To say that most girls' hockey players hate push-ups is an understatement. Not only do they hate them, but they are notoriously bad at them too. They either let their hips sag, barely bend their elbows or reach their head down towards the ground in a feeble attempt to get lower. Despite the fact that most girls' hockey players are horrible at push-ups, the truth is that it's not their fault. When it comes to being able to do perfect push-ups, the odds are stacked against young female hockey players. But once you know what you are up against, I am going to show you how to beat those odds.
The main reason girls' hockey players struggle with push-ups is poor posture.
Before we get into how you are going to fix that problem, you have to realize that in order to be able to play hockey well, you need to have bad posture. Think about it - you would never be able to stickhandle to puck far away from your body or reach out to catch bad passes if you were always standing up perfectly straight with your shoulders pulled back. Players have to let their shoulder rolls forward slightly in order to be able to reach for loose pucks and stickhandle effectively.
The problem is that this poor posture is reinforced by the fact that players spend the majority of their day sitting - in class, in front of the computer, and in the car on the way to practice. Hockey players may need to have a certain degree of poor posture to perform well on the ice, but letting it get too bad puts them at risk for serious shoulder injuries and back pain. Girls hockey players need to work on improving their posture off the ice so that they can perform their best on the ice.
Push-ups are a great exercise for improving posture - when they are done properly. Girls' hockey players tend to rely far too much on their arm strength and not enough on their core strength and stability when doing push-ups. Their lack of core strength and stability can be easily seen by the position of their body throughout the push-up movement. Players either let their butts come way up into the air or they let their hips sag down to the ground - both are indicative of weak core muscles.
To do the perfect push-up:
Your body must be in a perfectly straight line through the entire movement. In order to maintain this position, players must be able to keep their core tight (think about tightening up as though someone was going to punch them in the stomach), squeeze their butts (that one usually gets a few giggles) and squeeze their shoulder blades down and together (like they are trying to squeeze them down into their back pockets). When girls are able to maintain this position as they lower themselves down towards the ground, they take the load off of their "weaker" arm muscles and rely more on their "stronger" chest and core muscles to perform the movement.
Focus on the quality of push-ups instead of the quantity. It doesn't matter if girls can only do 2 perfect push-ups in the beginning. The point is to get better at them as the season continues and slowly work your way up. It may take a little bit longer to work up to the high numbers when you are doing them right, but your willingness to practice perfect push-ups will be rewarded with increased upper body strength and core stability. This will not only help girls to prevent back and shoulder injuries, it will help them to win battles in the corner, shoot harder and play better.
