The Coach's Road

This week's episode is a little bit different. Sticking to our theme of culture and development we discuss our own development through hockey. Rick grew up in Germany, playing for ECC Preussen Berlin and Derek grew up in the U.S. playing for the Colorado Springs Jr. Tigers so it provides us a good chance to compare the environments, coaches and lessons we had growing up. We discuss how each of us...

Today we explore the road that Coach Saara Niemi has taken through her career so far. As a player Saara played for the University of Minnesota Duluth, Ilves and the Finnish Women's National Team. During her playing days she won championships at the college and professional level and won Olympic and World Championship Bronze. Saara started her coaching career in 2011 when she became the Ice Hockey...

Today's episode features Slavomír Lener, the Ice Hockey Development Manager for the Czech Hockey. In this episode we explore similar topics to last week's episode with Kevin in order to compare and contrast the two countries. With Slavomír we dive into the Come Play Hockey Campaign and the Czech Academy and the practical ideas they are implementing within those programs. We also talk about the imp...

Today's episode features Kevin McLaughlin, the USAH Assistant Executive Director of Hockey Development. With Kevin we talk about why it is important for the US to develop its hockey culture, and what they want that culture to look like. We also explore the type players that the US wants to develop and how that relates to the goal of being the top hockey country. We dive into the American Developme...

Today we chat with Aku Nieminen the Membership Development Manager from the International Ice Hockey Federation about their role in developing hockey around the world. We talk about the programs, seminars and camps the IIHF offers its 81 members countries and what kind of coaches the IIHF wants to develop. We go through the Coach Development Framework being published this fall. We also explore wha...

Today's guest is Jukka Varmanen, a professional coach from Heinola, Finland. Jukka started his journey as a coach in 2000 with the junior organization of Heinolan Kiekko as an U18 coach. After two seasons in Heinola he joined the junior organization of HIFK in Helsinki. After spending five years with HIFK he worked two years with Lahden Kiekko-Reipas which is now the Lahti Peilcans. In 2009 he gai...

Today's episode is our first round table discussion for the show. In these episode we will bring together coaches from different sports and cultures around the world. In these conversations we will talk about the themes and topics we cover in the show, it is our hope to bring a practical voice to some of the theory we discuss. We hope you enjoy these shows! Today's guests are Branislav Bendik, a s...

This episode is a great conversation with Lauri Hakala. Lauri is the High Performance Coordinator for team ball sports at the Finnish Olympic Committee. He brings in a interesting and experienced perspective on Anders Ericsson's work of deliberate practice. We discuss with Lauri the difference between naive, purposeful and deliberate practice; how we can use deliberate practice in team sports; and...

In today's episode we talk with Ken Martel, the technical director for USA Hockey, about game-based practice design. More specifically we explore what skill really is and how it differs from technical ability, what is game sense and how can we teach it, and how do we create buy-in to these types of practices with coaches and parents. This is a great listen for any coach! As always, we asked Ken to...

Today's show is the first in our coach's road series. These episodes will release every third Thursday and highlight coaches from around the world, with backgrounds in different cultures, sports and environments. We will discuss how they got started in coaching, the lessons they have learned in their journey, how they got to where they are now and what kind of environment they want to create.&nbsp...

In this week's episode we talk with Dean Holden about critical reflection, what separates critical reflection from just reflection, questions to ask yourself, the role of a mentor in critical reflection and how to help players use critical reflection.  Dean Holden, PhD in Sport Coaching (in progress), has been learning and operating within the coaching, teaching, and mentoring area since the...

In this episode we talk with Arto Sieppi about his coaching philosophy, developing a coaching philosophy and the effects of culture and other influences on your coaching philosophy. Arto is a coach for Hockey Japan and is coming off of a Gold Medal with the Japanese Women in the Youth Olympics Games in Lausanne, Arto also coaches in Finland with his sons' club. Arto describes his coaching philosop...

In this episode we talk with Pasi Mustonen and Martin Andler about the Self Determination Theory. Pasi is the Head Coach of the Finnish Women's National Team and a Senior Lecturer at Haaga-Helia University of Applied Science. Martin is the Skills Coach for Harjun Kiekko in Finland. We describe what the SDT is, how to implement it, what challenges Pasi and Martin faced and why is the SDT important...

In our first episode we are joined by Markus Arvaja to talk about the growth mindset and its importance in sports and coaching. Markus is a Senior Lecturer at Haaga-Helia University of Applied Science as well as serving as the Mental Coach for the Finnish Women’s National Ice Hockey Team. We describe what a growth vs fixed mindset is and how to identify them in players, why it is important to educ...