I continue with some valuable things from Dave Smiths lecture, from the international hockey coaching seminarium.

He talked about the complexity in hockey, you need to skate, do stick handling and take decissions, which is not possible if you haven’t automized some of the skills or moves. If your skating isn’t automized, you need to focus on that and loose stick handling and good decissions (or you do stick handling and loose your movement / skating)

If you don’t have good automized skating skills, you will have problems with the game. 1. Quick and fast feets / skating (coordination skills)
2. Good stick handling skills will automatically give you more time on focusing on the game itself and to make good decissions during the game.

Test the footwork and coordination skills

You can test these coordination skills by a simple hockey off-ice practice. Let your players run standing on the same spot, add stick handling and start to ask them questions. Do they drop in speed or have problems performing these two things together, then you know you need to work extra either on footwork / skating or stick handling. Below an example from the stick handling and puck control eBook found on this page >>

Repetitions are the magic ingredient in hockey practices, 10 000 Hours – 10 years

A number of studies have shown that it will take ten thousands of hours to become a master of what you are doing or 10000 repetitions to automize a skill. This will apply for leadership, professional hockey players, floorball, work, hobbies etc. Each of us has the potential to master what we are doing, but it will require time, 10000 hours, or about ten years, if you really want to be the best in whatever you do. But too many of us don’t commit to the things we are doing, well enough, but we still hope to be the best or recognized, sometimes we give up too early, wondering why we never become the best.  “I was a great talent, when I was young…” Ever heard that?