Hockey Performance Training - A Holistic Perspective

What is holistic performance? It is a term derived from holistic living. It means all skills are connected to attaining optimal performance. It’s about stepping back and seeing the bigger picture, leading a balanced lifestyle, and practicing all parts of the game. Not just the game of hockey but the game of life as well.

To better understand holistic performance and how it’s important, we will dive into how fitness training has evolved from the early 80s to today in the context of hockey.

In the 80s and 90’s some hockey players used to do weight lifting with machines that created a one-directional movement. So these hockey players got stronger but how they trained the muscles wasn’t directly related to the movements of muscles on the ice. This frequently led to the risk of injuries from improper training methods even though players got a lot stronger on the ice, more muscles were being torn.

In simple terms, this type of training usually only benefited the physical body to a degree.

When we cross over into the year 2000 and beyond, we see an interesting trend. A lot of fitness trainers began working in conjunction with physiotherapists. When trainers started collaborating with physiotherapists, training for hockey became more sports-specific.

Movements for training became more functional, efficient and related to hockey. This type of training connected mind and body. As a result, athlete’s gained a big advantage over other players that didn’t do any training and trained the old-school way (heavy lifting only).

This takes us to today which is where Player Acceleration is leading the way. There is a saying, “if you want to fast go alone. If you want to go far go together”.

More and more athletes are recognizing that training for your sport alone is not enough. To gain a long-term advantage in today’s game; one needs to do what other players aren’t yet. Think of it as a personal discovery! Hockey players are beginning to realize the importance of yoga, nutrition, proper sleep habits, stress management, sports psychology, and breath work, and how it creates balance not only in hockey but life as well.

Why does holistic performance matter in hockey?

Well quite simply put, you are not going to perform your best if you are sleep deprived and feel sluggish playing hockey the next day. Your slump will last longer if you don’t have the right mental mindset to get you out of it (sport psychology). Your body will break down over time if you don’t nourish it with the right nutrients (nutrition).

Do you see the pattern here?

All these areas are connected to one another.

The more areas outside of hockey you focus on, the better your athletic performance!

That doesn’t mean practicing stick-handling skills isn’t important anymore. It means that developing proper nutrition and practicing stick-handling skills are equally important. For if you are not as healthy as can be, how can you get the most performance out of your body?

Taking your hockey training to another level

We talked about how aligning mind and body allows one to train smarter and more effectively, but what if there was another power inside all of us? Another level of holistic performance we could connect with? It turns out there is!

It’s called the soul. We’ve heard about the soul, but what is the soul?

To many people, it means many different things. So let us try and describe this most powerful force in our universe – the soul! Quite simply put it's energy.

Energy can neither be created nor destroyed, just reshuffled!

Thought is energy, words are energy, and movement is energy. This energy which one can name the soul feeds everything with life. It makes your heartbeat, it makes the fuel combust, the wind move, powers your phone, powers your food, powers your breath, grows plants, creates waves in the ocean and so on.

Guess what?

It can even power your hockey!

How do you know when your soul is playing hockey with you?

You will know because it will feel like passion and every time you step on the ice you will get a rush and have a big smile on your face!

Every time you score a goal, you will skate to the bench, reflect, and ask yourself? Whoa! How did I do that? I didn’t think about anything.

Everything just flowed.

And when things flow in life they flow in hockey.

This is where Player Acceleration can teach you how to align soul mind and body to create the hockey you’ve never even imagined you could play!

We will show you techniques that help you develop holistic performance that only a few athletes on this planet know the secret to. We will open up the doors to powers that already exist within you waiting to be expressed in hockey.

It’s there in you now, can you feel it?

Give us a call to inquire and stay tuned for more educational content.