The Importance of Dry Land Training
by Jeff Serowik, former NHL Player

The best piece of hockey advice I believe that I have ever received was given to me at age 10 by my coach about the importance of dry land training. He told me that if I want to succeed in hockey you must hone your skills off the ice as well as on the ice. I believe that this invaluable piece of advice I was given about one aspect of off-ice conditioning helped pave my way to the NHL.

I come across about 2,000 young players a year through my hockey camps. I stress the importance of dry land training and conditioning to players as well as parents. As parents can fully attest, hockey is an extremely expensive and all consuming sport due to the nature of the expense and limited availability of ice time. If your child is really dedicated to hockey there is much hockey homework that can be done at home!

After playing with many of the great European NHLers I found it very interesting to discuss with them the emphasis on dry land skill development. Jaromir Jagr, Alexei Kovalev, and Martin Straka told me that they were instructed to work on their hands via stickhandling, shooting and plyometrics for hours daily. Jaromir Jagr for instance stickhandles daily after practice with a 45 lb. weight at the bottom of his shaft of his stick. Typically, European hockey players have the stereotype for being finesse players. This may ring true due to the dedication and amount of off ice training that is expected of them as young players.

Over the years I have come to realize that anything in life that is good is hard. Motivation is the biggest key to success when working off ice. If a player is not into it and works at hockey half-heartedly or not at all, he or she will never see results on the ice. Ice time should be treated as a gift. Unlike other sports, one cannot just jump on ice at will to practice. Do the little things off the ice and really make the most of your ice time.

INSTRUCTORS

Mike Garrow
A graduate of the University of Alberta, Garrow holds a Bachelor of Education with a major in mathematics. From 1998-2003 he developed and instructed summer dryland hockey programs at the U of A, and regularly conducts hockey school and college dryland camps in Canada and the US.

The 2002-2003 WCHL Rookie of the Year, Garrow is starting his second season with the Taylor Cup champion San Diego Gulls after playing part of '02-'03 with the AHL Utah Grizzlies. Last season he chipped in with 33 points in 48 games for the Gulls.

The native of Kenora, Ontario made his professional debut in 2000-01 after playing three seasons at the University of Alberta, where he recorded 95 points in 118 games with the U of A Golden Bears. He was also selected as an all-star each of his three seasons with the University of Alberta.

Clayton Read
As an associate instructor at Acceleration Alaska in Anchorage from 1999-2003, Clayton developed dryland/plyometric programs, strength training and hockey treadmill programs.

A native of Winnipeg, Manitoba, Read is also starting his second season with the San Diego Gulls after coming over from the Tacoma Sabercats, where he ranked third in team scoring. In 2002-2003 he had 20 goals and 56 points in 70 games.

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