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Guest writer (origin story): Chris Hodson

August 6, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE:

Today’s guest writer is Chris Hodson, combining his own personal origin story with a strong description of how damn awesome it is to be on the ice. For some reason, Chris and I rarely end up on the same team in Dev League or in other potential situations, which bites because a) I really like being teammates with him, and b) he can really play, so is a good guy to have onside.

A Song of Ice and Fire

Chris Hodson in flight. Pic: Jason Bajada

By Chris Hodson

Silence. Tension. The moment stretches out for almost an eternity. Everything else melts away. The puck drops – it’s on.

You chase the puck down, the world rapidly contracts to contain only you and your opponent, the scrape of his/her skates behind you a reminder that they’re but a single stride away, their stick biting at your heels. The pure exhilaration of the contest, the desperate battle to come out on top, the intensity, the fire of the moment – these are some of the things that hockey means to me.

Like many hockey players here in Australia, my interest in hockey had its beginnings in the 90s, when the Mighty Ducks movies hit our shores. At this time, being maybe nine years old, I somehow convinced my mother to drive me out to Oakleigh, where we sat half-frozen, and watched several games in a row. I remember two things from that night – hockey was fast, and ice rinks were cold.

After that evening, nothing happened on the hockey front for many years, until I somehow obtained a copy of NHL ’98 on the PC. I booted it up and played as the Mighty Ducks (of course!), but I recall that the season schedule always involved an early game against the Calgary Flames, where the AI-controlled Theoren Fleury would consistently put pucks past my hapless goalie. When I first explored the NHL years later, I discovered that the Mighty Ducks were now just the Ducks, and wore drab black jerseys. Bah! Boyhood dreams shattered! Calgary was the only other team I remembered, and so they were the natural choice for a team to support. And I’m pretty Flames-crazy now… But I’m getting ahead of myself here.

I used to be quite the sportsman when I was younger – tennis year round, with cricket and footy filling out the other free day on the weekend – but this was unsustainable for me through the final years of high school. I focused on my studies, and I did miss my sport, though at the time I didn’t realise how much.

When I finally decided that I needed to get back into something, anything, I was faced with a bit of a dilemma. The guys my age now had several years of experience on me, not even considering the deterioration of my own skills over that time. This led me to consider pursuing something new. Enter the Icehouse – the final coat of paint barely dry, ice freshly frozen.

I decided what the hell, let’s go totally left field and sign up for some skating lessons. Could be fun.  Could be disastrous… As it turns out, I was hooked after a mere 60 minutes on the ice.

I’m proud to say that I’ve done an Icehouse program every single term since it opened over two years ago (except one, where the popularity really spiked and all the classes were full – I just general skated instead and ruefully watched my class happening without me from the other rink), beginning with Aussie Skates 1, 2 and 3; two Intro Hockey classes; one Intermediate and one 5-day intensive over Christmas; and four Development League terms. And it’s been a blast!

Now I’m not the most nimble or co-ordinated of folk (far from it, in fact), and, as some of you may know, skating is not very forgiving when it comes to the lack of these sorts of traits. So what I did was buy myself a pair of $15 rollerblades from Cash Converters, and skated for about two hours a day at the local netball courts.

The day that I bought the skates, it was raining, but I could not wait another instant to try them out. So I went and skated in the rain. I strode very gingerly away from the fence, managed to roll to the centre of the court, stop, fall down in a comical fashion, and fail to get back up. To the great mirth of any onlookers.

But after much perseverance, this became the scene of success – forward and backward crossovers were learnt here (although with a complete lack of “hockey stance,” or knee-bend :P), and many sessions extended past sundown. These were some of my favourite sessions, skating alone through the dying embers of evening into the cool of the night.

My love for hockey is rooted in my love for skating. There’s nothing like it. Going far faster under your own power than nature ever intended you to go, coupled with the carving of skates and the spray of ice – bliss.

Hodson: natural born goalscorer.

When the Icehouse initiated “Skate all Day!”, I went and did just that, chalking up 8 continuous hours on the ice.  Even during my Masters exams, I was there for my hockey class – literally the only time I left my study-cave, barring actually going to my exams. Once I passed through those doors and strapped on my skates, nothing else mattered, there was no world outside of the rink, no troubles other than how to deke that defenseman into next week. As soon as you hit the ice, you slam those engines into afterburner and never look back.

One particular semester, early on in my hockey development, I had an irritatingly large gap in my uni classes on Tuesdays. As luck would have it, it synchronised with a session at the icehouse – naturally, I headed down, and almost broke into hysterics – there was no one else there when I arrived. My jaw hit the floor – all that ice was for me? I have never lost this feeling of giddiness when it comes to ice, my heart rate still increases measurably on the short walk from the carpark to the front door of the rink.

And then there’s hockey on top of all this. For me it’s like going to war. You strap on your armour. You unsheathe your sword. You and your fellow warriors stand as one to face the opposing legions. Especially at the development level, I’m certain it’s just as hectic/disorganised as a real battle would be anyway!

But after the battles have been waged and wars have been won and lost, there’s the flagon of beer/chocolate milk shared amongst friends at yonder tavern/7-11. These people share my fiery passion for the ice. I’m privileged to be a part of a rapidly growing hockey community here in Melbourne that’s forcing the existing status quo to undergo radical change. The most exciting part is being part of the change, and seeing our own hand present and prominent in the forging of hockey’s identity and place in Melbourne and Australia.

Others sometimes gawk and gasp at the revelation that we play ice hockey here, or perhaps cringe at the description of our latest hockey injury. Sometimes they say “But hockey is crazy! You’re crazy!” or “What? Hockey againtonight?” – I just reply with a cheeky grin, and tell them yep, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Chris, face to face with goalie Jay Hellis. Pic: Jason Bajada.

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Guest writer: Jason Bajada

July 31, 2012 by 1 Comment

This is a cracking piece. Who knew a goalie could put words together? Turns out Jason Bajada is that guy. Welcome to life between the posts …

Stay out of my crease and we’ll stay friends

By Jason Bajada

I am a goalie.  And I love it.  And I hate it.  And I hate you all.  And you are my best mates.  And I love it.

Jason Bajada: feeling two metres wide. Pic: Wayne McBride

At any given time, none, some, or all of those feelings are true.  Would be true.  Have been and are true.  Tense doesn’t matter.

There is a common understanding amongst hockey people that goalies are weird.  I’m not going to try to explain why, but I will let you know what it is like being a goalie in a game – you can figure out if we are weird once you have read my story.  There is a lot of swearing in this, because I really don’t know how to efficiently express myself any better.  I understand the theory that “those who swear are less articulate, and therefore less intelligent, than others who do not”, to which I respond: fuck that.

When I am putting my gear on, I feel like I am two metres wide and I am invincible.  During the warm-ups, I concentrate so hard on every single shot coming in, I hold my breath until the last shot is made.  I wear myself out during the warm-ups because I am so wound up I can’t breathe.

And all I keep thinking to myself is that I am better than everyone else on the ice.  And I believe it with every fibre of my body, every hair on my head and every exploding neuron in my brain.  Actually, I don’t just believe it, I know it.  It is a fact, and now I get to prove it to you all.

And that is what I am thinking during warm-ups.  Because if I don’t, I can’t do my job.

And then the game starts, and the only thing I can see is the puck.  Nothing else matters.  Everything else fades into the background.  In my peripheral vision, I see the blur of players in their jerseys, and instantly calculate whether or not they are on my team, and how far away they are from playing the puck, and if they are in a position to put the puck on net, and whether or not it will be a strong shot or not.  And if they pick up the puck and start skating, I’m figuring out whether they are on their forehand or backhand, and whether or not their team-mates are moving into position to take a better shot, and whether my team-mates are moving into a position to help or hinder me.  And if the shot is taken, I work out the trajectory of the puck, and where it has come from, and whether to drop to the ice or not, or whether to stick my arm out or not, and where my stick is, and where the puck could go after I stop it, and whether or not I have the chance to ice the puck, or if I have to move to make a follow-up save from the rebound.

And that entire paragraph takes place in my world in less than a second.  And the next second, it might start again, or maybe it stops.  But I also have to work out whether or not I need to get up or not.  So the next second is always more complicated than the last, because I have to figure out how I am supposed to recover from the previous second.

Above and beyond all of that, every single second of the game I have decisions to make.  And I regret most of them.  I could have done something different, or better, or more efficiently.  Even when I do make a save, I am never satisfied with it.  The next save has to be better.  And I fucking hate that.

Nowhere to hide: Goalie life.

Then I stick a pad out and watch the puck deflect into the corner.  Or make a glove save as I am standing strong in the crease.  Or take the puck off my face and have it land at my feet, so I drop and cover it up.  I have conquered the desires of the opposition, and tamed to rage that fired that puck at me.  I destroyed the dream of the goal, and have forced them to re-think how they play the game.  I have beaten them, I am the victor.  In that second, I have just proven to everyone there that I am the best there is.

And I can’t think of anywhere else I would want to be.  And I love it.

The best part is when one of my team-mates sweeps out to the corner, corrals the puck I just deflected out there, clears it out of the defensive zone and creates a rush out of just one pass.  It is poetry in motion, and everything just flows together like it was meant to be.  The Hockey Gods have looked down on that piece of ice, stroked their beards wisely, and at that specific time, said to themselves, “Let’s make something magical happen.”

And it is at times like those that we are a brotherhood.  A sisterhood.  A hockeyhood.  Time stands still, and everything is easy.  And I love everyone in the building, along with all of those ancient hockey warriors who have fought on that piece of ice in years past.  Everyone should get to feel this, and I feel sorry for those who don’t know what they are missing out on.

But as quickly as it started, the moment is over.  The puck is back at my feet, and everyone – even the refs, it seems – is hacking away at it, forcing me to make save after save after save, never letting me take a breath to figure out what I need to do next.  I see my team-mates – that same hockeyhood from seconds ago – standing in the way of the puck so I can’t see it.  I watch the puck deflect off a team-mate and into the post.  I scream –  scream myself hoarse – at the player on my right to get the puck away from me.  It is within a metre of the goal line and I have no control of it.  It needs to leave, and it needs to leave NOW.  Just fucking move it.  Pass it.  Skate it.  I don’t care what you do, just MAKE IT GO AWAY.

NO!  DON’T PASS IT RIGHT ACROSS THE …

The puck is now behind me.  Players wearing the wrong colours are cheering and hugging each other.  And you are yelling at me.  Telling me I should have done better.  That I should have made that save.  Asking me sarcastically where the hell my stick was.  You make the biggest bone-headed play in the history of hockey, and it’s my fault we are now losing.

And I hate you.  I hate you and I want to hurt you.  I want to hurt you so much you will be scared to play again.  You were my team-mate, but after that play you don’t deserve to even share the ice with me.  I don’t care, I hate you.  Fuck off, and stay the fuck away from me before I rip your face off through that cage.

The very next shift, the centre wins the face-off, tears down the ice and goes top shelf blocker side to get that goal right back.  After the obligatory fist-bumps along the bench, he points his stick right at me and yells “That one’s for you, buddy”.

I am a goalie.  And I fucking love this game.

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Guest writer (Origin story): Aimee Hough

July 26, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The pocket rocket, the smiling assassin, the Christmas angel reveals the murderous thoughts underlying her appearance.Figure-skaters everywhere, relax.

“Smart alec man-child” … I got all emotional. In fact, I might get that put on my tombstone.

And for anybody who crosses her path, Hough is Hoff, as in cough, or maybe Hasselhoff. Woe betide those who get it wrong.

The rage behind Aimee Hough

By Aimee Hough

Aimee Hough yesterday.

Okay gang – I guess it’s my turn. My story; My adventure into the wonderful, thrilling, hilarious world that is hockey. The good and well… not so good; But I’ll get to that.

Alrighty. I have always been a team player. I have had sport sewn into every thread of the fabric I’d call my life. It was dancing and netball, but it was being part of the swimming club with my two older sisters, Jess and Kaitlyn that makes up most of my childhood memories. The Wednesday night training, the Sunday night time trials or spring interclub, where we would all pile into the bus and make the loud and laughter infused bus ride to MSAC at Albert Park where we would compete against surrounding clubs. Being the age that I was, would fall asleep on a close friend who, long story short, rescued me from bullies and has since become well…. Mine! This story is constantly remembered as we reminisce over the good old days (she says at 21 years of age). The point of this is the club environment. Engaging in a sport with people who make you feel accepted.

As I got older the amount of swimmers lessened as did the appeal of the club. Thus became a lull in my sporting activities. Netball and dance were always there, as was EVERY sporting event I could get involved in at high school but sadly it just didn’t feel the same. Enter the Icehouse. In 2010 I began Figure skating with Jess and Kaity. 8:45 Saturday morning on the ‘Bradbury Rink’ became our thing to do. We began with swivels, c-cuts and edgework. As we moved up in class we were given sew on patches… awesome *rolls eyes*. Months later I purchased my overpriced (and soon to be irrelevant) figure skates. Although soon after it dawned on me, as much as I loved skating, it just wasn’t enough. I’ve been dancing for as long as I can remember but even as we were taught in skating “arms up – point where you want to go” I was never completely satisfied. A year later, Jess decided to work/live in Canada for seven months: Insert Jess’s absence and Kaitlyn’s demise due to poor knees. This was it – I needed a change. Hockey: Here I come!

Little did the world know …

The first few weeks of intro were monotonous. Then gear, sticks and pucks came along. I’m sold!!! Not to mention the sarcastic antics, movie quotes and shenanigans that I held similar with the coaches, Army and Lliam.

Last September I travelled to Canada and was able to partake in the glorious moment of buying my own gear. The shine of ‘hire gear’ lost its appeal after the first time I put on the cold, wet disgrace that is the shared shoulder pads. When it came to purchasing gear, being small, finally became a benefit. I’ll take my junior $150, Bauer Vapor 3.0’s, any day. Yes, I may be constantly ridiculed for my less than normal sized gloves. The best one from the change room was “are they your gloves? I can hang them from my rear view mirror”…… hilarious…

Here comes the not so good part of my adventure. How many times have any of the males been mistaken for a figure skater?? None I’m guessing. Well for a female, it’s either a hit or miss. I took my skates to be sharpened, where the onset of separation anxiety set in. When I came to collect them the girl took some time. She then called for assistance. Heart rate heightening. They both returned asking what type of skates. I simply said “Bauers”. They both returned with skates in hand, huge smiles and the other guy laughing “that’s what you get for assuming”. This, happy readers, is the downside of being a woman in the hockey world, or as a “blonde Christmas tree angel” as Alex Mcnabb so kindly labelled me, or as my dad seems to think I resemble Lisa Simpson on the ice. I guess I can live with that.

Don’t be fooled. I may be a little blonde, but all I can say is ‘Bring it!’ (I’m looking at you Nicko Place). I like to think I can hold my own. I may be knocked down but watch me smile as I pick myself up and keep on skating. Especially after I’ve taken you down with me.

Since the first day in intro, I haven’t looked back. I’ve been given exactly what was missing and I’m reluctant to let it go now – A club. A family. I’ve met so many genuine people that I’m so happy to know. Yes including the smart alec man-child that is this blogs creator. I’ve been given people who (on more than one occasion) can appreciate a good movie quote… okay…more than one…okay, the entire script. But as long as I can make people smile, I’m happy.

Aimee (in white) about to take out a helpless Rookie.

Hockey has provided me with so much: Great group of people, car park hockey and the ‘trouble station’, general skate, jersey preferences, chilling at the pub – constantly, Goon, Miracle, Young Blood, Mighty Ducks (and allllll the quotes that accompany them), my first Oakleigh experience, Sponsorship, talking for hours – walking back to the car – to continue another hour of talking, ROOKIES, sharing gear when somebody needs it (regardless if it fits, so long as someone can participate), Melbourne Ice games,  the endless sound of Velcro and the unimaginable, yet unexplainable filth that is hockey smell, countless advice, ‘Recovery drinks’, shit stirring anyone and everyone that walks by – especially Army and Lliam, intro, 5 X intermediate, first ever Dev League, the upcoming Ice road trip, the Gala, Summer league and the promise of the future.

To those who’ve joined me on this Journey – Thank you.

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Meanwhile, whatever happened to that Nicko guy?

July 24, 2012 by 7 Comments

By Nicko

The coldest place on Earth, certainly under an Australian flag, is reputed to be Ridge A, 14,000 metres high on the Antarctic Plateau. The average winter temperature on Ridge A is said to be minus 70 degrees, Celsius, although nobody has ever set foot there.

But I’d challenge the Australian and American scientists, who declared this finding in 2009, after exhaustive satellite probing and climate imaging. I’d say to them: Oh yeah? Try hanging out at the dilapidated Olympic ice rink, in Oakleigh South, deep in the Melburnian suburban tundra, during mid-winter.

That, my whitecoated friends, is fucking cold.

The magnificent if chilly Oakleigh rink.

Wearing four layers, a beanie and gloves, I pushed through the front door a few Fridays ago, ducking the straps of plastic presumably designed to stop some bizarre breed of Ice Age-ready mosquito, with my trusty Reebok stick in one hand, and my bag of gear over my shoulder. I was nervous. It was the second time that week I had strapped on my armour and skates and tested the Oakleigh ice. On the Wednesday night, some Rookie friends and I had hired the ice for a scrimmage, which was a blast, especially for those of us debuting on this particular rink, which is tiny – much smaller than the Henke Rink we’re used to – and has no glass, meaning to be boarded involves being jammed against a fence about waist high. Even better, down the end where an ageing Zamboni creaks out between sessions, the ice dips away and there are holes in the bottom of the boards, so that a puck might disappear in there, mid-battle.

Believe it or not, until the 2009 season, this was home to the Melbourne Ice and it is still the scene for many games of winter and summer season hockey every year. As the only surviving rink in Melbourne, outside of Docklands, there isn’t much choice. It’s actually magnificent in its decay and history and authenticity as the last of the suburban hockey rinks.

On this Friday, I was in Oakleigh to finally come face-to-face with the Cult of Joey.

A while ago, I wrote a blog about how I’d found myself in a hockey funk; feeling like I wasn’t improving, wasn’t pushing myself … basically it was a written rant to kick myself up the arse and work harder, which is what I did almost immediately after writing it.

But an unexpected result of that piece was that I was publicly “called out” on Facebook by Joey Hughes, a star of the Melbourne Ice, to let him train the funk out of me.

It was an unforeseen twist, not least because a) I hadn’t realized this blog was being read by a wider hockey community, including my coaches Lliam and Army, let alone Joey Hughes and his Ice-import coaching partner, Martin Kutek, and b) I had recently raised questions about the violence of Joey’s brother, Ice captain Vinnie’s in an Ice game.

Joey Hughes, in action for the Ice. Pic: Canberra Times

So Joey Facebooking that he challenged me to come to Oakleigh and lose my funk was a shock, yet I had to politely say thanks but no thanks, because I was on a novel deadline, travelling a lot and couldn’t find the time to commit. Joey was having none of that and so, finally, here I was, pushing through the door and watching the fog hang over the ice of this tiny rink.

A couple of hours later, after my first Intro session of Next Level hockey, I sat on the boards with Joey, for a genuine chat. It wasn’t quite so cold that your words froze in front of you so that you had to read what each other was saying, but it wasn’t far off. Put it this way, I had sat, in my armour, for an hour, during the Intermediate class that followed mine, fully intending to play Game Time scrimmage, but was so bone-core frozen, I eventually abandoned the idea. Plus everybody looked too skilled for me, so I decided to watch a scrimmage or two before poking my skate out there.

Joey could pass for Latin, or maybe native American, or Italian. He has dark eyes and hair and carries himself like a dancer, but with an intense, harder edge, which comes out on the ice where he is something of a warrior. According to the NLHA website, he has been skating at Oakleigh since he was 11 years old, just before he took off to North America to chase his hockey dream. He’s been a hockey player all that time, and now he’s back at the Olympic rink, training a new generation of players.

The local hockey community is small and very welcoming, but I feel there has been a shade of Us & Them over the past year or so, where you’re either an Icehouse skater or a member of what I laughingly call The Cult of Joey. Many of the Next Level Hockey devotees have an evangelistic loyalty to their coaches, Joey and Martin, along with Tony Theobold, Vinnie Hughes and no doubt others I don’t know about yet.

Any chance they get, Next Level students will tell you about the personal attention, how their skills have improved dramatically, how Oakleigh is where you become a really good hockey player …

I had no reason to doubt them, I just always felt a loyalty to Lliam and Army, and the other Icehouse coaches, who have patiently watched me stumbling around for a long time now. (I spoke to Lliam about it once, and he shrugged that it was great Joey was doing his thing, just turning out more and better hockey players, which was the whole point.)

Even so, I couldn’t afford to drive out to Oakleigh at least one night a week on top of my Icehouse commitments. Real life didn’t have a window that large, regardless of my worry that I would be left behind in terms of development.

And so I’d hear the Cult of Joey rave about Oakleigh, and wonder. Until now. On this Friday, I joined Intro and quickly had all my usual technical faults identified. Told to bend my knee to 90 degrees, while my non-skating foot was horizontally in front of me, I managed maybe 30 degrees, which had Joey skating along beside me, saying, “You gotta be kidding me?” and me giving him a colourful explanation of my age compared to his and where he could shove his deep knee bend. To which he laughed and explained why I simply have to bend my knees more, even though – like everybody – I totally thought I was already.

And so it went.

Part of the Next Level way is to drive its students to be better, to buy in, to forge together and commit. It’s definitely a more driven, different atmosphere to the Icehouse classes where Lliam and Army push us hard, but in a slightly more casual, shambolic way. Lliam’s description of how to fire a wrist-shot (which in his case, is a bullet) was along the lines of: “Look, I learned this at age four and I can’t really explain it, but it works, so do it like this.”

As you know by now, I love these classes and have improved more than I ever could have imagined over 18 months of training and lessons.

Talking to Joey, on the boards after my class, he explained that he had read my “funk” blog and felt a genuine desire to help. He said he read about a passionate rookie who’d hit a wall, and rode in to help if he could. Fresh eyes, is all he thought. Even as an elite international player, Joey said he benefits hugely from new ideas, new voices, different slants on the same technical or fitness issues. So he wanted me to come along and hear something new.

And he’s been totally right. Martin has already given me some amazing tips about outside edge work, everything Joey has said has been useful. It’s great.

And on Wednesdays, Lliam and Army have begun the long road of Intermediate classes again, with encouragement and enthusiasm for our improvement.

I’ve relaxed and can feel improvement happening, even in Dev League where I’ve been in the thick of things. We’re in good hands at both venues, and talking to Joey, just like Lliam, that’s the whole point. There’s an excitement about how many rookies are swelling the ranks of the playing numbers in Victoria; a genuine problem at Ice Hockey Victoria level of how the Hell to accommodate so many people who want ice time.

The Cult of Joey might exist in the enthusiasm of NLHA skaters, but not among the coaches. Joey and Lliam, as Victorian born and bred stars, are mutually enjoying the ride as hockey surges in Australia.

As am I, now savouring personal, friendly, expert teaching from so many Melbourne Ice stars, and with my rookie mates both encouraging me and hanging shit at me at every turn.

Life’s good and the funk is gone.

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Guest writer (Origin story): Jack Hammet

July 23, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE

Today’s guest writer is Jack Hammet and I feel a need to explain how we came to know each other.

He’s more or less the same age as Will (AKA BIg Cat). In fact, Jack went to school with Will and his wider circle of mates, which is where I first heard about him. What I heard wasn’t always great. From all accounts, Jack was a little more wild than the others; more prepared to really push boundaries and potentially get into trouble. I’ve always been a big believer that teenagers should get into some trouble (ask my younger son, Mack – AKA Wookie, AKA Mackquist – for an account of The Ferret Incident sometime and you’ll hear an outstanding story of the kind of trouble kids should get into).

Teenagers should push things a bit, but not so much that you worry for them, that you’re scared. I heard rumours of this kid who played it harder and faster than the rest of the school crowd, and I’d seen guys like that in my generation, especially in journalism, where some cadets couldn’t handle the hard-drinking, hard-living, dick-swinging world that was daily papers. Some spun out badly and were alcoholics or fuck-ups by their mid-20s. Others swam on, survived and matured.

So, I finally got to meet Jack when I ventured down to the Icehouse. He and Big Cat had been skating most of the summer, in fact from the moment VCE exams ended, if not before. They were getting good as I literally staggered onto the ice, barely vertical.

And here’s the thing, this manchild instantly struck me as an outstanding person. I was ready for some punk Hellraiser (and he still loves that profile, as you will read between the lines below – he’s a happy Goon) but damn, if Jack, big bad Jack, wasn’t a man I could look in the eye and just know that he was a good one. He wasn’t always a genius – he hurt Will one day, needlessly slamming him during a Stick & Puck session – but he travelled for a while, then came back and you could see him growing into himself, losing the anger that (until the piece below) I had never understood, and had really only heard about.

Here we are,  a whole – what? 12 or 18 months later, and Jack is a lock for a leadership role in whichever team he lands on; he’s helping rookie defenders know where to position themselves, what not to do; he’s endlessly there for people.

Rock on, Jack, and thanks for this piece. It’s from the heart and honest and for that, respect.

Nicko

Does blood bounce on ice?

By Jack Hammet

I hate to start this on a depressing note but bear with me, it’s not all sad, and I think it’s important in explaining my story and unwavering love for hockey…

When I was 7, my mum was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was a long and hard road that unfortunately ended five years later with her passing away when I was about to hit 13. I never knew my dad and for a lot of my childhood it was just my mum and I. As you would expect, this formed a strong connection between us and she was my rock. When she passed away, everything changed for me. I found myself dealing with a step dad trying to drown his sorrows in beer (and doing well at it) and a little brother who was still far too young to look after himself. This left me, just entering my teenage years, trying to balance looking after my brother, school (which I hated) and the anger/confusion/sadness and everything else that resided within me as a result of my mum’s death.

“What? Who? Me?” Jack (standing) in his element.

But I feel in a lot of ways, that sport was my saviour. I know other people that have been through similar things and become drug dealers, criminals and all kinds of things and I honestly think that sport has kept me grounded and given me something to focus on and provided an outlet for all the anger I had.

(No more depressing stuff, I promise.)

I always loved sport and had played football (Aussie Rules) since I was old enough to run, I loved the contact and was always good at dropping (and sometimes injuring) other players. For this reason, I played full back. I played full back for the Fitzroy Lions for about eight years before I made the switch to basketball.

Immediately I missed the contact and got fouled out most games for my first season and occasionally ejected (kicked out of the stadium). In both basketball and football, I found myself getting in trouble due to fights. I went to a pretty rough school for most of high school and needed to be able to look after myself. I was pretty big in comparison to most people my age but decided I better learn how to fight anyway so I started doing MMA/ judo/ karate/ jujitsu/ boxing and a whole bunch of other fighting styles as well as my personal favourite, sporting brawls!

As those of you who have spent time with me will know, I like to have a laugh and do stupid shit but once the game starts, whatever that sport may be, I get much more serious! I’m not one to go looking for a fight but if people mess with my teammates, I’ll be coming for them. This attitude was appreciated by my teammates but not so much by refs, parents etc… Due to this, basketball just didn’t quite fit my style. But that all changed when I discovered ice hockey!

When I was nearing the end of year 12, I saw a family friend who was managing the Icehouse at the time. Once I told him I had never skated before, he told me I had to go down and give it a go. I made a day of it and brought a few friends down with me (one of them being Will “Kittens” Place). Will and I immediately fell in love and came back later that night for a pond hockey session, I came back the next day and bought my first pair of hockey skates. To say I was hooked is an understatement! It was then that I started watching the NHL and AIHL and started following the greatest hockey teams on the planet, the Pittsburgh Penguins and the Melbourne Ice!

It was not long after this that I met Joey Hughes (of Melbourne Ice and NLHA fame) at a party. We got talking (and drinking). He encouraged me to keep up the hockey and to come down and get trained by him. The fact that even the top level players in Australia are so chilled out and happy to talk to newbies made me feel right at home and seeing his passion for hockey only made my love for it stronger.

I felt straight away that I had found a sport that I truly clicked with. The parts I was most fond of were the contact, the team (family like) oriented mentality and of course, the fighting. I had to pinch myself, I had finally found a sport where I wouldn’t get in trouble (well not too much) for fighting!

From the day of that first skate, hockey became a big part of my life. And has become more and more so as time has passed, to the point

The only pic I could find of Jack in a Washington Capitals jersey, instead of his Penguins kit. He remains fun to annoy. … oh, wait. I’ve made a huge mistake. – Nicko

where I now even work at the Icehouse. It is safe to say that I bleed hockey!

Throughout all of the year 12 exam period, I didn’t study, well not biology and business management anyway, I studied hockey! I spent the better part of every day down at the Icehouse. Even on days I had exams, I would skate in the morning, rush to my exam, do it as quickly as possible, then go back to the Icehouse to practice my crossovers and hockey stops, the important stuff, not stupid school work.

It wasn’t long before I joined classes and Lliam and Army became my mentors, I skipped intro and went straight to intermediate classes … a term of that and I was on to dev league. As with past sports, it was clear that defence was where I belonged and I couldn’t have been happier!

I got my first hockey injury at around the same time at a stick and puck session.  Being a male, I thought the helmet cage made me look soft, so naturally, I put a screwdriver to it and went without. I was on the ice for no longer than 20 seconds before I realized my mistake, I took a slap shot to the face and got knocked out. As I woke in a pool of blood, I realized that cage was probably there for a reason… I made the trip to the hospital in my full gear (minus skates, gloves and helmet) and once I was recommended for plastic surgery (no scar) but also had the option of stitches (scar) to get my lip put back together, I took the stitches. It was then, sitting in the car in my gear, going home with a mouth full of stitches, that I felt like a real hockey player and I have never looked back.

This is only the beginning of my hockey journey, I’m 19 years young and I’ve got a lot to learn (I now wear a cage and just deal with looking stupid) plenty of time to work on my skating, shooting, dangles and all the rest of it. I’ve met some awesome people through hockey and I know I’ll continue to meet more. Thank you to those of you who have been there with me so far, I look forward to skating alongside you for years to come.

I am eagerly waiting to play my first season of summer hockey this year and I can’t wait to play my first game, score my first goal, get my first check (even if summer is non contact) but more than anything… I can’t wait to drop the gloves!

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Guest writer (Origin story): Theresa

July 17, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE

Today’s guest writer is Theresa, a dynamo of organisation and hockey passion who has become a leading figure in the self-proclaimed Rookies and our dreams of forming a summer team. Well, actually, it simply wouldn’t happen, or have a chance of happening, without her drive.

Here, she explains how her hockey obsession began and how it survived so many false starts.

My hockey addiction: a love story

By Theresa

Theresa, about to tear it up at the Icehouse. Pic: Wayne McBride

Hi, my name is Theresa, and I am addicted to hockey.

First a bit of background info:

I grew up in South Africa. I found hockey at age 13 when I went general skating to go look at some handsome hockey boys.  I happily general-skated once a week for a few years, gaping from afar at these boys.  By age 16 I was a real “rink rat” and running the rink cafeteria. By age 18 I was dating one of these boys, and tried to play a bit of hockey myself for a half season.  My prized birthday gift was a pair of Graf hockey skates.

But I was talked out of playing hockey by the boy I was dating, because he and his friends felt it was “unladylike”.  I was impressionable back then; I listened to him.

I moved continents to North America (L.A.), and while I only took one suitcase, they contained my skates. In my year in L.A., I bought everything Kings and Gretzky at the time, though I never skated.

At age 19, I presented myself to the Canadian consulate in South Africa and filled in all the paperwork they could give me for immigration. The Canadians are pretty strict about who they let in, and who they don’t. This 19-year old upstart with no qualifications to speak of, no hockey skills, on her own dime, was hardly given a glance.  I was told in no uncertain terms that I didn’t qualify.

By age 21, I was on my way to Sydney, Australia.  In my two suitcases, was one suitcase of shoes (what else??), and one of clothing and again my prized Graf skates. I worked crazy hours and hardly skated. I can count on one hand how many times I skated in many years. I lost most of the ability to skate.

Fast forward to the near-present, when I settled in Melbourne a few years ago. That’s where I met Adam McGuinness of (among others) Nite Owls fame, who encouraged me to come back to hockey.  He didn’t seem to think it was unseemly for me to play – in fact he encouraged it!

For a work social outing, Adam suggested we all go watch a hockey game, and so I was introduced to the Melbourne Ice. And here my resistance to being involved in hockey crumbled.

In my head went around a myriad of thoughts, among others: “Wow the standards in Australia are high!  The Icehouse is amazing! I am mesmerised! I am in LOVE!!”

I knew that in all my years out of hockey, I was still madly in love with it. All of it. Perhaps it was self-preservation that kept me away from it. I could feel the pull back into it, magnetic and irresistible. I remember saying to my sister at the time: “This is going to suck me in, it’s a bit scary”.

And so it sucked me in.

I enrolled in beginner hockey school at the Icehouse, and started over again.  Imagine my awe when I found out that the Melbourne Ice captain, Lliam Webster, was also my coach! Talk about weak knees! And this other guy called Army, whom I couldn’t understand at the time because of his thick Canadian accent, also from the Melbourne Ice, was coaching me!  Army is the guy who skates over opposition defence men like a tank and scores multiple goals! Wow, I was in the company of hockey royalty!!

I went to all the Melbourne Ice games in the remainder of 2010 and in 2011. In 2012 I bought a Melbourne Ice membership and went on a road trip to Adelaide and the Gold Coast as a MI “groupie”. I will be going to Perth for the MI games in August, and of course to the finals in Newcastle in September. I have become a “one-eyed” MI fan (as fellow Rookie Wayne McBride calls me).

I attended all the IIHF world championship games in Melbourne in February 2011. It was there that I really noticed the hockey marvel called Joey Hughes, awarded the top forward for the tournament. I remember Googling him at the time and not only discovering his business NLHA, but also seeing more about his international career. I mistakenly thought at first: “Wow, there is another Joey Hughes who plays professional hockey in North America, also with a brother Vinnie Hughes!” – only to realise it was this very same person I was seeing in action in front of me.

I vowed to be trained by him, and after emailing him a few times, but not getting enough people to join me to help cover the cost of private lessons, I didn’t make it to NLHA in 2011.

In June that year, some of us started a Facebook group called “The Rookies“. We have grown from a five-person group of hockey school friends, to several hundred. We are intensely enthusiastic, intensely vocal, intensely passionate about hockey.  We are all, to a greater or lesser degree, addicted to hockey. I am one of its five “admins” who monitor and steer the group direction and activities.

At the end of 2011, I enthusiastically bought my first full kit and another pair of Grafs online, which (due to being very ill-fitting) regressed my skating noticeably.

It was in these ill-fitting Grafs that I presented myself to Joey for my first NLHA camp in January 2012. It was a group bootcamp, and more affordable than private lessons. Joey was diplomatically horrified with my skating abilities.  But he and Czech legend Martin Kutek and local hard man Tony Theobald (and guest instructors like Vinnie), persisted with me and patiently got me to skate better and faster and harder, despite my feet aching almost every time I skated. They truly took me to my next level – many of them. I love every camp and every individual class with NLHA. I get better and better and better. I even deferred my part-time degree for one semester, to be able to fit in all the NLHA camps. (Now of course, I am going to buy new skates from them, after NLHA sized me up for the right fit!)

I almost went to Poland to support the Mighty Roos in April this year, but I couldn’t get anyone to come with me! Even my husband, who has reluctantly but obligingly been dragged along to all my hockey excursions and activities, wasn’t up for this one.

Earlier this year, The Rookies secretly raised funds within our group, and surprised our coaches and heroes (and now our friends) Joey, Army and Martin, each with full 2012 Melbourne Ice player sponsorship. If we had more money we would have sponsored Lliam and Tommy and Shona too!

The Rookies are also doing volunteer work for The Melbourne Mustangs, particularly in supporting their imports. For instance this Saturday just past, we had an off-ice training day and fundraiser with three of the imports (and with import Martin Kutek from the Melbourne Ice).

We vocally and enthusiastically support anything that is Melbourne hockey and hockey school, in either of its two rinks.  We believe in “Hockey Karma” and in paying it forward.

And now we are starting to look at putting some IHV 2012/2013 summer league teams on the ice for the Rookies, with at least two clubs so far expressing an interest in assisting us, and at least two or three teams’ worth of Rookies ready and willing to commit.

Theresa where she’s happiest: on the ice with a bunch of Rookies.

We believe that while we are working hard at opening up avenues for our own development and involvement in hockey, we also try to give back as much as (and more, if possible) than we have received.  I look forward to seeing more individuals and more clubs join hands in this cause.

My renewed dreams of “making the big time” in hockey, will of course never be realised.  I have a full time job, which pays my mortgage and limits my hockey practise time.  Besides, I am now *cough* a bit older, and not really able to compete against 20-year olds anymore. And yes, I am getting back to that degree next semester because I like to finish what I started; which means I consciously have to cut back a bit on hockey.

But that does not alter my love of (read: passion for, addiction to) the sport.

I still have dreams of going on an extended leave/sabbatical/whatever to Canada. I might do a short one, a teaser, at the end of this year.

But the longer one will also still happen…

One day.

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Guest writer: Rachael Hands

July 14, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE

Our latest guest writer is Rachael Hands, just coming off a nasty knee injury, queen of the pre-skate snacks and happily a new classmate of mine on Friday nights. This story makes me wince in all sorts of bad ways … and I fully intend to privately find out the identity of the “Melbourne Ice player” in question. Rachael, you’ve been warned.

Hi, I’m Rachael and I’m a basiphobic*.

By Rachael Hands

Hi, I’m Rachael and I’m a basiphobic*.

Like any good Rookie, I’m self-diagnosed of course… Oh, and according to http://www.webmd.com, I’m also traumatophobic, which feeds into my basiphobia. This makes me more anxious and then ultimately leads to me falling on my butt during hockey lessons anyway!

Simply put, I’m attempting to be an ice hockey player with a pretty serious fear of falling over and hurting myself badly. Again.

Back in August 2011, on Tuesday the 16th to be precise, I was skating up and down the Henke rink at the Icehouse during a regular hockey lesson when CRUNCH! I hit the ice. Me being me when I fell, didn’t do things by halves either. I hit the ice very hard and very awkwardly with my knees taking all of the impact first. It was less than a split second after the initial crack of the protective gear meeting the ice that I heard the popping and crackling in my left knee, then felt this weird sucking sensation as I skidded with surprising grace (as if I meant to look like a falling tonne of bricks with arms and legs) on plastic shin guards (sans socks!) through centre ice. Having been rushed at full-tilt by a professional Melbourne Ice player I panicked, not trusting his ability to stop before he got to me; then I hesitated about getting out of his way so as not to hurt him and our chances of winning a back-to-back Goodall Trophy. The rather serious result of those normally inconsequential actions was little newbie me crashing onto the ice like a sack of potatoes. The bizarre noises and feeling in my knee joint was my Medial Collateral Ligament being torn clean in half.

That was in the first 12 minutes of the 60-minute lesson. I still had 48 minutes of ice time and I was damn well going to use them! I got up, adrenaline coursing through my veins, and with some kind of misguided steely resolve I laughed the fall off and the subsequent pain I was in to skate out the rest of the session. Admittedly when I look back on it, I didn’t just have a ‘lazy leg’ as I skated around that night, I actually couldn’t lift it. I couldn’t bend it and I didn’t do terribly much weight-bearing on it either. I glided through the rest of the session in a mass of throbbing agony. The following day (when the inside of my knee was almost the size of a grapefruit and purple) I took myself to see Nick M, my regular physio who has treated almost every injury I’ve ever obtained through the playing of sport. He had yet to see me for a hockey injury, even though I’d been in classes for a term and a bit and evidently doing well by my coordination standards! I don’t remember much of the session other than he lifted my bad leg up from the table and I cried like a baby because it hurt that much. He hadn’t even put any stress on the joint! Nick immediately ordered an MRI and it confirmed the worst-case scenario. My MCL was totally ruptured and would require the most intense rehabilitation and physiotherapy I had ever experienced in order to heal.

What followed, without giving you another blow-by-blow account, was five and a half months in a hinged leg brace, firstly locked dead straight for three months then little by little I was given a few degrees of flex in the knee joint until a second MRI revealed the knitting of the MCL was complete. After that, it was intense physical therapy (progressing from daily appointments to now once a week) to learn to reengage the MCL and the surrounding muscles correctly to prevent re-injury. I literally had to learn to walk before I could run, let alone skate! Which brings me back to my fears of falling over and hurting myself again.

I arrived at my (clearly very accurate) phobiæ diagnosis one ridiculously hot January afternoon in Nick M’s sweltering treatment room. I was being run through a series of stress tests on my knee to determine whether I was going to be able to return to skating in the foreseeable future. It dawned on me that as much as I had been bugging the indeterminably patient Nick to let me back out onto the ice since my ‘limbed bag of flour’ impression; I was actually (and very secretly) incredibly terrified of falling over and making the existing injury worse. So, like any good gen-y’er, I went straight home to google what the fear of falling was, coupled with a fear of injury and arrived at a mild case of basiphobia (a fear of walking and or falling down) and traumatophobia which is other wise known as the fear of significant injury.

I am happy to report to you, the readers of Nicko Place’s blog, that while my knee has healed to the point where my physio has begrudgingly given me his blessing to continue my hockey lessons and join a summer league team, my fear of falling and hurting myself gets more intense every week.

As the drills get harder, the edgework more extreme and the general pace of lessons increases, my fears escalate in an uncanny correlation. Since finally getting back onto the ice regularly in February of this year, I can see how far I’ve come. In a lesson at NLHA last week, I felt some complete control over my skating again. My legs were really solid underneath me and I loved every minute of it! I felt good on the ice and not like I was struggling as usual, but that pervasive nagging thought about falling and hurting myself so badly all over again kept eating away at me. For many hockey Rookies, the fear of falling and or hurting themselves disappears with confidence in their own abilities. For me though, it’s a struggle to talk myself into the fact that my knee can handle it. I still baulk at the superman/sliding drills or anything requiring me to put all of my weight on my ‘bad leg’ while it’s bent at any angle greater than straight. My coaches have been patient and very understanding but I sometimes wonder whether or not I can teach myself to ignore those feelings. So far though, such attempts have proven to be fruitless. Practising falling over on ice so I get used to it again requires discipline I just don’t (want to) have. I’d rather spend the precious little time for hockey I have available to me trying to gain some more of that elusive control on my outside edges, crossovers and joining the infamous Martin Kutek-led  ‘underpoosh’ revolution. Surely, if I practise those skills enough then I don’t need to think about forcing myself to fall over? I’ll be good enough not to, right? Or at least that’s what I keep telling myself.

But, I’ve resolved (very publicly today) that for the coming term (intermediate classes at the Icehouse in addition to another round at NLHA) I will not let my fears get the best of me. I will skate and if I fall, so be it. I won’t try to fight it and stay upright; I will just go with momentum, following the quickest route straight on to the ice (a mantra coach Joey Hughes likes to drill into me every week). The only thing for me to do in order to get over the irrationality and anxiety about falling and potential re-injury, is to bite the bullet and just trust myself and of course the work that Nick the Physio has done with my knee to get me back to a point where I CAN skate. I simply have to jump in, skates first and the fear of falling be damned. That, and remember to enjoy learning to map the shortest distance down on to the ice from wherever I may be on the rink!

An intense fear of jumping is called ‘catapedophobia’ by the way… I’m just saying! 😉

*well, sort of…

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Guest writer: Alex McNab

July 10, 2012 by 7 Comments

WORLD EXCLUSIVE

Today, Alex McNab takes us into the hot, sordid, sweaty and potentially smelly world of girls sharing hockey change-rooms with the boys. (And with regard to her last paragraph, she totally had it coming.)

(Next up, “Jess” with a very personal, brave and heart-wrenching story of how hockey changed her life.)

It’s (only mostly) a man’s world

By Alex McNab

“Hi.”

Alex McNab on the ice.

“Hi.”

“I’d like to try on some skates, please.”

“Sure, they’re just over here.”

“No, not the figure skates. Hockey skates.”

“Oh. Oh, okay. Ha.”

This exchange took place late last year, a couple of weeks into my first term of Intro to Hockey, and people’s reactions to “I’m learning to play ice hockey” still range from disbelief to hyena laughter.

Responses of “But why?” or “That’s different …” or “Are there many girls that play hockey?” are pretty standard. If it’s unusual in Australia for a bloke to play hockey, it’s even more so for a girl. A quick head count of those in the Rookies Facebook group (my only point of reference, but surely a good one) shows guys outnumbering girls approximately six to one. This held true in last term’s class, where there were just five girls in a class of thirty. I don’t know if it’s different overseas, but in Australia we’re the minority in a minority sport.

Which is mostly pretty damn awesome.

For starters, away from the ice, there are always people willing to talk about it, hear about it and ask questions about it. You are a curiosity, and if “I play netball” isn’t much of a conversation starter, “I play ice hockey” guarantees a response, especially if you’re wearing heels when you say it.

I’ve been asked some pretty funny questions: Are girls even allowed to play hockey? Do guys go easy on you because you’re a girl? Why don’t you just play a nice, gentle, non-contact sport? Do you have unresolved anger issues? (What the …?)

In contrast, on the ice and in the world that surrounds it, gender doesn’t really come into it. Classes are unisex, changerooms are unisex, leagues are unisex. Even the gear is (mostly) unisex, which results in all sorts of strange sizing and comfort issues when it comes to chest armour. My single favourite piece of hockey equipment isn’t my skates or my stick (no penis jokes here), but my lovely girly chest armour with curved plates on the front, designed to accommodate boobs. And as far as the rest of the gear goes, a lot of smaller girls shop in the kiddie section. (Don’t laugh, at least it’s cheaper.)

Most typically ‘female’ sports – netball, dance, tennis, swimming – are non-contact, and in many mainstream sports there’s enough female participation to warrant separate leagues for men and women. So it’s an awful lot of fun to play a mixed sport where you can go hard, shove if you need to, and not worry about breaking someone’s nail.

Yeah, skating as hard or fast as a guy can be tricky when you’re a foot shorter or thirty kilos lighter, but given my current skill level, that’s the least of my problems, and at least I have a girl’s arse for cushioning when I fall.

Plus, there are some perks to being a girl-in-a-guy’s-world. Lliam, for one, is far more concerned and conciliatory when you fall over in class than he would be otherwise, and he has been known to stage whisper, during scrimmages: “Just hit them. You can do whatever you like to them because you’re a girl. Hook, trip … whatever.” As you say, coach.

And there’s some fine man candy around the Icehouse, for those who care to look. I may still be mourning the departure of the gorgeous Jacques Perreault from the Melbourne Ice team at the end of last season (and Cute Dave ceased to be Cute Dave, and merely became Dave, once he modelled club gear for the wrong team), but sometimes unisex changerooms can seem like a gift.

Alex armoured up.

For the sake of discretion, I duck into the toilets to change – topless girls would probably result more in shock, and less in celebration – but guys have no such qualms about whipping off the gear. So yes, boys, we might just take the opportunity to sneakily check you out while you’re shirtless, and we’re not going to apologise for it – think of it as compensation for the way you smell post match. Certainly, growing up with three sisters and going to an all-girls school did nothing to prepare me for the odour of 25-odd sweaty, post-hockey men in a confined space, but I’m not arguing for it to be changed.

The question of whether girls and guys wanted separate changerooms came up recently. Answer: hell no. Logistically, the changerooms are already stupidly crowded, so an additional changeroom that just four or five people would use at a time would be plain silly. I was also quietly chuffed at the responses of some of the boys: that they like the camaraderie and team spirit of changing together, and that having women around keeps them in check (pun intended, I’m sure). That it’s good to be equal, and that they’d hate us to be removed from the pre and post-match banter – even if this concern was based more on the possibility we might discuss them behind their backs …

And then the discussion descended into a debate about the merits of Bonds knickers.

Hockey isn’t exactly a glamour sport, and we sure don’t do it to look sexy, but despite this the girls I play hockey with are some of the, well, “girliest” I know: Jess, who combines her hockey with pole dancing (hello!), Aimee, who looks like a blonde Christmas angel off the ice, my sister, Scarlett, with her Jane Austen-era sensibilities, Rachael, the Rookies’ answer to MasterChef, and Theresa, the ultimate social secretary. There’s also another woman I see around a bit who sports a “Mother Puckers” jersey. Brilliant. Me? I quit moaning about the cost of skates when it was pointed out to me (by several people) that I had unflinchingly spent that and more on far more impractical footwear in the past.

We like that it’s guys and girls, all learning together. We like the social side of it. We like that we’re not treated differently, that you boys don’t go soft on us, and that we can walk into the changeroom in heels and out of it in skates.

Recently, at a Stick and Puck session, Nicko hooked me and I fell. I wasn’t wearing armour and I played the girly card. He called me out on it: “Quit whinging. I’m a feminist. If you’re on the ice, we’re equals, and you shoved me first.”

Which pretty much sums it all up.

Filed Under: Ice hockey Tagged With: , , , ,

Guest writer (Origin story): Chris Tran

July 6, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE:

Today, rookie Chris Tran talks us through his international journey of Mighty Ducks, rulers-and-erasers-hockey and finally to the Icehouse. (Next up is Alex McNab with a sure-fire traffic generator as she talks about girls in the hockey changing room …)

My journey

By Chris Tran

Where it all began…

Where does my story begin? I’d like to say I grew up in Canada watching my dad play in the minors, learning to skate on the frozen pond behind our house and playing street hockey with the kids in the neighbourhood. None of that is true, of course. Actually, dad lived in Canada for a while in the 80’s after the Vietnam War and he was a semi-pro table tennis player, only to perpetuate the Asian stereotype.

I was born and raised in Melbourne and like a lot of 80’s and 90’s kids, my first exposure to the beautiful game was through the Mighty Ducks Trilogywhich I watched religiously during my childhood (and in my late teens when I rediscovered them).

The Tran house was ruled by: “Quack! Quack! Quack!”

Once our eyes were sore from staring at the TV screen for so long, my little brother and I would play a little one-on-one. Now our family came from humble beginnings; we couldn’t afford rollerblades or hockey sticks so we had to make do with wooden rulers and used erasers as pucks. None of that really mattered to us though and we played till our backs wore out – as it turned out, 30cm rulers were too short even for us so our games didn’t last very long.

Eventually I grew out of this phase (most likely due to someone taping over our copy of D2 with a double episode of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman). AFL and the FIFA World Cup took over and it wasn’t until 2009 that I found the sacred trilogy on DVD and rekindled my love for the game…

February 23, 2010 and beyond!

I don’t think I will ever forget this day; my first skate at the Icehouse. I had skated once before when I was 8 years old at the Edmonton Mall ice rink in Canada. Twelve years later I was hoping to pick up where I left off, secretly wishing that once I set foot on the ice I would manifest into some sort of ice skating prodigy. This…unfortunately didn’t happen.

After falling for about an hour, I realised my rentals were two sizes too big; the scars those blisters left on my ankle are there to remind me that I’m actually a size 6. Despite being battered and bruised with bloody blisters all over my ankles, I knew this was the sport for me.

Since then, there have been four terms of hockey school, torturous bag skate drills, concussion scares and long double shifts in the d-zone but nothing else has changed…The feeling of liberation and the ice cold air that hits my face when racing from end to end and the sound of the blades carving against the ice is satiating after every stride; there’s nothing else like it.

Man, I love this game!

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Guest writer: Liam Patrick

July 4, 2012 by Leave a Comment

WORLD EXCLUSIVE:

Welcome to the first nickdoeshockey entry not by me, Nicko. Instead, Liam takes us through his intro to the non_icehouse world of Joey Hughes. (Liam gets the nod as the first guest because he shamelessly mentioned my goal a week or so ago. Next up: Chris Tran, who doesn’t mention my goal, in a rookie error, but will be published anyway.)

A rookie’s journey to NLHA

By Liam Patrick

Oakleigh.  It’s the little rink that is (in many ways) the heartbeat of Victorian hockey.  It’s the ugly older brother to the shiny, sexy new Icehouse.  Over 30 years old it can be best described as in need of some TLC and at times you cant really see what is going on due to the fog, or being freezing cold when not skating or the delightful “war bunkers” that are the changerooms.  However it is where many hockey players can access ice-time – be it for training, games or the NLHA classes.

Next Level Hockey Australia (NLHA or “Next Level” – the constant catch-cry) is lead by Joey Hughes (Melbourne Ice-star, Hockey sensei, all round good guy) with more coaching from Martin Kutek (Melbourne Ice-star, master of the “underpoosh” and another all round good guy).  They also do really good pricing on gear – plus the fancy new flat bottomed V skate sharpening.  Ok, end plug.  NLHA have run boot camps and coaching clinics in the past but this Winter they kicked off a program for adults not dissimilar to the Icehouse’s hockey school.

Now, the famous Rookies group (often mentioned here by Nicko) had began to get involved with NLHA and many, many rookies immediately signed up to these classes and championed them!  Unfortunately, I didn’t.   Yes – lazy, stupid, slow.  I was most jealous when Facebook would become abuzz on a Friday night with excited Rookies extolling the virtues of this great new hockey frontier.  I had actually been fortunate enough to get to tag along to summer league team training (they needed numbers and I knew a guy who knew a guy…) taken by Joey way back in January.  I knew they would be getting some really good coaching.  I looked at my bank account, sighed, and checked what supermarket had baked beans on special…..

Liam Patrick (black and green) celebrates a goal at the Icehouse, Intermediate end of term game. Pic: Wayne McBride

I entered the program 3 weeks in.  At the Icehouse I was doing intermediate and dev league.  Joey said he needed to see if I could skate and asked me to do a beginners class first then he would see where I could fit in.  I was a bit miffed “Hang on, I’m doing intermediate, I have some weaknesses, but I can skate” I thought/posted to the Rookies.  Anyway I headed down that first Friday night.

After battling a wet Monash Carpark (I refuse to call it a freeway), I wobbled my way through the beginners class feeling like the new kid at school sitting exams on day 1.  5 minutes in Joey called for us to get into “hockey stance” and promptly came and knocked me over onto my arse before pointing out where I was going wrong (feet too wide, knees not bent, head down….)  This sums up the whole NLHA experience for me – Joey and Martin can always find something you need to fix up to make yourself a better hockey player and go to the next level no matter how basic it is.  I got through the class and Joey agreed I could play game time and that he would happily take me into classes.  I was to stay with the beginners and work hard on my basics – particularly my non-existent outside edge!

The weeks went on.  I got the chance to try an intermediate class – wow!  There was a step up.  Filled with IHV players looking for an edge plus a lot of the more skilled Rookies meant the standard was pretty good.  My skills got shown up fast.  The drive home that night was very sombre as I recounted the number of times I fell on my arse, lost the puck, went the wrong way, got beaten for pace and generally just made myself look like Bambi.  In hindsight it was a great reality check and probably stopped me getting too big for my boots!  I had been recommended to repeat intro at the end of term 4 at the Icehouse, instead I skated 3-4 hours a week over Christmas and went up to intermediate.  Likewise I then went up to Dev the next term after a semi-successful crack at “intermediate dev league”.  I think I needed the wake-up call to remind me I was a long way away from being a semi-competent hockey player, take my eye off summer league and worry about getting the basics right, which were starting to get exposed.

The “term” rolled on.  I had 4 hours a week of hockey.  My non-hockey friends thought I was mad (“But its Friday night!”), my housemate questioned me when I was lying on the couch moaning and sooking the following days (rank hockey gear stinking up the laundry).  I was in heaven!  I began to see some tiny improvements – I could almost occasionally stay on my outside edge, sometimes.  I was focusing a bit more on my basics and almost executing them in Dev and game-time – the downside being I forgot about my positioning, the puck and other things that “occasionally” count in a hockey game.  I found a bit of extra time to general skate during the week to work on the latest tips from Martin and Joey.  I found having four different coaches (with Lliam and Army contributing from the Icehouse – as helpful as ever) meant I was picking up extra observations and tweaking different things (I even nailed a slapshot in a stick n puck which was exciting, if not entirely useful!).  But I still wasn’t nailing my outside edges, my cross-overs were still clunky and generally I lacked any sort of agility – something that was continually being found out in dev and gametime.

Icehouse hockey school finished.  I engaged in a great “battle” with Nicko on the ice.  It was bloody brilliant to see him score his goal.   As a reader of his blog for 6 months it was great to see him finally get a chance and he finished the job (would have loved to have seen that rodeo celebration though….), we all know how much he loves hitting the ice and how hard he works – even if we were on the opposing teams.  I managed to snag a goal myself which improved my hockey spirits somewhat.  At least I wasn’t totally useless on the ice.  I found myself skating a tiny better with the upbeat frame of mind.

Friday night at gametime was a different story.  I nearly always played D because my lack of agility wasn’t exposed as much, if anything it made attacking forwards skate out to the boards as I clogged up the “guts”.  But I still  l didn’t handle the puck cleanly, regularly turned it over in our zone, fell over (including bruising my shoulder and tailbone in one night which really concerned me as to what damage I may have done once I cooled down and was shovelling Nurofen whilst sitting on my couch) and generally didn’t contribute much more than another body on the ice.  Yet for some bizarre reason I still enjoyed every second and was busting to get back over the boards.  Hockey is a strange drug.

Finally it was graduation night.  I’d had a long day of personal disputes, girl problems, Icehouse registrations going into meltdown and then

Boarding, with Liam Patrick …

work being well, work.  I found myself wearily driving down “the carpark” to the rink not even considering, let alone focused on what I needed to do.  Joey agreed to change the sharpen on my skates as I tried a new tactic to find this mysterious outside edge and I hit the ice for beginners.  Whoops.  So now stopping was hard, I was slower, my legs hurt, my pivots were worse than my stopping and I barely felt any improvement in tracking my outside edge.  Oh and we are being assessed tonight? Good call Liam, good time to experiment – idiot.  Even by my standards I skated badly.  Maybe the distraction of cursing my own stupidity didn’t help.

After a class photo I had an hour before game-time (while the intermediate superstars strutted their stuff, I  usually spent this time consuming Masterchef Hands’ latest culinary delight).  I grabbed Joey and asked for the feedback.  “So do you want honesty or me to blow smoke up your arse” to which I replied “Bullshit, give me honesty, I’m a big boy….”Again I thought the conversation defined Joey as a coach.  I had my strong points (apparently) – I could participate in game-time ok, I could pass, I could read the play and position myself accordingly – but my skating was letting me down.  I couldn’t get to where I needed to be, I was running into people, I had no agility.  But, if I wanted to I could join intermediate, he was going to push me and expected me to work harder on that outside edge.

Challenge accepted!

I walked away feeling positive – for mine, the sign of a good coach.  I knew skating was always my weakness.  I secretly knew at times I was biting off more than I could chew and pretending I could get by. But it also felt good to know that I didn’t totally suck at everything, that somebody I hold with a lot of respect thought that I was capable of hitting “the next level”.  Game-time that night was fun, I even ventured up to a wing and put a shot on goal against people who play Prem C and A reserve hockey.  Good players, who cares if they weren’t going 100%.  I think the positive frame of mind helped.

So where does that leave me?  That was Friday night just gone.  The new term starts this Friday night.  Good, no lay off.  I am putting my finances, time and energy towards skating now.  Hockey specific skills (i.e. stick n puck and drop in) can wait.  I’m going to own this outside edge.  I’m going to become a more competent skater.  I’m going to keep up with the better players.  Ok. that’s enough self-indulgence of telling my story (Nicko, you did ask for it!).

So NLHA.  Get to it.  Please trust me, the above reads like a 15 year old emo kids diary, I know.  But at the end of the day Joey and Martin have started improving my skating and have made me really focus on it and be aware of it rather than my previous “go get puck” type of attitude (merely hoping my skating would improve over time).  I can’t speak highly enough of them (even if Joey seems to make it his mission to make me hit the ice once per class while fixing my hockey stance, knee bend or whatever other lazy habit I have that night).  Even if I stop improving now (which I hope I don’t!) the time, money and effort have been worth it thus far and I can only hope I can turn this into real improvement.

Please don’t think this means I don’t like or respect the Icehouse and in particular Army and Lliam.  Most certainly NOT the case.  Every time I’m there I learn something from them as well, they taught me the foundations I am building on and they are always great fun to be around.  They are also both generous with their time and advice to improve people’s game.  I intend to participate in both as long as I have the time and money to do so!

Like all the rookies, my gratitude to all four of our coaches is limitless and we cannot thank them enough for their effort and energy!

My perfect week of hockey – some time at the Icehouse, some time with NLHA, nail my outside edges and maybe even find the back of the net.  Oh and another big win to the mighty Melbourne Ice…..

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