Got a 500lbs squat? Run the mile in 4:40? Impressive. But unless you can use those tools on the ice, they’re just window dressing.
Thirty seconds into his shift, Danny was already sucking wind. His heart was pounding, and it wasn’t just the adrenaline: the Spring tryout had him jacked up, sure, but he was struggling to keep up. Just two months ago, he was breezing past these same guys in tournaments; now, when it counted most, he didn’t have anything in the tank. No legs. Zero wheels. But why? He’d been running every day since the end of the season. He’d been doing ‘bag skates’ twice per week. He’d been doing workouts at the Y every single day – sure, he’d skipped “legs day” a couple of times, but none of his buddies wanted to go, either…..
Danny’s “cardio” is fine. At a low threshold (when he’s just warming up, or skating around) his breathing is easy. Put him in an intense 30-second shift, though, and he’s dead in 10 seconds. Even though he passed the 2-mile-run test easily (11:04,) he’s unable to use energy quickly. In fact, his body is trying to slow him down; to push him into an aerobic mode so that it can stay in its comfort zone.
You break down energy in several different ways; the most prevalent metabolic pathways are shown below:
What’s clear from the graph, though not expressed outright: training one system limits your capacity in another. If you totalled the area beneath the three curves individually, you’d notice that they’re all the same surface area: that means, you only have so much energy available to you at a given time. Training to use that energy aerobically (low heart rate, sustained output for a long period) means that you’re limiting your ability to move in shorter, harder bursts. You’re actually training yourself to be less intense; to move slower, and with less power!
Think those daily 5k runs are ‘building a base?’ upon which you’ll magically gain anaerobic capacity? Different skill altogether, unfortunately. While there’s some overlap between energy systems, you should spend the majority of your training time in the system on which you’ll most depend – that should be obvious, right?
There are those who believe that more is better; that a two-minute workout can’t possibly be intense enough to help you play hockey better. Those folks have never had a hard penalty kill. They’ve never faced elimination in the early Spring. YOU – the player – know how hard 30 seconds can be. Train to match that demand.
Tomorrow, we’ll take a closer look at the methodology of developing better energy systems for hockey.