The youth training process should serve two primary purposes:
1) Facilitate long-term development – Start with basic training strategies that lead to consistent, incremental progress. Save advanced training methods for when the athlete has several years of training experience AND the basics stop working.
2) Maximize durability – Break the cycle of constant sport participation, and train in a way that improves the athlete’s ability to cope with and adapt to stress (i.e. build in rational exercise progressions, start conservative with training frequency, volume and intensity, avoid provocative movements, etc.).
The injury statistics above are alarming. We need to do better.
Feel free to post any comments/questions below. If you found this helpful, please share/re-post it so others can benefit.
To your success,
Kevin Neeld
SpeedTrainingforHockey.com
HockeyTransformation.com
OptimizingAdaptation.com
P.S. Interested in age-specific year-round hockey training programs? Check out Ultimate Hockey Transformation
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