How To Maximize Your Stretching:
Getting the Most ‘Bang’ for your Stretching ‘Buck’

By Kim McCullough, MSc, YCS

All hockey players must stretch and most do.  Stretching helps players to:

•   decrease muscle and joint soreness

•   decrease the incidence of injury

•   increase their on-ice performance

However, there are an infinite number of stretches that any athlete could potentially perform.  When it comes to stretching, a lot of athletes suffer from ‘paralysis by analysis’. They are familiar with a number of stretches but are unsure which ones they should perform on a regular basis.  If they spent two minutes performing each and every stretch they knew, they would be stretching all day!

In order to determine which stretches players should perform, one must consider:

•   Which stretches will best address the player’s needs?

•   Which stretches will maximize the time players spend stretching?

If a player can realistically devote 15 minutes a day to stretching, how do they determine which stretches they should be doing?

Rule #1:  Stretch what’s tight

This seems like a simple enough rule, however, it is rarely followed. In fact...

Most athletes stretch muscles that are already loose!

The vast majority of players spend the majority of their time stretching muscles that are already relatively loose. A hockey player who has excellent range of motion in her hamstrings is more likely to spend time stretching her hamstrings than her extremely tight quadriceps.

Why would a player spend their time stretching a muscle that is already loose?

Because it is easier.

Most players want to avoid pain. Players are much less likely to spend their precious stretching time performing more difficult and painful stretches. In the case above, the hockey player finds the hamstring stretch quite comfortable and stays away from the more painful quadriceps stretches that she desperately needs.

Rule #2: Go with the Majority

Every player needs to identify the joints that require increased mobility in order to excel on the ice and focus the majority of their stretching time on the muscles that surround those joints. Determining which of their joints require the greatest mobility and which of their muscles require greater flexibility can be accomplished in a variety of ways. Players can focus on stretching what feels tight or get a formal assessment and evaluation from a health-care practitioner. However, the easiest way for players to determine which stretches they need to perform is to go with the majority.

Athletes that participate in the same sport often exhibit very similar stability and mobility issues that manifest themselves in similar postures.  For example, hockey players often suffer from the ‘duck tail’ effect. 

Over the course of the hockey season, a player’s skating muscles become extremely tight and their posture can change considerably. The muscles that allow you to bring your knees towards your chest are your hip flexors and these muscles attach to the vertebrae of the lower back. Driving the knees forward in the skating stride is a hip-flexor dominant action. Since every stride requires activation in these muscles, most hockey players develop overly tight hip flexors.

Increased tightness in these muscles pulls on the vertebrae of the lower back which increases the curve in the lower back. This is the reason that a lot of hockey players have glutes (butt) that seem to stick out. Performing a simple hip flexor stretch every day would release tension in the hip flexors and alleviate a great deal of the lower back pain that plagues so many hockey players.

Simply focusing on a few stretches that address the key flexibility issues that most players suffer from would alleviate a great deal of pain and prevent countless injuries. There is no need for players to try and stretch every single muscle in the body. By concentrating their time and energy on a smaller number of extremely effective stretches, hockey players will be able to get the biggest ‘bang’ for their stretching ‘buck’.

© Total Female Hockey 2008

Kim McCullough, YCS, MSc, is a Athletic Development Specialist and founder of Total Female Hockey. In addition to training and coaching girls at all levels of hockey, from novice to the National team, Kim has also played at the highest level of women’s hockey in the world for the last decade. Kim’s female player development website features a state-of-the-art Complete Off-Season Training Program and her blog gives the coaches and parents of aspiring young players access to the most up-to-date tips and advice on how to help their players take their game to the next level. To learn more about female-specific player development, get your Free Report: The #1 Mistake Female Players Make in the Off-Season at http://www.totalfemalehockey.com