OBO

If you play in a distinctly hot and sunny climate, glare is going to be a continuous problem and bane to your playing abilities. Rather than standing around with your glove put over your eyesight to try and block out the sunlight, it’s better to have something to maintain the coverage against glare. With summer hockey now upon most western european countries (like the UK), the sun becomes more of a prominent issue when trying to perform at your best. The basic method of blocking out sunlight is to tape the top of the helmet you wear. You will often seen internationals doing it when it is particularly sunny (like Australia’s goalkeepers did in recent tournaments), so even the best use its simple methodology!

Taping the helmet

A simple, but really effective way of keeping the sun out of your eyes is to tape the top of your mask, above the eye line. By doing this, you cut off the light showing down on you, eliminating the sunlight that would otherwise get through to your eyes. You want to tape over the bars of the helmet, to make sure it blocks out the light, before taping the ends onto the sides of the helmet, to keep it on.

‘Gaffer’ tape (which is cloth based tape used for stage production) will give your a bigger coverage, so you do not have to do multiple layers in order to block out the sun. Insulation/duct tape (used to insulate electrical wires) makes a great alternative (it is less likely to leave behind a gooey stain!), but due to its thin width, it often requires a few layers to get good coverage (just simply tape below the original line to get another). It is also good to know about the colour you use. Taping with white tape will reflect the sun light, rather than absorbing it (like black or a dark colour), making it easier to see.

Players spend a great amount of time taping their stick handles to get that extra for drag flicking or strong hits. Goalkeepers, as kit addicts, should also spend as much time if not more tweaking their equipment to suit their needs. I got this tip from Sparta hockey (the famous goalkeeping coach duo of Steve and Panda in England) and have find it to be extremely useful ever since.

Why?

Zinc oxide tape is a great alternative stick grip for goalkeepers. The grip itself is soft and smooth, but at the same time grippy, making it easier to slide your hand up or down the stick to change position of where you are holding it easily. Zinc oxide tape is great for gripping the stick in extension; giving you for when you extend the stick out (lowering your hold in stick tackles or extended stick saves i.e. when diving) and then want to hold it high again.

Where can I get it?

Auction sites like ebay are great places to buy it. Zinc oxide tape is supposed to be used for medical cures to cover blisters, so you should be able to find it in pharmaceutical stores too.

Taping the stick

The tape itself is self-adhesive, with the underside being the sticking surface. Therefore all you have to do is roll the tape around the stick, with the non-sticky side facing you, to get it to tape to the stick. The technique is to wrap the tape around the stick, so that you get the tape to cover the stick handle; try to work diagonally to cover more area. It is easy just to simply tape over an existing grip (unless you want to remove it!), as a double tape grip gives you more to hold on to. To finish off, you can wrap some insulation tape around the ends to cover them and prevent any peeling.