Every hockey player at nearly every age group and skill level should be stretching before practices and games.
A message for my fellow beer leaguers – your peak hockey days may be behind you, but stretching before a game can help you skate like you once did. More importantly, a proper warmup can prevent injury. As you get older, staying *in* the game becomes just as important as performing your best.
And to the young players out there – build a stretching routine that works for you. After trying out different stretches, you’ll soon realize what your body needs to work on. Maybe you lack in hamstring mobility, or maybe you lack in ankle stability. Identifying your weaknesses and priming your body in those areas prior to a game can drastically improve your performance and reduce injury risk.
Basically, this post has a little something for all hockey players.
Here are our recommended pre-game stretches to prime your body for peak performance:
Proper Warm-Up Before Stretches
Prior to performing these pre-game hockey stretches, you’ll want to ensure that your body is properly warmed up. Doing any athletic movement with cold muscles makes the movements much more difficult and it also opens you up to injury risk.
Some of our favorite pre-game warmup movements are jumping jacks, jump rope or a very light jog. Remember, the goal here is simply warm muscles and maybe a very light sweat, but anything more than that will hinder your on-ice performance during the game when it actually counts, so go easy!
Kneeling Ankle Stretch
Focus Area: Ankles and knees
Movement: Hold for 3-5 seconds
Ask most physical therapists to analyze your physiology and one of the first things most will do is analyze your feet and ankles. There’s a good reason for this – your feet and ankles are your connection to the ground, and the power and agility of your movements will be determined by how your body interacts with the ground. If your ankles are not properly warmed up and stretched, you will not be able to skate as best you can.
Butt Kicks & High Knees
Focus Area: Quads, Hamstrings and Glutes
Movement: Quick but controlled
Moving up from the ankles and knees, you get to your quads, hamstrings and glutes. This is where the power for your skating stride will come from. Without good mobility in this muscle group, it will be very difficult to get the depth you need for a strong and stable skating stride. This movement in particular is low impact and low risk, making it a great dynamic warmup movement for the beginning of your pre-game stretching routine to warm the muscles and prep for more advanced movements.
Elephant Walks
Focus Area: Hamstring and posterior chain
Movement: 20 reps each leg
Moving up the body further, we get to the posterior chain, or the muscles of your hamstrings, glutes, lower back and lats. Nearly all hockey players have tight hamstrings thanks to the repeated skating motion, which opens us all up to hamstring and lower back injuries. It’s important to avoid static stretching *before* hitting the ice because static stretching will hinder muscle performance. So when it comes to stretching the hamstrings and lower back, skip the toe touches and opt for elephant walks, which are by far the best dynamic hamstring stretch.
Standing Hip Circles
Focus Area: Hip mobility
Movement: 8-10 circle each direction, each leg
Once your ankles, knees, quads and hamstrings are properly warmed up, you’ll want to focus on your hips. Hockey players also have notoriously tight hips, and unfortunately tight hips will also hinder the depth you can achieve in a skating stride. Since your hips are connected to many other parts of your body, they can also contribute to hamstring and lower back injury risks if they are not sufficiently warm and loose prior to hitting the ice.
Lateral Lunges
Focus Area: Hips and hamstrings
Movement: 10 reps each side
Because the hips and hamstrings are so crucial to skating performance, we added a second movement for warming them up – lateral lunges. Lateral lunges are a fantastic dynamic warmup and stretch for the entire lower body. It’s important to keep your feet flat on the ground throughout the movement. Resist the temptation to lift your heels or your toes up.
Lumbar Spine Twist
Focus Area: Lower back
Movement: Twist and hold for 10 seconds x 2 sets each side
For the final pre-game hockey stretch, we have the lying lumbar spine twist. Hockey is a very rotational-heavy game, so having good range of motion in your lumbar spine will help with your game. Since it’s important to avoid static stretches prior to performance, you won’t want to hold this movement for more than 10-15 seconds.
Static vs. Dynamic Stretches
A common mistake hockey players make when warming up prior to a practice or game is that they perform static stretches instead of dynamic stretches. There is plenty of research on the difference between the two when it comes to effecting game performance, and the science is clear – static stretches will reduce muscle power and reactivity.
With that being said, static stretches are effective at increasing overall flexibility, it’s just best to save static stretches for post-game, post-workout, after a plyometric routine, or at least 3 hours before competition.
Stretch Before Every Practice And Game!
A properly designed pre-game warmup stretching routine can be the secret weapon many hockey players and hockey teams need to get that competitive advantage on the ice. Before your next game, try out these movements and see how they can improve your game too.
