In training to perform better on the ice you always strive to challenge yourself, pushing your body to the next level. You're running or skating longer to improve your endurance, or faster to increase your speed. You're lifting heavier weights or doing more repetitions to improve your strength. As you push your limits, the body will adapt to the raised level, and you will perform better on the ice.

Many players forget how complex and challenging their movements on the ice are. Mastering the art of skating when standing on a few millimeters of steel while handling the stick and puck, and on top of this keeping track of teammates and opponents. It's extremely hard to do efficiently. So you'd think balance and technique training would be big part of players training. But this type of training usually doesn't get a lot of attention.

The upside is that there's huge room to improve your overall game by improving in these areas. Not only will it help you reach your full potential as a player, it will make the game more fun to play while helping you to stay away from injuries.

The saying "you can't shoot a canon from a canoe" ties well into this. This roughly speaks to that you can build a lot of muscle and power (the canon), but if you have a base that's unstable (the canoe) you won't be able to utilize that strength in the way that you desire.

In human biomechanics there's something called kinetic chains, that refers to how different parts of the body acts as a system of chain links when performing a movement. Each part serves as a base that needs to be stable to transfer energy to the next one efficiently.

A helpful example to visualize how a kinetic chain works for you as a hockey player is by looking at a shot. Though the stick is responsible for moving the puck to the net, with help of the stability of the skate to the ice, the legs and core initiate the movement. The force is then transferred through the shoulder, the arms, the hands, through the stick to the puck that is released towards the net. Any instability in this chain will negatively effect the shot hardness and / or accuracy.

The same principle goes for any skill or situation on the ice. Whether it's your passing accuracy, stability in battles, power in your forward stride, efficiency skating backwards, or quickness in transitions. The outcome is all determined by your success in having your body parts, or chains links, work together as a system supporting each other.

So with this knowledge, what's important to keep in mind when training to become a more efficient and technically skilled hockey player?

The key is to remember to not only raise the bar when it comes to speed, strength and endurance, but to do it when it comes to balance and technique as well. And to keep it in mind in all your training, whether it's in the gym or on the ice. By continuously pushing yourself to challenge your technique, to perform movements with higher quality you'll activate a specific kind of muscles, called "stabilizers".

While the large muscles, called "movers", are responsible for performing a movement, the stabilizers, located around all joints, are responsible for creating stability, allowing for an efficient movement. If the stabilizers are not properly activated, the large muscles will step in and create stability for the movement, causing them to work extra hard. This is not ideal for several reasons. Less power left to perform the movement, slower reactions, less efficient and precise movements, and an increased risk of injuries as the large muscles will be more tensed.

So help yourself and activate your stabilizer muscles, improve your balance and technique to reach your full potential on the ice!

Here's some tips to improve your stability and balance to become a more efficient hockey player:

• Find ways to challenge your stability by adding an element of instability
• Slow down your movements, take pride in performing them properly
• Challenge your balance by doing one-legged drills

Find your own ways and be creative in how to challenge yourself!

Variety in training is important from many aspects. It will help create a good physiological foundation to maximize performance while staying away from injuries and is also important from from a motivational side. But training effects of a high intensity activities like hockey are very specific to the muscles working. This means that its extra important for hockey players that they are engaged in hockey specific training to a large extent.

To understand importance of sport and hockey specific training we need to look at how the body provide energy during exercise.

The energy systems for providing energy are called the "aerobic" and the "anaerobic" system and are in most activities working side by side. But depending on intensity and duration one is usually working more than the other. Since the training effects are different between them it is important to know about this when creating your training program.

Aerobic means "with oxygen", and refers to producing energy with use of oxygen. Activities that pre-dominantly use the aerobic system are characterized by low intensity and are about 90 seconds or longer. Marathon running and long distance skiing are some examples of typical activities almost only utilize the aerobic energy system.

+ Can work over longer periods of time

- Slow to get going and generate energy

Anaerobic, on the other, hand means "without oxygen" and refers to producing energy without access of oxygen. Activities that utilize the anaerobic system more are shorter, hight intensity activities. Some examples of activities that mostly uses this energy system are weight lifting and 100m sprint.

+ Quick to generate energy

- Can only work for a short period of time, up to about 60-90 seconds

Ice hockey is categorized as a high intensity sport and pre-dominantly uses anaerobic energy.

Looking at the training effects of each system helps us understanding more the importance of specific training. Although somewhat simplified this will give a good overview.

Aerobic training effects can be described as "general" and have good transferability from one activity to another. Why? Because some of the main effects are that it improves your lungs capacity to bring in more oxygen and that it makes your heart pump harder to bring the oxygen out to the muscles. And regardless of the activity you're engaged in, you can take advantage of stronger heard and lungs.

Anaerobic training effects can be described as more specific than the aerobic ones, and mainly shows improvements inthe specific musclesactivated.

Some of the effects are :

+ Increased ability to handle lactic acid, which is produced in high intensity work.

+ Better ability to stor and utilize glycogen for quick energy production.

+ Increased muscle mass and thereby strength.

+ Improved nerve / muscle connection.

So for hockey players that to a large extent is relying on anaerobic energy, it's important to know about the local effects that high intensity, anaerobic training provides. And that it's therefore important that a big part of their training should be hockey specific.

Running, biking or skating on traditional inline hockey skates doesn't replicate the movements of skating on ice well. But with the use of Flow Motion Technology, the O1 chassis is able to mimic the feel, balance and muscle activation that players get on ice. This allows them to gain the advantages and need of hockey specific training even when training outside the rink.

And coming back to the importance of variety in training. Being able to get away from the ice, and still be engaging the hockey specific muscles and movements adds a lot of value when it comes to staying motivated and excited to get back on the ice.

Hockey specific training in the sunshine!

The feel of skating on ice is something special for hockey players. The smoothness, the ability to turn sharp, pivot from forwards to backwards easily, and finishing with the ball of the foot when pushing off. It's a sensation that many has tried to replicate off-ice, but with no success.

One of the keys to provide this unique feel is the ability to shift the center of gravity (COG) along the length of the blade, heel to toe, with a smooth motion. The heel to toe shape of the steel is commonly referred to as the profile. It's flat enough to provide proper support and glide, and round enough to provide good agility.

Although skating feels normal for hockey players, it's not a natural human movement, unlike running, walking or jumping. In a run cycle, you start your stride by planting the foot on the ground, and it stays in that same location through the whole cycle, until push-off. A skating stride on the other hand involves an element of gliding, where your foot is constantly changing location and angle relative to the ice. Pushing off efficiently while maximizing the benefits that the glide phase offers is adding a significant level of difficulty.

The element of gliding while pushing off also adds another major difference from the human running cycle. A push-off in running is performed straight backwards, while a hockey stride push-off is performed to an angle, sideways. The ability to "grip" the ice to push to the side is possible thanks the use of the inside and outside edges of the steel. These edges are created by the hollow sharpening used on ice hockey skates.

Looking at a forward stride, it starts with the foot right below your upper body, and the center of gravity (COG) is located fairly centered on the steel runner. As you're going through the push-off motion you're "rolling" over to the ball of your foot to finish the stride with the inside edge. In other skating movements you utilize the outside edges and more of the rear part of the steel, but the principle is the same.

A key to utilize the edges when skating on ice is this ability to smoothly shift your COG. Not only from inside to outside, but from also from heel to toe. Coming back to the unique ability to take advantage of the glide phase and the fact that you're pushing off to the side – not straight backwards, like in running. You need to be able to get that rolling heel-to-toe movement to fully access the edges and the agility they provide.

Most ice hockey players feel disappointed when trying traditional roller hockey skates, becuase of the flat and immobile feeling. Flow Motion Technology allows you to get that same quickness, mobility and smoothness like you have on ice. Trusting the wheels like you trust the edges.