A couple days ago, I posted an article comparing a few lower body power tests, and how they may or may not be “hockey specific”. If you missed that article, you can check it out here: A Hockey-Specific Power Test
A comment that I’ve gotten a few times, and something I had considered myself while interpreting the data, was simply that the lateral bound test would be confounded (or at least influenced) by the height of the individual. In other words, because it involves jumping off of one leg and landing on the other, having longer legs and therefore a larger lateral excursion would lead to increased jumping distances. I think it would be hard to argue that leg length doesn’t in some way influence a test like this, but it’s important to remember, as I noted in the previous post, that the ability for longer legs to equate to larger lateral excursions depends on a number of factors, notably pelvis structure and positioning, femoral head architecture and positioning, and length of the adductor complex on both sides. Bottom line is that when sifting through the data, many of the top achievers were among the smaller kids on the team and many of the bottom achievers were among the taller kids on the team. In short, there’s a lot more to the story than just how tall someone is!
Last Friday I had an opportunity to sit down over a cup of coffee and catch up with Joe Heiler from Sports Rehab Expert. I’ve known Joe for over 4 years now and I was fortunate to have a chance to contribute some articles to his site early in its evolution. Now, SportsRehabExpert.com is over 4 years old and has really grown into an incredible resource.
With the recent release of my Optimizing Movement DVDs, Joe wanted to talk about some of the topics discussed in my presentations, including:
Joe was kind enough to let me repost the interview here so you can listen to it for free. You can download it at the link below:
Optimizing Movement continues to get great reviews from those at both ends of the rehabilitation to elite performance continuum. This is what Penn State University Hockey Strength and Conditioning Coach Rob McLean had to say:
“In Optimizing Movement Kevin does an amazing job of laying out many of the dominant philosophies that are influencing our industry, and discusses how they influence his approach to training. Much of the FMS, SFMA and PRI information is very complicated and yet Kevin presents them with a simplicity that allows you to grasp the concepts quickly and recognize how important it is to look for movement dysfunction. He then discusses how he evaluates his athletes and uses that information to direct his movement-based approach to create a training program that deals specifically with the athletes’ limitations. Lastly Kevin reveals overwhelming evidence to show that most athletes walking through our doors already are dealing with sub-threshold injuries that must be managed or else we, as strength coaches, will only make them worse and never achieve the best result possible for our athletes.
I try to review all the great information that is available every year from Cressey, Robertson, Reinold, Weingroff, Ward, Jamieson and many others. For me, Kevin’s Optimizing Movement was definitely the best DVD I’ve seen this year and I would consider it one of the best DVDs I’ve ever watched. This is the DVD that brought everything together for me and allowed me to implement my knowledge and define my core beliefs. I strongly recommend it to strength coaches or athletes who are looking for direction in applying these philosophies to create athletes that are more durable and move better.”
Rob McLean, Head Strength and Conditioning Coach, Penn State University Hockey
Check out OptimizingMovement.com for more information!
Next week I’ll be posting a couple articles discussing early in-season training programs for hockey players, so be sure to check back. In the meantime, enjoy the interview and don’t forget to stop by SportsRehabExpert.com to check out all of the articles, videos, interviews, and forum discussions!
To your success,
Kevin Neeld
OptimizingMovement.com
UltimateHockeyTraining.com
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