Hockey equipment is a large financial investment. Taking care of this investment is a very good idea, so you don’t have to spend more money and also so that the MRSA bacteria doesn’t grow in the equipment causing health problems. Here are some great tips to keep hockey gear in top working order and extend the life of the equipment.
Proper care of the equipment helps make sure that it protects the player with maximum effectiveness from the time of purchase to the time the equipment is retired or outgrown. The most common complaint with hockey equipment is that it smells bad. The more often it’s worn, the more it smells. Drying equipment properly is vitally important to keeping it working at maximum effectiveness.
Open the bag
Pull everything out
Hang it up
Spread the equipment out so that air can move through it
Washing equipment every few months is also a good idea. Of course, not everything can be washed. Gloves and skates can’t be put into the washing machine.
By placing SportzGemz inside the gloves and skates, they will also be dry, with no smell, for the next icetime.
It’s always good to have a small toolkit with you. It’s always right before a game that a screw comes loose on a helmet or a skate lace breaks. Here are a few basics to have with you:
Extra Laces
Helmet Screws
Screwdriver
Scissors
Tape
Towel
Practice Puck
Before the season starts and then again at Christmas are great times to double check the equipment, making sure:
The equipment still fits
The screws on the helmet are still tight
The helmet isn’t cracked
There is no rust on rivets
All clasps are working
Velcro is still holding well
All pads are intact and laced as needed
Some equipment, like helmets and hockey pants can be adjusted as the child grows. Other pieces must be replaced.
Skate Sharpening
Skates need to be sharp to work properly. Skate blades cut into the ice, especially when making turns and the edges have to be sharp. Skaters use their edges to accelerate, so the sharper the skates, the faster a player can move. With a young child, sharpening the skates once a month is probably sufficient. As a player grows, they will need their skates sharpening every 5 or 6 ice times. Ice surfaces are all different. Some are harder than others. If the skater is playing on a hard ice surface, the skates will need to be sharpened more often. Skates can also become nicked and sometimes will even lose an edge, meaning that the sharpening isn’t done properly. If these happen, get the skates sharpened immediately.
As a rule of thumb for parents:
Sharpen once a month if under 10 and not playing rep.
If the child is constantly falling (after they know how to skate), it’s time to sharpen the skates.
Prior to a tournament get the skates sharpened.
If the skate looses an edge.
If there is a nick in the blade.
Most kids can tell you they need their skates sharpened after they’ve played for a few year.
Skate Blade
There are different types of skate sharpening. The amount of blade sharpness and hollow are often a matter of skater preference. Sharper blades have a deeper groove in the blade that helps with pushing off, stopping, changing direction, pivoting and turning. However, if a blade is too sharp, a player can have problems gliding and stopping as the overly sharp blade tries to grab the ice.
Key Points for Parents
Hockey equipment needs to fit properly.
Buying equipment big, in hopes of not having to replace it often, is dangerous for the player.
Replace any problem equipment immediately.
Make sure skates are always sharp.
Use skate guards to protect the blade and guard against injuries;
Key Points for Players
Always wipe down your skates after use and air out your hockey gear.
Put your SportzGemz inside your gloves and skates after playing so they dry out.
Here’s a great idea to use in connection with your SportzGemz.
Hockey Sudz were created by some sports dads in Tsawwassen, BC. The families behind Hockey Sudz all play hockey and were being suffocated by the smell of the hockey equipment. They formed a company called Sports Solutions Hockey Soap, with its sole product Hockey Sudz, an antibacterial, biodegradable, hypo-allergenic and environmentally sound cleaner geared specifically to cleaning hockey equipment. Each container sells for $9.95 and is good for eight to 10 washes.
Hockey equipment can be washed and washing machines that are front loaders are gentler on the equipment than the traditional tubs. Almost all the equipment can go into a washing machine. Remove the plastic parts, prior to putting the equipment into the washer and don’t put the wet equipment in the drier. The heat from the drier can burn and cause the equipment to become misshapen.
Most of us can’t wash equipment after each ice time and you can’t wash hockey gloves or skates. Between washings, use your SportzGemz to absorb the smell and to speed up up the drying time. By inserting the smaller pouches directly inside gloves and skates, your gloves and skates will be dry in about 4 hours.
A new skate sharpening technique is quickly gaining acceptance in the hockey world. BlackStone Sports, the Ontario manufacturer of skate maintenance equipment that developed the flat-bottom V method. This new method allows for sharper turns and a freer glide when moving in a straight line.
“Having the angles instead of the arc was quite intriguing,” said Wilson, who is awaiting the results of a University of Ottawa kinesiology study on the effects of the flat-bottom V. Depending on the angle at which the fangs are cut, he said, “when a player stops, he doesn’t have that ‘chattering’ effect.”
My husband and I used to have great debates about the hockey equipment my son wore. I used to opt for the more expensive, stressing that if it was more expensive, it was probably better. Dave would go for fit and be much more practical. One of the pieces of equipment we could agree on were hockey gloves or ringette gloves for our daughter.
Hockey gloves need to fit and fit well! Here’s a list of what we look for.
Some hockey gloves my kids like
Decide how long you want to keep the hockey gloves. If you are buying gloves for a child, you may be replacing them yearly as the child grows. As the child gets older you may replace them every two years. When our son started playing midget hockey, we bought very good quality gloves for him, knowing this would be the last pair we bought.
Think about the level of competition. Rep players need better quality equipment than house or recreational players. Hits are harder, the competition is more intense and the kids play more often at rep levels.
Do some research. There’s lots of info on the internet about different brands.
Decide how much you want to spend. The price of hockey gloves varies widely. Sometimes you can get great deals on last year’s model – just ask!
We’ve always gone to a hockey store, rather than a chain store to purchase gloves and skates. The staff is more knowledgeable and the selection is better.
Look for gloves that are comfortable and are not too wide on your hands. Your fingers should fit inside the fingers of the gloves with only a small gap to spare. Some gloves have individual pads on the fingers for each joint. This makes the glove for flexible.
Another thing to look for is how high the padding comes up your wrists. Your wrists take a beating and you want them protected. Think of your hockey equipment as armour and you want as few gaps between pads as possible.
Pick up a stick and make sure you can handle it correctly.
Lastly, make sure the athlete is the one trying on the hockey gloves. They have to wear them!
I remember the first time I took my son for hockey equipment. It wasn’t the best experience. Hopefully these tips will be helpful.
In August last year, I was chatting with Brad Lazarowich, an NHL linesman with over 1500 games under his belt. Our daughter’s go to school together and have played ball together and against each other over the years.
He asked me what I was up to. I explained and offered him a set of SportzGemz to try. Hotel rooms can really smell bad when you wear your skates as often as he does.
Although very skeptical, Brad tried the SportzGemz. Much to his surprise, they work!
I ran into him again today, at another softball tournament.
Brad uses his SportzGemz and agreed to let me use his name, saying how well they work.
SportzGemz and SportzGem5 will be available February 6th and 7th at the Richmond Ice Sports Centre. We have been invited back by the tournament coordinators.
Team pricing is avialable, please contact me at 604-671-1031. Preorders will receive a special bonus.
Hopefully the snow will hold off as Vancouver in the snow is not pretty and the traveling teams will be able to get into town.
The kids will play a minimum of 4 games this weekend, at least 2 games a day. In between games, it’s difficult to dry the equipment and if you’re staying in a hotel, the room usually smells horrible!
To help out, we have a team special on SportzGemz5 this weekend. Purchase 10 or more at $29.95!. When SportzGemz are used between games, the skates and gloves will dry out. Also, the smell in the car from the ringette equipment won’t be as bad!
Ringette is the fastest game on ice. It is similar to hockey in that the players wear full equipment, including skates and score by putting the ring in the next. Ringette is a passing game, where the ring must be passed over each blue line. Also, a 30 second shot clock ensures that a shot on goal must happen every 30 seconds, or the other team receives possession of the ring.
I am recommending your product to the mom’s on my son’s hockey team. He is a goalie and has the worse smelling gear in the world. I used the sports gemz after his last game. I don’t leave the gear in the bag to dry – I put it on a goalie drying rack, and but put the sportz gemz inside the gloves and helmet. It made a huge difference! His helmet does not smell at all anymore and the leather hands in the gloves smell only 1/2 as bad as they use to.
Here’s an article about why hockey equipment smells so bad.
The mineral inside the SportzGemz attracts and absorbs moisture. It also has a unique property that grabs and sucks up ammonia, salts and the urea created by the body when you sweat, making it inherently and naturally anti-microbial.
Stinky hockey gear poses health hazard
Jeff Lee,
Vancouver Sun
Published: Friday, August 31, 2007
Just what is it that makes hockey gear stink so much?
In a word, bacteria.
But it also helps that hockey players, for the most part, don’t take care of their equipment as well as they should, providing a never-ending cornucopia upon which bacteria can feed.
According to cramscience.ca, a Canadian science initiative designed for youth — and the only website that actually tries to demystify hockey gear stink — the stench is caused by “microbe manure” produced when bacteria such as Staphylococcus aureus, Staphylococcus epidermis and Propionibacteria acnes feed on the salts, ammonia, and urea secreted by the body’s sweat glands.
The bacteria survive and propagate in moist, warm conditions, including the body, which can then transfer them to sports equipment. If the gear isn’t cleaned or dried properly, it becomes a breeding ground.
But hockey gear stink isn’t the only problem bacteria create. They are also a health hazard. Every year, hockey players are temporarily knocked out of action because of infections from unclean equipment.
Last year, a young hockey player in Calgary lost his hand to an infection contracted from a seriously dirty glove.
In 2003, then-Boston Bruins star Joe Thornton was put on intravenous antibiotics after he fell and bruised his left elbow during practice and developed an infection a few days later. It was believed the infection came from bacteria in his elbow pad or from bacteria on his hand, which he transmitted by rubbing the bruise.
The year before, former Toronto Maple Leafs forward Mikael Renberg nearly lost a hand as a result of a Streptococcus-A infection caused when he broke open a blister while lacing up.
The hand became so infected that the next day he developed a 104-degree fever and ended up in a Vancouver hospital, where doctors considered amputation because of fears the infection could spread and kill him.
