Feature Story

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Beach balls, balance beams and pseudoscience

By Jack Blatherwick

Let’s Play Hockey Columnist

Decades ago, if a young player was motivated to become a hockey player there would be countless hours at the outside pond, sometimes scrimmaging or playing keep away, sometimes shooting pucks, stickhandling and skating.

There were no expensive experts selling advice in those days, so a workout might have been pretty simple training for the legs — maybe squats or sprinting up hills and stairs, maybe pulling a sled or portaging a canoe. It seemed logical that the legs were pretty darned important for skating.

Athleticism was developed by playing sports: quickness, agility, coordination, explosive power, dynamic balance — these were all part of the game, every game. Quick sprinters were quick skaters. Agility was common to every sport.

I guess the outside experts decided to wait a few years until they could sell their advice in warm arenas, so they didn’t have to shovel snow and flood the outside rinks. Back then, we thought of the great players and coaches as experts, so we trusted their advice. We watched and copied.

Watching Gordie Howe and John Mayasich, it never occurred to us you were supposed to isolate core muscles first, before you could even skate or sprint or jump. Core muscles were trained by skating, sprinting and jumping. We didn’t think about lifting weights while standing on a balance beam. That might have seemed more appropriate for a circus act.

Howe and Mayasich — just like the great players today — were great skaters who could do magic things with the puck in tight areas, who could turn on a dime, twist and dodge through opponents like running backs on the football field. It didn’t occur to us that we should practice juggling while balancing on top of a beach ball.

So, decades ago youngsters like Wayne Gretzky and Neal Broten just went to the pond to practice rink sense and hockey skills. Repetition. Fun. Trial and error — and finally trial and success.

Recently, I wanted to see if Alex Ovechkin had superior balance on top of one of those beach balls. It’s obvious he has superior hockey skills, but I’m here to report that even number 8 still has a ways to go before he’ll be a circus performer. On top of a beach ball, he’s no more stable than this old physiologist, but he’s got world-class balance on skates when he’s flying around the ice.

Maybe dynamic balance on skates is unrelated to static balance in the gym. Maybe his Russian coaches thought it more logical to skip those circus lessons and get right down to hockey business.

“Business.” Maybe that’s the difference. In Russia, the coach of a young Ovechkin knows he won’t make a cent until his product makes it to the NHL, several years down the road. In the U.S. our “experts” don’t wait that long. They collect before anyone steps on the ice or into their gym. So, even if their program doesn’t work, they already have their fee.

As illogical as this seems, the clincher is even worse: the more expensive the fee, the more likely it is to sell. More than any other sport, hockey has become a gold mine for outside experts. As we moved inside from the cold and snow, the added expense practically eliminated inner city hockey, moving it into wealthier suburbs. This fad – high-priced expertise – will finish this demographic change.

It doesn’t end with expensive advice. Folks are charging to test now — not ten bucks, not even a hundred. They come around with bells and whistles, with fancy brochures, advanced degrees and pedigrees, and super-advanced fees. They use big-time language — sometimes Latin, sometimes Greek — designed to impress.

They’ve impressed the NHL. Our testing combine is a tribute to North American gullibility. Imagine a baseball combine — all the best amateurs in the world gathered in one place for a weekend of testing to identify talent, and no one throws a ball. No one bats or fields. No one sprints to first base. Nothing that resembles baseball — just a bunch of high-tech tests on a bike.

“Dumb,” you say?

Well, that’s hockey. The more gimmicks and the more high tech, the more likely we are to fall for it, provided it costs a lot. I have to apologize for helping start this testing concept in hockey. I never thought anyone would charge for it, but back then, I never thought we’d practice every day without shoveling snow.

My advice?

Find someone who calls a leg “a leg” and not “a femur,” and you’re more likely to get relevant advice. Find someone who knows that hockey skills take a lifetime to master — that you’ll have to be a rink rat if you want to be any good. If this is your top priority — and it should be — it leaves little time for circus training.

Find former players who really understand the game, and you might get good advice about how to train for rink sense, for skills and for skating power. They might be reluctant to offer advice, because the trend is toward Latin-speak, and they might not be comfortable acting like the expert they are.

Dig it out of them, because they have a gut feeling that makes more sense than 50 years of combined research in the field of exercise science.

After reading hundreds of scientific research articles every week for decades, I can verify that there is a lot of pseudoscience out there — especially now that it gets funded by manufacturers with a bias. Problem is, it gets quoted by the “experts” as gospel. It isn’t.

Of course, there is some good research, but it hasn’t done much for hockey. Fifty years ago a retired hockey player would have offered his gut feeling about training to get better, and it would have centered around improvement of skills and athleticism. SKILLS and ATHLETICISM. Not a bad idea — even in 2007.

Today, a hockey coach is likely to say, “Go see Mr. Jones. He’s the expert. I have no idea what he’ll have you do, but work hard at it.”

If I were a youth hockey player today, I’d bet my money — and career — on the old-time hockey guys.

Jack Blatherwick, Ph.D., is a physiologist for the Washington Capitals.