Finnish goalies?

[Alberta34]

Just wondering what these guys are doing over there that make them move so good in the net? What kind of drills do the concentrate on and what kind of off ice stuff are they doing? I know some of you guys are goin to get on here and say the practice movements this an that but its more I think. They are way more athletic than the goalies from any other country. Kipper, nittymaki , Backstrom and Lehtonen you watch them play and you wonder what there doing that a guy like ward or Roloson isnt. So if anyone has some drills youve seen some of these guys or off ice stuff please post
thanks

[swedegoalie]

the one thing I've noticed when playing in finland is taht they strech alot!

It might be kinda obvious when you look at what things the pro's are doing but they really are streching all the time...

[Deezer]

I was in Oulu last week, as one of my students tried out for their junior team. What struck me the most was, as you say, athletic they were. I learned though, that they practice rigorously.

Everyday between 4 p.m-19.30 pm. They were still on ice in may, and a normal day meant weight training 4-4.45 pm, ice 5.15-6.30 pm and dryland again 7-7.30 pm. They were all very fit and had great discipline, noone said a word during dryland!

I talked to their goalie coach who told me that he could "only" attend three ice practices a week plus all home games and tournaments.

[blackmamba]

Originally Posted by swedegoalie

the one thing I've noticed when playing in finland is taht they strech alot!

It might be kinda obvious when you look at what things the pro's are doing but they really are streching all the time...

Watched Backstrom several times in the last week while sitting behind the net. We were amazed at his warmup / streaching at the start of the period. No other goalie that we saw went through as much trouble as he did to get ready for each period. It even continued during breaks in the action.

Other than that he looked pretty ordinary in the net during the action. He even gave up plenty of rebounds . Most of those rebounds however seemed to be just directly in front of him with him always being in position for a possible second shot.

[finnish beaver]

I`m coaching junior goalies in Tappara (16 x national champion).
Jukka Ropponen could tell more about finnish goalie coaching because of his long experience with goalies.

But anyway.. IMO the junior goalies mostly have own goalie coach in their team.
The situation is better than in any other countries, i suppose. That is the most important reason, why there is so many finnish top goalie for example in NHL.
My son is now 13 years old. He has about 5 ice session per week.That includes one special goalie ice. We have games every weekend during the season.

We are still training on the ice, thought there is summer knocking on the door.
For example; we have no pucks on our goalie ice. Movement, movement all the time...boring? No.. The guys know, why we are doing that.
Another important thing is to train lot of technic.
We also make lot of dry land training. Now, when on season is over, we train 5 times a week 2 ours each session.

We have now started the mental training for our junior goalies.
It is not usual in Finland. So, I try to do it a habit in finnish junior goalie coaching.
This situation is not so good than in Canada or States if we are talking about mental training.

We play games less, but we train more...

Maalivahdit.net

My own goalie coathing pages. I`m sorry; The pages are in finnish...so far.
We sell the licences to get in. There are now for example about 150 goalie drill clips and more coming etc. etc. Check the trailer. You see the level, we are doing our pages....

[Jukka Ropponen]

Answer is quite simple:

1) More goalie coaches

2) Association has effective basic level goalie coaches training/education program

3) 1+2=more structured training at early stage of goalies careers and focus on specialized training.

That's basically it. Guys like Beaver are good examples of the dedicated goalie coaches working with young goalies and giving them qualified and well structured instruction on almost daily basis.

Jukka

[The Wall33]

Originally Posted by finnish beaver

I`m coaching junior goalies in Tappara (16 x national champion).
Jukka Ropponen could tell more about finnish goalie coaching because of his long experience with goalies.

But anyway.. IMO the junior goalies mostly have own goalie coach in their team.
The situation is better than in any other countries, i suppose. That is the most important reason, why there is so many finnish top goalie for example in NHL.
My son is now 13 years old. He has about 5 ice session per week.That includes one special goalie ice. We have games every weekend during the season.

We are still training on the ice, thought there is summer knocking on the door.
For example; we have no pucks on our goalie ice. Movement, movement all the time...boring? No.. The guys know, why we are doing that.
Another important thing is to train lot of technic.
We also make lot of dry land training. Now, when on season is over, we train 5 times a week 2 ours each session.

We have now started the mental training for our junior goalies.
It is not usual in Finland. So, I try to do it a habit in finnish junior goalie coaching.
This situation is not so good than in Canada or States if we are talking about mental training.
We play games less, but we train more...

Maalivahdit.net

My own goalie coathing pages. I`m sorry; The pages are in finnish...so far.
We sell the licences to get in. There are now for example about 150 goalie drill clips and more coming etc. etc. Check the trailer. You see the level, we are doing our pages....

To address some points made by Beaver & Jukka,

1) It was shocking for me to find out that there are numerous Jr. A teams (at least in Ontario) that do not have their own goalie coach. Last year I was employed by a Jr. A team but they had to really 'beg' the team ownership for funding to pay me. It's a very short sighted, bottom line decision IMO.

2) 5 sessions and games on weekends sounds similar to a well run AAA team in Canada. Almost every AAA team does have private goalie coaching, which is kind of ironic.

Fortunately, I am now being hired to train much younger AA & AAA goalies (Atom, Peewee, Bantam) indicating that coaches are seeing the benefit to long term involvement. Teams are getting much better at selling the whole overall training experience, versus just selling practices and games.

3) I am curious as to the type and scope of mental training you do with your Junior goalies? I train high performance / elite goalies every week and I have an hour of class time before the session. Most of my discussion time so far has been video/technical review and broad concept topics. Can you share some ideas for mental training?

It appears that Finland has a much more focused goalie program than Canada. I'm seeing some trending towards better training here but from the sound of it we are still quite a ways behind.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

Wellsie

[WillyGrips13]

It seems that in the US and Canada there is a natural disdain for goalies by the other position players and coaches. If not disdain than resentment. Just listen to the tone of former players when they discuss goaltending. Maybe it's a generational thing. But, I've run across many people who tend to think the goalie is simply there to serve them and doesn't take into account that the goalie is your teammate. This attitude probably translates into how they decide to coach and to appropriate funds for goalie training. Maybe in Finland they do not have this attitude.

[swedegoalie]

Originally Posted by WillyGrips13

It seems that in the US and Canada there is a natural disdain for goalies by the other position players and coaches. If not disdain than resentment. Just listen to the tone of former players when they discuss goaltending. Maybe it's a generational thing. But, I've run across many people who tend to think the goalie is simply there to serve them and doesn't take into account that the goalie is your teammate. This attitude probably translates into how they decide to coach and to appropriate funds for goalie training. Maybe in Finland they do not have this attitude.

that's global... there's just one (or bunch of) smart guy(s) in finland who pretty much revolutioned the whole system. And obviously it works, finland's a small country and tehy've got lot's of nhl goalies and more coming up

[finnish beaver]

Next week 25 of finnish "pro" junior goalies will participate Jukka`s Goalie Camp in Espoo, Finland. We will be there too.. For me it is the main event of the year to update my coaching. Lot of discussions and more action.



---- Maalivahdit.net -----

[finnish beaver]

To wall33: You were asking about our mental training.
So, here is the content:

- The basics of mind control
- The connection b/w body and mind
- Self-confidence and self-image
- Stress; what is it? What is the positive stress like?
- Stressfull thoughts and dealing with them
- Vision training/ visualisation
- The flow-state: a state of no inhibitions
- Success/ failure
- Team spirit
- Meditation; a way of clearing of mind
- Directed relaxation
etc. etc.
I hope, that this will help You to understand the basics of our mental training.
We have a pro mental coach.

[CubanPuckstoppr]

Originally Posted by finnish beaver

Next week 25 of finnish "pro" junior goalies will participate Jukka`s Goalie Camp in Espoo, Finland. We will be there too.. For me it is the main event of the year to update my coaching. Lot of discussions and more action.



---- Maalivahdit.net -----

FB,

Can you provide us with an update?

[Jukka Ropponen]

Eurohockey asked me about the differences between various countries and their goalie coaching based on my experiences. I did give them answers and you can see them at: Q&A with goalie coach Jukka Ropponen

Basically I am trying to compare the state of goalie coaching in Finland, North America, Russia and Switzerland. Hope this clarifies the issue of this topic a little bit more.

Jukka

BTW: Beaver was all week at our camp last week and his son, Beaver Jr. skated with us. We had a several good discussion with Beaver about coaching goalies and it is really nice to have these passionate coaches like him that do such a good job with our youth/junior goalies in various clubs/organizations.