Trading his stick and puck in for a hurl and sliotar has given Alex Auld a whole new perspective on our national game.
The NHL veteran is the latest contestant in the Toughest Trade with Wexford Town’s Faythe Harriers before dual star Lee Chin puts on a pair of skates and takes to the ice.
From the moment he was thrust into the action on the pitch, the man who made his name in a sport where enforcers literally come to blows for the crowd’s entertainment was blown away by the physicality of hurling. It was an introduction the Canadian won’t soon forget.
“The first time the ball came to me in play and everything started! All of a sudden there was this battle and chaos. In training you don’t get a lot of contact and physical play. We’d done some situational stuff but it’s never the same as in a live game. When someone’s running at you with the ball and you’re competing for it, that’s when you had to make decisions and that was the ‘welcome to hurling training’ moment for me.”
Despite coming from a professional sporting background, Auld was surprised by the intensity in training. Although he noticed stark improvements in his game with each session, he regretted not being in better condition before trying his hand at the sport.
“I trained daily 4-5 days, pretty intensive stuff and it was good, I could feel myself getting better. But wish I’d done more running before I came, especially in really soft mud. That was a huge difference for me. Obviously we’re on ice and when we’re not training is in a more controlled environment, running indoors or on a track, so that was tough.
Hurling and ice hockey are widely considered to be two of the fastest sports in the world, but the debate has always been which over which one is quicker. As he’s experienced both, Auld can confirm that the skates allow ice hockey player to move at higher speeds.
“I think definitely the players move faster in hockey, you can’t deny that as you can skate faster than you can run. But everything else is pretty similar. The fact that the game happens at speed, the transition is quick. What I was blown away by was how the ball could be at one end of the field and you can almost feel like he can take a break but it’s right there all of a sudden and you’re in the battle.”
However, it is undeniable that the sliotar is struck with greater venom than the puck, although it has to travel much further. Auld therefore concluded that it’s more frenetic in the rink, but hurling can be deceptive with the faster ball.
“There’s a greater distance obviously and there’s all that space but you can feel like you can take a break but then it’s bang-bang. In hockey you feel as if you’re more in it more of the time. I would say the speed is very comparable. Hockey puck 106 miles an hour and sliotar 120 miles an hour. It’s pretty close for sure.”
That settles that.
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