Tag: hockey training

Thoughts on the American Development Model (ADM)

On Monday I flew to Minneapolis to work at USA Hockey’s Women’s National Team Camp. The camp boasts the top 28 U-18 girls, and top 51 O-18 players in the country and provides a great opportunity to check with everyone to assess their progress both on and off the ice. It’s been a great experience so far, and as always, I’ve been learning a lot about what it takes to develop a world-leading program.

As you can imagine, orchestrating on- and off-ice testing for 79 girls and processing the subsequent data has occupied a significant amount of time over the last 4 days. As a result, I haven’t had as much time to read or write as I typically do. I did, however, come across a great article from Andreas Wochtl, who coaches a few hours away from where our facility is. Andreas and I actually grew up playing in the same organization, but missed playing with each other by a year. As a European, I’ve been really interested to hear his thoughts on the current state of youth hockey development and learn about how he runs his programs. On that note, I want to share his article “Thoughts on the American Development Model” with you. Hopefully this stimulates some thought and discussion in the comments section below.

Thoughts on the American Development Model
I wanted to take a moment and bring USA Hockey’s ADM program to everyone’s attention. I’m sure you all have heard mention of this program (our team is now ADM compliant etc). This program is very extensive and detailed and there are tons of lists of factors and other implementation strategies (read sleeping pills). I can’t claim that I’m an expert on the ins and outs of this model but I’d like to share a few highlights that I think are important and worth sharing.

This is a long-term athlete development model that was introduced by USAH a few years ago (2009 if you’re curious) essentially to grow the sport of hockey and introduce it to more and more players. This was not done overnight nor on a whim; they spent years gathering data and talking to the leaders worldwide within the sport of hockey. The idea was to shift the focus away from games & results. This incorrect focus led to a large numbers (more than half) of players quitting before Peewee’s and one in five players quit after their first year. USAH wants youth teams to spend more time on the practice and effort. The program is supported by virtually every coach from the junior/college levels and up.

The key difference and the key for the success of growing the sport of hockey is positive reinforcement and allowing players to learn, fail, and ultimately succeed. Spending LESS time playing games, traveling to games, preparing for games, worrying about the scores of games, worrying about how much ice time I will get in games….you get the idea. USA Hockey wants all players to have an opportunity to learn to love the game of ice hockey, not be discouraged before they even get familiar with it. Why would anyone, adult or child, want to keep playing a sport in which the coach tells you you aren’t good enough, directly or indirectly, and you don’t get the same opportunity to participate games and practice? I bet a lot of guys (and girls) playing in adult leagues wouldn’t be very happy if there was a coach behind the bench doing these very same things when all you want to do is go out there and have fun.

If not wasn’t enough, games are not the best place for skill development….practice is. The best Peewee aged players touches the puck for 38 seconds per game (according to a puck possession study done by USAH) if I told parents that their son/daughter will only touch a puck for 38 seconds during an entire practice you would tell me I’m crazy. How can you get good at anything in 38 seconds? The answer of course is you can’t, you need time and you need repetition which you can only get in practice. Even further, NCAA college teams or the best prep schools in the country play nearly as many games as some of the mite teams in this area. Why? They know it’s in their players best interest to practice to help their players get onto the next level.

Some will argue that this is taking away from the “stronger” players at the younger levels who are so far ahead of their peers, or that it doesn’t allow the kids to compete fully. To put it bluntly, that is the biggest crock of you-know-what I’ve ever heard. When I hear, “oh he/she is the best player in the area”, although that’s great and yes that player should be proud of his accomplishments so far, there is a 60% chance that player will quit by the time he’s a Peewee or older. The ADM model allows the players who have the potential to be truly “better” to develop and emerge over time rather than have players to “peak out” at 11-12. Also, it still DOES encourage competition and not what I call “everyone-gets-a-trophy”.

Attitude. Competition is part of any sport, but it must be healthy competition not irate and, at times, shall we say ethically questionable.

The biggest obstacle to successfully implementing this program are adults. We are the biggest problem, yet we are the ones in charge of making it happen. Too many times have I heard/seen/experiences coaches who focus on their own short-term goals, such as shortening the bench in a Squirt game to get the W, or screaming at a player for making a bad play, convincing themselves that the kids really care if they win that tournament and get a trophy, etc etc (you know what I’m talking about) instead of really truly having the best interest of the kids in mind. We spend energy to plan tournaments, games, and develop the most advanced practices when all we really need to do is throw a puck out there and let the kids do the rest. A study was completed by Michigan State among 10,000 middle school and high school students to list the top 12 reasons why they play a sport; #1 for both boys and girls was to have fun. Winning ranked as number #8 for boys and dead last #12 for girls. There were at least 7 other reasons besides winning that were more important. The same institute also surveyed why kids stop playing, reason #2 –> they weren’t having fun.

This is a lot of information to comprehend and digest. The biggest takeaway is to allow our kids to have fun, truly enjoy the sport, and not try to implement adult values on kids sports. There’s plenty of reading material out there, research papers, and other information that supports these thoughts and that you’re can Google on a late night if you’re out of sheep to count. I have yet to come across one article supporting a 70-80 game schedule, or even 40 games, at the Peewee level but in all honesty and without sarcasm I would love to see one that did. As I said earlier, I am not an expert on this ADM stuff nor do I have a formal education in coaching or psychology, which is why I need to spend the time to learn what is out there and what are the best ways to help young players develop. Please feel free to share your thoughts on this subject and thank you for taking the time to read this note.

To your success,

Kevin Neeld

P.S. A significant piece of the new player development recommendations revolves around following a quality hockey training program!

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This Week in Hockey Strength and Conditioning

I hope you’ve had a great week. It’s been a bit of a change of pace here as our nights have slowed down because a lot of our kids are away at camps or vacations. The downtime has been great to dive a little deeper into some of the manual therapy work I’ve been learning over the last few weeks. Never a dull moment!

I have a few exciting posts coming up in the next couple of weeks so stay tuned for those. This past week was also a bit of change as I featured primarily the work of other people. It was probably a welcomed changed if you’ve been reading my ramblings for the last several months! Check out what you’ve been missing in the world of Hockey Strength and Conditioning.

We’ve also added some new content at our Hockey Strength and Conditioning membership site.

Darryl Nelson added a video of an exercise he uses with his players that have an upper body injury that prevents them from doing cleans. I really like the concept here, and it will likely be something I use in the future. I may tweak the performance of it slightly more so it’s more of a traditional clean movement (e.g. bar/weight path), but tough to say without really having tried it.

Click here to watch the video >> 1-Arm Cleans

I added a new article on the visual system based on information I’ve primarily learned from Pete Friesen with the Hurricanes and the book “See to Play” from Dr. Michael Peters, who is an optometrist that works with the Hurricanes (among other teams). I’m excited that Dr. Peters has agreed to do an interview for us in the near future as his book was PACKED with really valuable, interesting information that I think will benefit all of you. In the meantime, this article introduces a few concepts of how the complexities of the visual system can affect performance and recommends a couple great resources to find more information.

Click here to read the article >> Looking Deeper Into the Visual System

Speaking of Coach Friesen, we also added a notice about the 2012 Friesen PhysioFitness Summit. I had a great time at this a few years back and took a lot of notes. Unfortunately, the majority of my continuing education and travel schedule is booked for the rest of the year so I won’t be able to make it, but I highly recommend you make the attempt if you’re a fitness or rehab professional.

Click here for more information >> Friesen PhysioFitness Summit

Also, you can check out the recap article I wrote about a few of the major topics I learned at the one I attended!

Click here to read >> Friesen Physio-Fitness Summit Recap

We have a few good forum discussions going that are worth checking out as well. When you log in, make sure you check out:

Programming Questions
Conditioning
Psoas Specific Work
Volume Control

Sean Skahan, Darryl Nelson, and Mike Potenza have provided a ton of great feedback to the members that have asked questions and I’ve learned quite a bit from both our members and the exchange with Sean, Darryl and Mike.

That’s a wrap for today. As always, if you aren’t a member yet, I encourage you to try out Hockey Strength and Conditioning for a week. It’ll only cost $1, and if it’s not the best buck you’ve ever spent, I’ll personally refund you!

To your success,

Kevin Neeld

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This Week in Hockey Strength and Conditioning

I hope you’ve been well. The last few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind…although I think I’ve said that for the last couple of months so I suppose things have been pretty typical for this time of year!

Over the last the two weeks I’ve added a few interesting hockey training posts, including a presentation I gave to ~185 14-year old players in Colorado Springs a couple weeks. If you haven’t already, check them out at the links below:

We’ve also added some pretty good stuff over at Hockey Strength and Conditioning over the last couple of weeks, including a few articles from new contributors.

Articles

Defenseman Specific Speed from Sean Skahan
Reconditioning Phase: Step One in Off-Season Programming from Devan McConnell
Youth Hockey Training Presentation from me
Children’s Footwear from Dr. William Rossi
Top 5 Quotes from Perform Better Summit, Chicago from Brian Sipotz

Programs

3-Day Off-Season Program from Darryl Nelson
Pre-Camp Work Capacity Phase from Mike Potenza
Youth Training Program: Tri-Planar Circuits from Mike Potenza

Videos

Single-Leg Complex Training from Sean Skahan

To your success,

Kevin Neeld

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USA Hockey Camp Q&A

Last week I posted the presentation I gave recently at a USA Hockey U-14 Regional Festival Camp. If you missed it, you can check out the presentation here: USA Hockey Regional Camp Recap

I also added the presentation and all of the videos at Hockey Strength and Conditioning, so if you wanted to check those out, it may be worth trialing a membership to the site. You’ll likely find a lot of other beneficial information while you’re in there!

Hockey Conditioning: Is longer better?

After my presentation at the USA Hockey Camp, two parents, who happened to be former world-class figure skaters, asked a great question about conditioning. They mentioned that when they were training, their routine was 5 minutes long. The thought, then, was that if they trained to complete a 10-minute routine (or trained to go hard for 10-minutes) then the body would be well-prepared to perform optimally for 5 minutes. The parallel to hockey, was that if the average shift was 40-60s, shouldn’t the players just train to go hard for 2 minutes?

While this idea makes some sense on paper, it loses some of its merit in light of the specific adaptations that training in specific energy zones creates. I’ve written about some of this in the past, but the general idea is that we have three separate energy systems:

Alactic
Lactic
Aerobic

From top to bottom, these systems can provide energy for short, high-intensity efforts (alactic) through longer, lower-intensity efforts (aerobic). While the alactic system has the highest relative recovery time in terms of work:rest ratios, the shorter work intervals typically create recovery times that are less than 1-2 minutes, and if the lactic system is avoided, repeat maximal efforts can be more consistently repeated without significant decrements related to fatigue (one reason why some S&C coaches avoid training in the lactic zone for the majority of the training year, even in hockey players). Naturally, it’s a physiological law that the more highly trained you are on one extreme, the less proficient you’ll be at the opposite extreme. In more practical terms, the best sprinters won’t be the best endurance runners because the physiological adaptations to these two efforts are conflicting.

The major point here is that you want your training to be specific to the desired energy system adaptation. If you simply add time with the idea that overshooting the competition time period will make it easier to perform in the competition, you’ll likely cause other undesirable adaptations (e.g. decreases in muscle mass, strength, power, etc.). This is especially true when you’re crossing over energy system time limits. While it’s far more complicated than this, if you think of the alactic system as providing energy for efforts in the 0-20s range, the lactic system providing energy for efforts in the 20s-2 minute range, and the aerobic system providing energy for anything over 2-minutes, then any energy system work that crosses over one of these boundaries is that much more likely to create undesirable changes. Does training for 10 minutes negatively effect performance in 5-minute efforts? I don’t think it’s the best approach, but because they’re both toward the shorter end of the aerobic spectrum it may not be entirely negative. In contrast, doubling a 60s hockey shift to train in 2-minute max effort intervals could have a more negative effect.

This is aside from the fact, which I discussed in my presentation, that despite the average shift length ranging somewhere between 25-60s depending on the position and level of play, every shift is broken down into a series of shorter duration efforts interspersed with periods of rest and recovery (e.g. defensemen resting at the point in the offensive zone or back side of the net in the defensive zone, wingers resting while covering defenseman at the point, etc.). While these examples, which are just a few of the many that occur regularly for players at all positions, aren’t entirely passive, they’re far from maximum effort.

Is it speed training or conditioning?

Another concept I touched on during the presentation was the idea that speed training is meant to improve the athlete’s maximal capacity, and thus requires full recovery between efforts. A common problem at all levels, but especially with youth hockey players, is that players are rushed into their next sprint before they’ve had a chance to recovery. In general, I say if you’re still breathing heavy, you’re not ready to go. And if you’re not sure, then wait longer. You can’t expand the limits of your maximum speed in a fatigued state. If you’re breathing heavy at the start of a sprint, you’re officially “conditioning” at that point. I think this really resonated with the players, parents, and coaches in the audience because it passes the common sense test.

This, in my mind, is the major downfall of even well-coached (the overwhelming minority) CrossFit and other generic “do it yourself” training programs. Most are geared toward maintaining a high tempo, which has more of a conditioning effect than anything else. If you remember from the video below, there are several different qualities that need to be included in a comprehensive hockey training program, and simply attempting to jam more work into a finite period of time will impair the adaptations to several of them.

Unfortunately, because kids have such a young training age, EVERYTHING (no matter how stupid, physiologically senseless, and generally inappropriate) makes them stronger. This gives the illusion of an effective training stimulus, but really it’s lowering their adaptation ceiling by sending conflicting physiological signals.

Wrap Up

One of the reasons I had so much fun at the camp was that I had an opportunity to interact with and influence so many of our country’s youth players. There were kids there from Alaska to California to Texas to South Dakota, and everywhere in between (except Canada!). My hope is that these players now have information to combat the nonsense they’re exposed to through television infomercials and the whisperings of their fellow high school students. In contrast to Europe, who tends to emphasize development and has many of their best coaches working at the youth ranks, the U.S., at least historically, over-emphasizes competition and most of the best coaches are reserved for the top leagues. My hope is that the coaches and training professionals working with youth players continue to work hard and improve, so we can help provide better information and development programs for our players. I’m appreciative that USA Hockey gave me an opportunity to work with so many of their kids; hopefully they use what they learned!

To your success,

Kevin Neeld

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This Month in Hockey Strength and Conditioning

Back on track this week with a wrap-up of this week’s (and the three preceding week’s since I’ve been slacking) activity in the world of hockey strength and conditioning. Over the last several weeks, I’ve added several articles on topics ranging from strength and conditioning internships to specific hockey training techniques to maximize performance and minimize injury risk. Check out what you’ve been missing at the links below.

We’ve also added a TON of great content over at Hockey Strength and Conditioning. I HIGHLY encourage you to read through all of these pieces as I think there is an awesome combination of quality information, great training programs, and unique exercises that will apply to players at multiple levels. We’ve also had a few terrific contributions from a few guys I hold in a very high regard in Anthony Donskov, Jim Snider, and Kyle Bangen. Check out the links below.

Articles

Debit Card Strength and Conditioning: In-Season Account Withdrawls from Anthony Donskov
Essential Components of a Strength Training Program from Darryl Nelson
Pro’s vs. Joe’s from Jim Snider
Triple Flexion Training Considerations in Hockey from Kyle Bangen

Programs

Spring Training 4-Day Per Week from Darryl Nelson
Summer 2012 GPP Phase 1 from Mike Potenza
2012 5-Day Off-Season Hockey Training Program: Phase 1 from me
Off-Season 2012 Phase 2 Strength Training from Sean Skahan

Videos

Side Lying 1-Leg Hip Extension from Sean Skahan
2 Arm DB Snatch from Darryl Nelson
Phase 1 Sprinting Variations from me
Hip Extension Holds from Mike Potenza

To your success,

Kevin Neeld

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