Developing Young Hockey Players: Skating is Everything In my opinion, you don’t even need a hockey stick until you’re 6 years old Looking back, I wish I knew this when I was a kid. I actually didn’t start skating until I was 8 (which is late back then and really late these days) I have kids coming to me now who are 3, 4 & 5. Looking back, I wish someone told my parents to sign me up with a skating coach. Had I done more sessions working on just my skating I think I would have had a completely different trajectory in my career. Somehow, I was able to get to the AAA level when I was 14. Doing my own at-home training: shooting pucks in the driveway + roller blading In my day, there weren’t a ton of guys like myself - offering the additional skills. During my youth hockey career, I think I attended ONE additional skills practice and I was already like 15 years old. And I remember it being a lousy private session with a coach who didn’t really care about me and my brother (at SoNo Ic...