Practice faceoffs by yourself?

[Thepandamancan]

Anyone know of a way to practice faceoffs by yourself?

My team mates are not very big on practicing and we don't do faceoffs at pick up. I'm able to work on just about every other aspect of my game by myself at home, except faceoffs.

Is there anything I could do that can help me out or am I just going to need to find someone to stand there and drop a puck? If you smrt people can't come up with anything, I guess my next best bet is to get an erector set and build something.

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[ponder]

I have only ever practiced faceoffs when younger in team practices with other people, I don't see how you could get meaningful practice by yourself. Other than working out to improve your general strength of course (upper body mostly, but as with everything in hockey core and legs contribute too). Forearm/grip strength can be very important too, especially when going up against a strong guy who knows what he's doing. If you want tips for faceoffs, my most consistent method is:

- get into a very low, very wide stance
- grip your stick with both palms facing the ice (i.e. bottom hand reversed from a normal hockey stick grip), bottom hand real low, top hand pretty low too, like this:

- if the ref lets you (he shouldn't, but often they don't care in beer league), keep your blade a bit off the ice before the puck drop, lets you drive down and get better power
- watch the puck! Keep your eyes on the puck at all times, in the refs hands, don't just stare at the dot
- win the draw hard to your backhand, go in forcefully then pull back hard with both hands


With this technique I win a pretty strong majority of faceoffs at the beer league level. If a guy is just schooling me I'll tell one of my wingers to rush in for the puck asap, while I just try to tie him up until help arrives.