- thighs

I mentioned in another post the importance of weight resistance work for building up your shoulders and back, and situps for your stomach. But this post is mostly speculative; I rather sense that weight training for the thighs makes such a large impact on your skating that I am worried the change might throw you for too large of an adjustment.

Naturally your thighs have more to do with your jumps than any other part of your body. But due to the relative percentage of their mass to your total body weight, and the movable action of your hips, a change in the mass of your thighs can have a radical impact to your spins and axels.

Heavier more muscular thighs increase the height of your jumps, and they also lower your center of gravity, which reduces precession when you spin (hence helping you land your jumps). Heavier thighs however also decrease your torque, slowing your rate of rotation.

Adjusting to such a dynamic and varied change is a significant chore. I suppose my general recommendation would be to definitely check to get your coach's opinion first, and definitely proceed in a very measured and consistent routine so as not to overwhelm your ability to adjust your physics. I would love to hear comments from skaters about their thigh-training routine, and how it affects them.

- packing

After the tumult of the practice, the falls, the chatting, the drama, the bruises, an advancement or two, the deep creeping exhaustion finally overcomes the skater and the practice quietly dissolves to an end.

A couple of steps on the rubberized floor padding, a final stretch or two, grab the skate guards off the boards, and plop down on the bench with a sigh. Open the bag and take out the towel, dry the blades, remove the skates, dry some more, slip on the soakers, set the skates into the bag.

Squeeze and massage the toes.

Behind you the Zamboni starts its grinding around the outer edges of the ice. Put on your tennis shoes, check that you have everything, zip up the bag, a couple more stretches, go pay the coach, chat a bit, see you next time.

The winding down is as much a part of the experience as clearing before the hockey spirits take over.