As some of you may already know, I am an ice hockey fanatic! I grew up in Canada and spent most of my childhood at the local ice rink or the frozen pond down the street figure skating or watching my older brothers play ice hockey. Due to a heavy influence from my brothers and my dad, I didn’t have much of a choice and was basically born as a diehard Toronto Maple Leafs fan. Canadians are absolutely crazy about their hockey and rivalries between teams run deep; just like Australians and their Aussie rules.
The reason I love ice hockey is because it is a fast and physical sport requiring good hand-eye coordination, agility, accuracy, speed and strength. Athletes need to be able to “stick-handle” or control the puck, pass and shoot the puck, “bodycheck” or hit other players into the boards, and score, all while skating quite fast on ice (sometimes even as fast as 50kph!!!!).
Given this nature of the sport some of the most common injuries in ice hockey include shoulder separations and groin and hamstring strains, both of which can be successfully treated by a physiotherapist.
Tonight, the ice hockey is coming across the world to Perth Arena for the Wayne Gretzky Ice Hockey Classic. For those of you who have not seen an ice hockey game, tonight is a great opportunity to catch some hockey professionals show off their talents. Canada faces off against USA and my bets are that Canada will take the cake!!!! GO CANADA GO
Stef
