 2-Way Hip Rock: (2×8)/side
  9. Lateral Lunge -> Reverse Crossover Lunge: (2×6)/side
  10. Scap Wall Slide: 10
  11. Side Shuffle: 15 yards/side
  12. Butt Kickers: 15 yards
  13. Back Pedal: 15 yards
  14. 3/4 Speed Jog: 2 x 25 yards

See how easy that is? It’s a simple change that you can make to improve the effectiveness of your warm-ups.

Train hard. Train smart.

-Kevin Neeld

P.S. If you’re a hockey player or coach and want to get access to dozens of done-for-you dynamic warm-ups and training programs, go check out my hockey training site.

Jan

5

New Year’s Resolutions

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2009 has been an incredible year for me. I completed my graduate program at UMass Amherst, started a new job as the Director of Athletic Development at Endeavor Fitness, and moved to Baltimore with Emily.

To keep the good times rolling through 2010, I’m making a list of goals for the year:

1) To remove the word “pump” from the lexicon of gym goers everywhere
2) Expose all alleged NO supplements for the imposters they are
3) Smash the cell phones of anyone that texts in the middle of their training session
4) Solve the New Jersey Sleeveless Shirt Epidemic (This is a serious problem and appears to be spreading at an unprecedented rate)

If I accomplish even HALF of these goals in 2010, I’ll enter 2011 a happy man.

Keep training hard through the new year!

-Kevin Neeld

P.S. Over the next couple weeks I’m going to be posting some incredible information that I picked up from Nick Tumminello, so keep checking back frequently.

P.P.S. If you haven’t yet, check out my new hockey training site, which has videos of hundreds of hockey training exercises on it and my Off-Ice Performance Training Course at a drastically discounted $47.

Oct

23

Rotational Core Power Training: The Final Phase!

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Phase 4 of our Rotational Core Power Training progression for hockey players, baseball players, and golfers includes exercises involving a strong rotational hip movement, energy transfer through the core, and follow through with thoracic spine rotation.  The “Standing Cable Rotational Pull-to-Push” is a great example.

Aug

20

Is Time Magazine Trying to Kill You?

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Last week, one of the athletes I train approached me about an article he came across in Time Magazine.

My reaction to his comments was: “You have to be kidding me.”

I was going to blast the article and the complete lack of social responsibility Time Magazine showed by printing the article.

This is just ANOTHER example of a staff writer for a magazine completely misinterpreting research and putting together a story of lies with a catchy title to attract an audience.

Effective journalism, yes.  Effective lifestyle advice, no.  In fact, printing articles like this is dangerous and essentially says that Time Magazine weighs you reading their article more than your life (or at least your quality of life).

I don’t want to waste too much time on this crap.

John Berardi took a more level-headed approach to commenting on this article.

Find out what his response was to the “Exercise makes you fatter” slogan of Times Magazine.

- Kevin Neeld

Aug

14

I Can’t Get it Up

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Luckily, I’ve never had this problem.

Other guys aren’t so lucky.

When I switched the way my hockey guys do bird dogs after watching a video that Nick Tumminello put out, I’d say about ½ the guys I train either really struggled or couldn’t lift their leg at all.

Watch the video below to see Nick demo the exercise that leaves most guys saying “I can’t get it up!”

Jul

1

Hockey Player Plague: Sports Hernias and “Groin” Strains

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One of main topics of the Boston Hockey Summit was the growing problem of sports hernias and “groin” strains within the sport of ice hockey. These injuries are affecting an increasing number of high-level hockey players. I wrote Dissecting the Sports Hernia last summer for StrengthCoach.com outlining some of the research on the topic.

The anatomy involved with these injuries can be very complex, but the concepts involved in preventing them are relatively simple: Maintain balanced strength among the muscles connecting to the pelvis and maintain adequate hip range of motion. Admittedly, these concepts are “simple” in theory, but difficult to implement.

One of the factors associated with hip and lower abdominal injuries is a loss of hip internal rotation range of motion. This can be the result of excessive tightness of the hip external rotators. The stretch below is a great one to maintain hip internal rotation range of motion. Basically you just plant your feet, pull your stomach down toward the floor, and pull your knees toward each other. You should feel this deep in your hips.

 

Knee-to-Knee Stretch

 

Kevin Neeld

Jun

29

Isometric Yoga Circuits for Hockey Players

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Brijesh Patel, my friend and colleague from Quinnipiac University, spoke at the Boston Hockey Summit about training program design for ice hockey players. During his talk he went through several yoga-based isometric circuits that can be incorporated into off-ice training warm-ups. Everyone, including myself, that I’ve seen do these circuits has the same reaction: They feel loose AND strong. The circuits are well-designed to improve range of motion around the hips and thoracic spine (spine around your upper back…this is a good thing), and activate the hip abductors/external rotators and muscles around the posterior shoulder (muscles on the outside of the hip that don’t get the training attention they deserve).

I started using two of these circuits with all of my athletes. In both of these circuits, each position is held for 10 seconds.

3-Way Squat Circuit
1) Deep squat while pushing your knees out with your elbows to stretch out the muscles on the inside of your thigh
2) Maintain the deep squat, but move your hands behind your head, interlock your fingers, and pull your elbows back together. It’s important to keep your back flat (don’t let it round forward) and actively pull your knees outward using the muscles on the outside of your hip.
3) Maintain the deep squat while extending your arms straight overhead and continuing to pull your knees out.

3-Way Split Squat Circuit
1) Split squat position with arms extended straight overhead. Focus on squeezing your butt on the back leg and pulling down into the floor through the ball of your foot on the front leg.
2) Maintain the position while performing a triceps stretch on the arm on the side of your back leg and leaning toward the side of your front leg.
3) Maintain the position while twisting toward the front leg and reaching back with the arm on the side of your front leg and following this hand with your eyes.

As I type these descriptions, I’m realizing how simple these are when you see them, but how confusing it is to try to explain it. If you’re simple-minded like I am and have no idea what any of those descriptions mean, your best bet is to head over to myfittube.com and watch the videos that Brijesh put together for them. I’m confident you’ll be able to wrap your mind around them as soon as you see them.

When you get to myfittube.com, look for Brijesh Patel’s Deep Squat Series, and Warrior 1 Series.

Jun

25

The State of Youth Hockey with Michael Boyle

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The state of youth hockey is…in big trouble. Michael Boyle is widely regarded as the world’s authority on ice hockey strength and conditioning. His presentation on hockey player development at the Boston Hockey Summit was one that I truly believe EVERYONE involved in the game of hockey should see…probably twice.

Coach Boyle used a number of specific examples regarding athletes he’s worked with in the past that went on to play for an NCAA Division 1 team and/or professionally to support his argument. In my mind, this is the best evidence for any argument. Anyone can argue theory (many people, including myself, do), but nothing speaks louder than results. The main points from Coach Boyle’s talk were:

1) Early specialization (only playing hockey) inhibits development. Kids, especially those younger than 16, need to play multiple sports for several reasons. Playing different sports will incorporate a wider range of movement patterns, which will help prevent overuse injuries. As a quick side note, many of these overuse injuries don’t appear until AFTER hockey players are late in their high school years, but the foundation for these injuries is laid by ONLY playing hockey starting at a young age. Performing different athletic movements will also increase the number of movement strategies in an athletes’ “movement library”. This basically just means that hockey players’ bodies will be proficient at a larger number of movements, which could have implications for both performance and injury prevention. Mentally, playing different sports is refreshing. It’s the parent’s responsibility to keep their kids involved in multiple sports, even if the kid claims that they really enjoy playing hockey year round. Most kids would also prefer to eat ice cream and pizza for every meal, but that’s not good for them either.

2) In addition to playing multiple sports, the single best way to develop high level hockey players is to get them on a WELL-DESIGNED strength and conditioning (what I refer to as Athletic Development) program. A quality Athletic Development Coach can design and implement a balanced training program that will help young hockey players add muscle mass and functional strength. In addition to improving performance, a quality training program will also decrease injury risk.

The take home message boils down to: Young hockey players need to spend less time playing hockey and more time developing overall athleticism.

Not everyone has access to quality Athletic Development Coaches, and even people that do can’t always afford them. That was the biggest reason I put together my Off-Ice Training Course, so people without a background in strength and conditioning and exercise science could still put together quality programs.

Click here for more information on how to develop your own off-ice training program.

- Kevin Neeld

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