(Re)Building the Perfect Hockey Player

Well, not perfect but at least not the broken down guy I am right now. Like a lot of you who've been playing for a while, I've picked up my fair share of hockey related injuries. Actually, if I add up all the hospital and dental bills I've probably spent as much money on hockey as Don Cherry has on ugly ties. For the most part, I shrugged them off but as I hit the wrong side of 40 a year or so ago, that started to get a lot harder.

I coached and skated a little when I was living in Kuwait in 2006 (with the wonderfully named Kuwait Mooseheads) until I screwed up my knee again. A quick trip to a physiotherapist led to a diagnosis of a dislocated kneecap and a torn meniscus, leading to ongoing inflammation and patellar tracking disorder. I picked up street hockey with BTSH when I got back to New York but it's been a while since I skated hard. I also recently got diagnosed with a nasal bone spur thanks to a couple of decades of deviated septums so tomorrow I'm off for a septoplasty.

In the meantime, to fight off all this, I've begun training for the new ice hockey season for the first time in decades. I've signed up with the folks at Blue Streak Sports Training at Chelsea Piers and I'm looking to get back at least some of those steps I've lost over the last couple of years.

Will I be able to get back to the level I played at in my prime (or hopefully, even better)? Who knows? But it should be fun trying and I'll keep you all informed of my progress. Hopefully, my own experiences will also help some of you out there find ways to deal with your own aches and pains and keep up with the young tyros in your league.

Old time hockey, boys, old time hockey!