In this private lesson Kathleen warns her students that they are going to do ‘a gazillion stride exercises.’ The very first step is to have her athletes stretch at the wall. Keeping the chest up, she wants to see her students stretch their legs nice and straight behind them, while keeping their hips right beneath. She then adds a press and push away at the wall to remind them the direction the toe should be going in.
Next, her students put their blade on a puck to work the stride motions while standing still. This ensures once again that they focus on direction of push and integrating the proper arm movement.
The third step is alternating c-cuts while gathering the feet below in between. Kathleen wants them to ‘grab’ the inside edge and keep the blades on the ice for this particular drill.
Toe drags are next and emphasize trying to achieve maximum distance covered with each stride. They want to feel the blade on the ice for balance but to also to generate power with longer strides. Pay attention to toe placement to avoid loss of power.
Slow-motion stride drill is last, with the goal of pressing and balancing. Kathleen wants them to tuck their foot under while they glide. As we witness, the skaters tend to tip too far forward onto their blade.
Kathleen finishes with saying that so many hockey players want to move their feet way to quickly and end up kicking their feet up without properly finishing their stride with good posture and balance. Slowing down the exercises is key to help this.
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