Rugby – Hockey – SAQ

Hockey girls and a rugbycoach: interesting mix! The 2014-15 season brought a whole new experience for the girls of the MB1 team of the Mixed Hockey Club Castricum. Playing in the National Super B league for 15-16 year olds for the first time they were overrun in the first games of the season. They turned to their Castricum Rugby Club neighbours for advise and found me! A rugbycoach of course but also an SAQ Advanced Trainer. I was more than happy to kick-start their movement development. The hockey club contacted me for an eight week program till Christmas and I was confident I could boost their performance. I know how well hockey girls can adapt from rugby clinics I run at schools in the Netherlands, so I was up for the challenge. The program was an instant success with the quality of movement of the girls improving and with renewed energy they re-entered the competition. It always surprises me how quickly athletes react to these exercises….

We decided to continue in the New Year and I could extent the program and mix more hockey elements into it. Switching from hockey – sprinting for position – hockey became the natural next step. A big part was Arm Mechanics: start sprinting with the hockey stick in one hand! The season ended very positive with a solid position in the league but more important the big lesson for the girls that investing in yourself and doing extra work pays-off.

I enjoyed the hockey experience too. I always mix in SAQ elements in my rugby programs, so why not hockey? The enthusiasm of the girls and their open minded approach to all the new and strange movement patterns I threw at them was a great experience. It was also good to detail an eight month SAQ program.

The Viper Belts were perhaps the biggest fun exercise: of course the resistance work but most of all the explosive starts accelerated by the 20kg power boost of the Viper cord, a screaming success (literally!)

Key to the success were the hockey specific SAQ resources, the I-Diploma education and the use of video feedback. I would advise to buy the book or DVD’s.

The collaboration between me and the hockey club continued until the 2016-7 season. I worked with three more youth teams and also educated other hockey coaches and organised SAQ programs as integral part of the work of all the youth teams.

SuperCoach Online and SAQ

Of course all the work that was done in these three years is now an important part of the SuperCoach Online database. Want to learn more on how to built an SAQ program into your sessions? Feel free to contact me at martin@rugbycoach.com.

Reference Material

Find the SAQ and Rugby and the SAQ and Hockey books on my bookshelf

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