I’ve just received my first ever hockey stick. Geez it’s big! Anyhow, I need
to get practise time in before UNICON which means hitting the local parking
lot. The blade (laminated ash) will need some kind of protection I reckon.
Does anyone have any particular recommendations as to what to use? Some kind
of thick tape I suppose. Should I be looking for some that offers grip or is
smooth better?
As you can probably guess… what I know about hockey can be written in one
word - nothing. Any help much appreciated.
I used to play a lot of pond and rink hockey on ice. We used the standard hockey stick tape, which is a coarse cloth tape, usually white. We would do a slightly diagonal wrap around the blade to protect the bottom of the stick and to add puck-handling friction. We also would add a knobby ball-like wrap on the handle end of the stick to keep it from slipping out of our gloves. The tape is available where they sell hockey sticks.
I’ve never played uni hockey, though, so I don’t know if that is the approach uni hockey players use, or if the sticks are of the same length.
> Does anyone have any particular recommendations as to what to
> use? Some kind
> of thick tape I suppose. Should I be looking for some that
> offers grip or is smooth better?
Hockey experts may respond. In the meantime, remember you are playing street
hockey, which is a fairly common sport (depending where you are). Your local
sporting goods store probably can supply you with the necessary tape.
you will probibly want to put some cloth hockey tape on the blade of your stick. get white tape because black can mark gym floors. If you are using the stick outside it will probibly wear out rather quickly so you might have to retape the stick often. I take off the old tape before puting on the new stuff instead of just adding more tape because I like the feel it gives me better.
One of the big things that I would recomend practicing would be stick handling without looking at the ball. It is also nice to be able to lift the ball when you shoot and be able to pass the ball without bouncing it so that the person you are passing to is able to get it without the ball bouncing over their stick.
When I started playing street hockey, I went to the local sports store and
found a plastic blade. It looks exactly like a standard wooden replacement
blade, only plastic. I stuck it into my Easton aluminium stick and voila!
the aluminium sticks are a little more expensive than wooden ones, but the
blades are cheap and dont wear out nearly as fast. Also less channce of
cracking a aluminium stick… trust me, I got a whole pile of broken
wooden ones at home.
Leo
“Neil Dunlop” <neild@roachmill.demon.co.uk> wrote in message news:mailman.1019213797.10384.rsu@unicycling.org…
> I’ve just received my first ever hockey stick. Geez it’s big! Anyhow, I
need
> to get practise time in before UNICON which means hitting the local
parking
> lot. The blade (laminated ash) will need some kind of protection I reckon.
> Does anyone have any particular recommendations as to what to use? Some
kind
> of thick tape I suppose. Should I be looking for some that offers grip or
is
> smooth better?
>
> As you can probably guess… what I know about hockey can be written in
one
> word - nothing. Any help much appreciated.
>
> Cheers,
> Neil
>
>
>
Thanks to all for the pointers. I’ll give the local sports shop a try tomorrow and see what they’ve got in stock… which probably ain’t going to be much given my past experience…