Holiday Deals!

Just letting everyone know that there have been insane deals on hockey equipment for Black Friday and Cyber Monday.  I recommend icewarehouse.com for the best deals.  They have 20% off for IW members.  And you can easily become a member by purchasing a water bottle or t-shirt.  Otherwise dickssportinggoods.com has 25% off any one item today only.  Great if you're looking to buy a high-end stick.

Get Those Rinks Ready

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving, which marks a big day American families to be together. It’s also a good marker for when you should start preparing to make your backyard ice rink. You don’t want to wait much longer as the temperature will drop considerably soon, and this long weekend makes a good time to put it together. You’ll notice it’s been about a year since I made a post. This is mostly due to the fact that I went through the crazy effort of making a backyard ice rink last winter. Because of that, I’ll export some of my hard earned knowledge to you.

My rink from last year

Before even thinking of what you’ll need for a rink, you should first ask yourself whether or not you really want to make one. From January to February last year, a lot of my free time was dedicated to keeping up the rink. Although truthfully that’s right in the middle of the winter, where you’re probably not going out too often to begin with. These nights were filled with going out after work into the freezing cold, working with freezing water, and staying up at late hours while the temperature was its lowest. But I did it because I wanted to know I could build that, and I knew it was the last year I would have a backyard for awhile since I moved in the Spring.

Once you do decide that you want to spend the long hard winter outdoors in the cold rather than inside, then here’s some things you should do to get going this weekend.

1. Measure the perimeter and area of the rink you want. Don’t bother trying for curved corners. 
2. Figure out the height of the boards you will need. This is mostly important if you’re working with uneven ground. The backyard I used was about a foot lower in one end than the other, so it needed higher boards on one side. The normal height you should use is 1’, and increase it on the lower end to make it level. If you’re low end is 1’ below the high end, then make the low end 2’ boards and the high end 1’ boards. 
3. Purchase your boards from a home development store like Lowe’s or Home Depot. Just go cheap with the untreated 4’ x 8’ plywood, and have them cut it into smaller segments. I did four 1’x6’ segments since that was the max size I could fit in the car that was useful for the rink size. The extra wood you end up with can be cut up into small stakes and joints. 
4. Purchase ample nails and screws which are long enough to go through the boards. Just ask someone who works at the store what they suggest. I used a power drill for putting this together, so I used a lot of long nails. 
5. Make sure you have a vise grip so that something can hold the stakes or joints to the boards while you nail or screw them together. It just makes it easier. 
6. Lay down painter's plastic tarps over the boards and cover the entire ice area. It shouldn’t be water tight, as you want the melted runoff to drain.  The plastic is just there to assist with building a proper ice base, though compacted snow can do this job too, but the sheets are easy to put down.  I used 10'x100' plastic sheeting.  Just tape the sheets together at certain points so they don’t fly away. Use a staple gun to attach the plastic to the boards. 

After all these steps are done all you have to do is wait for the temperature to drop and the first snow to come. It’s just a matter of time in December. Once you get your first snow fall, compress it down (like step on it or sled over it), and add lots of water to turn it into slush. Let it freeze, then keep adding water until it evens out into a smooth ice sheet. Alternatively if it doesn’t snow for awhile, but it’s really freezing (like lower than 20 degrees), you can probably just puddle the water outside and let it freeze. But that will take more water and time on your part.

I’ll put up another post detailing some temperature and watering guidance, and some gritty details on how to avoid having your hose frozen. At least for this weekend you’ll be all set for the rink before the temperate drops. Probably by this time next month you’ll be out there on the ice.

-Drew

Proper Warm-up

There are a few specific things I always like to do during a warm-up in order to get ready for a game. Every player is a little different though. In men's leagues you don't have practices, so the warm-up is really your only time to get ready for the game. The time available is usually too short to attempt specific plays, so I prefer to just get myself ready.

First thing I do is jump out onto the rink to get myself pumped up. It's an easy way to get yourself psyched up for a game when you rush out onto the rink. Once I'm out there I look at whether or not anyone has setup the goals and it's pegs. The last thing you need is a goalie with all his pads on trying to fumble around digging spikes into the ice. If it's not setup, I'll skate over and do it first.

Once that's done I like to make a lap or two of my team's end of the rink. I then do some forward-to-backward transitions, and practice my backwards c-cuts and backwards cross-overs during additional laps around my zone. Finally I start practicing my stops, making sure I can get a good deep cut with my skates. I find it important to go through all the skating techniques I use during the game.

Once I'm done with my skating elements, I go over to the side and do some streches. The last thing you need is a cramp during a game. Just a few light streches like calfs bends, thigh extensions, and rotating your torso should be enough.

I then grab a puck and practice some shots into the boards. This includes wristers, backhands, and slapshots. But the most important part of a warm-up is getting shots on the goalie. Not for yourself, but to make sure the goalies is all set to go.

Many guys attempt "shootout" attempts on the goalie to warm him up. I suppose this is fine, but it really doesn't replicate what the goalie will face at all. The best things to do are slapshots or throwing wristers at him so can get some positional practice in. Attempting to guess at where or when you'll deke isn't exactly the average shot he'll face in-game.

Now you're all ready to go for the game. If you still have some extra time, pull another guy aside and practice passing. Besides skating this is the most frequent thing you'll actually do during the game. You can also practice setting up some one-timers to your teammates as well, as that is the regular shot you'll get on the powerplay. Some guys like to practice deflecting shots in front of the net too, but I prefer not taking a puck to the groin until at least the start of the game.

Roller Hockey Stop

Doing a hockey stop is a key fundamental to skating. You go from a fast speed to a dead stop very quickly. This is fairly easy to do thanks to the sliding nature of ice, but when on roller it can be a little tricky. It's really only tricky because everyone is used to the motions of the hockey stop on ice. Roller requires a slight variation.

Inline skates have a higher amount of friction compared to ice no matter which surface you're playing on. This means when you attempt to do a hockey stop similar to how you would in ice, then you're really just going to fall flat on your face since the wheels will grip the surface quicker.

When I perform a hockey stop in roller I'm actually doing a wide semi-circle turn, then pivoting my hips similar to how I would on ice. After I turn I dig my wheels hard in the mid-heel section to come to a full stop. If the surface is wood with really good grip, then I come to a screeching halt. If the surface is something with less grip though, such as asphalt, then I slide a bit.

If you're having difficult picturing this, think of a regular ice hockey stop as a straight line where you pivot your hips to keep in that straight line, and scape the ice to stop. But in roller hockey you start off in a straight line, make a quick semi-circle, then dig in your mid-heel and return to the straight line direction to stop.

Here's a video of myself doing this at the rink. Notice I'm doing a semi-circle turn before I go into the stop.

Style Design Tape

Thanks to the great deals icewarehouse.com ran for Black Friday, I picked up a few items. Mostly it was just some extra pucks, a wood stick for outdoor roller, and some tape. Tape is one thing you really tend to blow through since it gets scuffed up regularly.

I always am a bit stylin' with my two-tone tape jobs, but this time I went all out and bought some kick-ass new tape they had in stock. That's right, skull & bones! True, it's not quite as stylin' as the guy who shows up to the rink in Coach loafers, but it's the best I've got going for me.

Now in order to keep the design obvious, putting this tape on requires a slightly special method when putting it on the stick. Rather than just wrapping around, which is actually what I did for the first part, you need to individually tape on strips. You can see I applied a strip from the top of the blade while aligning the design, and wrapped it around the bottom. Very important that you wrap around the bottom, since that's what is touching the ground and will get the most wear.



As you can see this leaves a lot of excess. But similar to taping the rounded end of the blade, you simply cut it with a scissor. Here's the sweet finished product when all is said and done.



Now there's only one thing left. That's to show up with this flask to the rink with my water instead...

Gatorade Water Bottles

Now this may be a silly thing (probably is) but man these bottles are great! There was even an epic thread discussion on them on the gsbb forums. Usually I don't care for this kind of stuff but having a bottle with a 1 way valve is a huge thing especially for goalies who don't get a lot of breaks/time to drink.

So lets take a look at these bad boys. Pretty good construction, thin bottle with a 1 way valve cap. The importance of this is, you don't waste time taking off your gloves, lifting your mask to open and drink. Just pick it up and squeeze for refreshment. Hasn't leaked in the few times I have messed with it and when squeezed you get a super soaker like stream of water. This is definitely a time saver, especially at some pick up games where there are only 2 goalies and all the out players just want to skate non-stop. You can grab these at Modells or Dicks if you can find them for about $3 a pop and cheaper on Ebay. You can also order them direct from Gatorade like I did for about $8.99 for a 6 pack.

Skate Collection

Skates are the most important piece of equipment you wear. They effect everything to do with your ability to play. Because of this it's very important to spend time and think about which skates to use. My skate collection is pretty comprehensive, and not quite ridiculous. At least once you consider I play on 3 different types of surfaces. Thanks to upgrades, most of them are fairly new. Here's a run down of the current skates I use. I'll spare you from reading about my old terrible skates. That's for another post on what happens when you DON'T spend time thinking about what you strap on your feet.

Outdoor Skates

These are the Bauer Vapor XVR Lite's. I bought them off of inlinewarehouse.com about 2 years ago mostly because they were on sale. They're no longer made, so you would have to get a newer model. Not that you would want these anyway, as I mostly got them because I was still new to playing and wanted to get things on a budget.

The bearings they came with were ABEC 7 and the wheels were Hyper Razors, which are multisurface 78A hardness wheels. Once I joined the indoor roller league at Hot Skates earlier this year, I swapped out the bearings for ABEC 9s. I highly suggest this for any roller hockey player. You don't want to be left in the dust because of your bearings when in a league.

Right now the wheels are Rink Rat Hot Shot XXXs, which are soft wheels for indoors. This is strictly because I had used the skates indoors earlier this year for my roller league. Once I bought a new pair of skates specifically for the indoor league, the Vapor XVRs became my outdoor only skates, but I didn't care if the wheels wore down so I kept them in there. The downside is I can really feel these wheels sliding. It might be because they are so soft. Once I wear them down a bit more, I'll change out the middle 2 wheels with my old Hyper Razors for a more balanced hardness.

Indoor Skates

As mentioned above, I previously was using my Bauer Vapors for both indoors and outdoors. Once I got sick of switching the wheels every week, I decided on purchasing a new pair specifically for the indoor league. After a long study of what was out on the market, I purchased Mission Solder SEs for a few reasons.

Originally I was thinking of purchasing another Bauer Vapor skate since I'm a real big fan of their design, both lightweight and aggressive stance. But Mission was recently purchases by Bauer, confusing since Bauer is also in-turn owned by Nike. Back on topic though, this model of Mission skates were the first ones made using similar molds to that of Bauer. Even the sizing is the same, whereas previously Mission skates using a different sizing model. Because of the similarity, I was willing to switch over.

The Soldier SEs are right in the middle of Mission's skate line. Even at the mid-tier though, they still come with ABEC 9 bearings and Rink Rat Hot Shot XXX wheels. These were the same specs of what I had in my Bauer's, so it would be an easy transition.

Ray has also recently purchased these skates too the previous season. His opinion of them being a pretty good skate and a great deal was enough to convince me. If you want a more detailed review, you can also check out this video from inlinewarehouse.com.

Oh one other big reason I got these too. These skates had just gone on sale! At the time the newest model of Mission skates, the Axiom line, were just announced. The price for these skates dropped by $30, so I figured it was worth getting.

Ice Skates

Being the fan of the Bauer Vapors I already owned for roller, I figured I would get the same for ice. I had read that Bauer Vapors were the most popular skate in the NHL. After seeing that I knew what I was going to buy when I upgraded my skates for ice hockey.

I ended up getting the Bauer Vapor X:30s. These are also mid-tier skates, ranging about $180 currently. Ice skates tend to be a little more expensive than inline skates. I'm not exactly sure why, but I suspect it's because they have to be a bit more stiff. For an in-depth look, you can check out the video from icewarehouse.com.

The Vapors are a great line. They're ultra lightweight, so you'll get that quick jump when in a foot race. They also have a very aggressive stance which you can slightly notice. These skates are made to be worn when you're in the forward leaning position, the typical stance to balance yourself when skating.

All Bauer skates come with Tuuk blade holders since they make them. These are also extremely popular holders, although I can't find an article on their popularity. You'll notice many players in the NHL switching out their skate holders with these all the time. The main reason they're popular is because they have a higher rocker number. In laymen's terms, the blade is more curved. This allows for quicker and sharper turns, which are very important in hockey.

Conclusions

If there's anything you should take away from this is that you really need to spend time and consider what skate to get. I highly suggest reading reviews online and even trying different types on at the store. It's ok to get a starter skate when you're first joining, but don't be surprised when a few months later you decide to check out something else. Also be sure to have a skate for each surface you play on in regards to roller. It's just too annoying to constantly be switching back and forth.