One thing I’ve noticed about my pink team, is that they know exactly who they’re going to pass to, and the receiver is also expecting the puck. So don’t blame yourself. Then again, although my spring league is a mixer, in which the teams consist of all different-level players, some of the teams just have more of the better players than others. Part of the reason Pink passes well is because quite a few of them play together on different teams during the regular season.

On the green team, I noticed that some of the players, as soon as the puck even touches their blade, they just whack it away to either no one in particular, against the boards (which does help get it out of our zone), or worse, to the other team! And even though we have one of the top players in the league (who coaches our intermediate squad and plays on our advanced squad during the regular season), the passes aren’t caught nearly as successfully. Though we have a few people who normally play together, this team truly is a mix, in terms of regular season players. If that makes sense.

When I thought I’d go back to skating up this past year, Brian and I used to pass a floor hockey ball back and forth outside. Maybe this is something you and Amy can work on as well.

Oh, yeah — and don’t forget to bend your knees and lean forward when skating, which rollerbladers don’t do. Try to make your legs move straight back and forth instead of kicking them off to the side when you push off. The Stamm class, I hear, is a big help, and so is going to public skate as often as you can.

Unfortunately, even though I think I’m a better goalie than forward now, I still skate like a forward because I’ve skated that way for so long! Now, how ’bout passing some goalie tips my way?

I find my passes picked off quite a bit by the higher skilled players & for the same reasons you mentioned PLUS I need to pass harder…the soft, slow passes get picked off more easily. I need to pass just a tad sooner too.

I notice more contact as well, but it is more of the sheilding or riding the player type of contact rather than the totally spastic head on crashes that happen in D level where too many of us aren’t very good skaters.

I wonder if playing up where the teams aren’t evenly matched are as good a learning experience for the forwards…do they get much action?

I took a couple of power skating classes and they were helpful (though I still feel like I can’t skate well at all!).

How does this “1000 shots challenge” work? Shooting off-ice counts?