Hockey
training program
Repeat sprints in a low, bent posture for 60 minutes — engine, change of direction and a bullet-proof back + hamstrings.
Your first month is free, with nothing to pay today. Then A$24.99/month, cancel any time. On the App Store and Google Play.
Train Smart’s hockey program is a complete weekly strength and conditioning plan periodised to the Australian hockey season — pre-season February – March, competition April – September. It trains repeat-sprint ability, bent-posture endurance and change of direction, builds the week around your team nights and game day, prescribes a weight in kilos for every working set, and retests you every four weeks on Max pull-ups and Standing vertical jump, plus the conditioning benchmark your running plan is built around.
Why this program exists
You sprint repeatedly, in a bent-over posture, for sixty minutes. Then your lower back tightens up and your hamstrings are permanently short, and no generic program has any idea why.
Hockey is soccer’s neighbour on running and hamstring demand, with one addition nothing else has: a sport played bent over. So the prehab is spinal flexion under load, hip rotation and the wrists that hold the stick — plus a rotational med-ball throw for the drag flick.
A default hockey week
This is the sport’s own template — the starting point before it is fitted to your days, your equipment and your season. Team nights and game day are protected; everything else moves to the days you are free.
What hockey is won with
These are the qualities the program is built to develop, in priority order. They come from the sport, not from a generic template.
- Repeat-sprint ability
- Bent-posture endurance
- Change of direction
- Hamstring + back durability
| Session | Type | Duration | Focus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lower Strength + Posterior | Gym | 55–65 min | Sprint strength + back/hamstring armour |
| Repeat Sprints + COD | Conditioning | 35–45 min | Match-speed running + cutting |
| Power + Trunk | Gym | 45–55 min | Explosive hits + rotational control |
| Aerobic Engine | Conditioning | 40–50 min | Run out a full 60 minutes |
The season changes the program
- Pre-season
- February – March — set volume ×1.2. Build the engine and the strength base.
- In-season
- April – September — set volume ×0.7, prescribed weights hold. Maintain, don’t drain.
- Off-season
- October – January — baseline volume. Rebuild general strength and fix the niggles.
- Block structure
- Four-week blocks: three weeks accumulating, one week deload. The block’s character changes across the year rather than repeating.
- Game day
- Protected. The day before gets a 20-minute explosive primer with no running, no heavy legs and no prehab block bolted on.
The hockey testing battery
Five numbers, re-run every four weeks. Chosen to match what hockey programs actually measure — and the results re-price your training weights and reset your conditioning paces.
| Test | Measures | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Yo-Yo Intermittent Recovery 1 | Repeat-effort capacity with recovery, which is how a game is actually played. | level |
| Max pull-ups | Relative pulling strength — the best upper-body number there is for a field athlete. | reps |
| Rotational med-ball throw | Rotational power — the drag flick, the strike, the throw. | m |
| Standing vertical jump | Lower-body power in its purest form, and the cheapest fatigue check you own. | cm |
| Nordic hamstring break point | Eccentric hamstring strength — the best-evidenced hamstring injury screen there is. | ° |
What is actually in a hockey program
Every movement below appears in the sessions above, with the coaching cues the app shows you, the sets and reps it is prescribed at, and ranked alternatives if you cannot do it. The weight is calculated from your own last top set.
| Movement | Appears in | Why it is there | Trains |
|---|---|---|---|
| Front Squat | Lower Strength + Posterior | Quad and trunk strength in the upright posture sport actually loads | Quads · Glutes |
| Hang Power Snatch | Lower Strength + Posterior | The fastest lift in the gym — trains rate of force development directly | Quads · Glutes · Hamstrings · Traps |
| Loaded 90/90 — hold each side | Lower Strength + Posterior | Internal and external hip rotation held at end range — the range that runs out first in cutting sports | Glutes |
| Nordic Curl | Lower Strength + Posterior | Hamstring injury prevention — the #1 AFL injury | Hamstrings |
| Nordic Hamstring Lower | Lower Strength + Posterior | The most-evidenced hamstring exercise there is, done as a slow lower into a hold rather than a fall | Hamstrings |
| Seated Straddle Good Morning | Lower Strength + Posterior | Adductors and hamstrings at length together — the wide, low position a slide tackle or a low ball ends up in | Groin / Adductors · Hamstrings |
| Trap Bar Deadlift | Lower Strength + Posterior | Foundational power output | Hamstrings · Glutes · Back |
| Trap Bar Jump | Lower Strength + Posterior | A loaded jump — peak power output with no barbell skill to learn first | Quads · Glutes · Calves |
| Incline DB Press | Power + Trunk | Upper strength for shielding the ball | Chest · Triceps |
| Jefferson Curl (light KB) | Power + Trunk | Loads spinal flexion and hamstring length together, then holds there — the range you land and bend in, owned rather than avoided | Hamstrings · Glutes · Back |
| Lateral Bound → Stick | Power + Trunk | Controlled change of direction | Quads · Glutes · Calves |
| MB Rotational Throw | Power + Trunk | Hitting + slap-shot power | Abs / Core · Glutes · Shoulders |
| Wrist Extensor Eccentric — end-range hold | Power + Trunk | The wrist and forearm loaded eccentrically — the only thing shown to fix a stubborn tennis elbow, and the joint every hand-plant and stick sport punishes | Forearms |
Staying available
The prehab block is matched to the region of the session it sits in and to the tissue this sport actually punishes — not a generic mobility flow bolted to the front.
Prehab only works if it happens, and the reason it usually does not is that it has nothing to do with the session it is attached to. Rotating a pool by session number puts shoulder work before a squat day and Copenhagen planks before a bench press. Technically covered; nobody does it.
In Train Smart each movement is classified by the region it protects and matched to the session, and the pool rotates across the week so you cover all of it rather than doing the same three moves three times.
More on prehab that people actually do →
What the free month covers, and what comes after
The first month is one complete four-week block — three building weeks and a deload. The first retest comes after that block, and it is the first time the program measures what your training did.
- Week 1
- Testing session on the hockey battery. Your starting weights and paces come from it.
- Weeks 1–3
- The first block builds. Hit your reps and the weight goes up on its own.
- Week 4
- Deload — the week the previous three become fitness.
- Week 5
- Retest. The results re-price your weights and reset your conditioning paces.
- Weeks 5–8
- Block two changes shape, priced from the top sets you just did and the numbers you just tested.
Hockey training questions
What does the Train Smart hockey program include?
When is hockey pre-season?
Can I follow this program if I only train twice a week?
What tests does the hockey program use?
Do I need a full gym?
Get your hockey program
Pick hockey, answer eight questions, and your week is built — around your team nights, your game and the days you can actually train.
Your first month is free, with nothing to pay today. Then A$24.99/month, cancel any time. On the App Store and Google Play.
- Install itFree to download on iPhone and Android.
- Tell it how you playYour sport, your season, the nights you train and the kit you have. No account needed.
- See your week, then start freeYour program is built before you pay anything. Start the free month to unlock it, and cancel any time in your store settings.