Rod Brind’Amour coached his Carolina Hurricanes all the way to a Stanley Cup championship. Afterward, the players discovered that he had been pulling a practice prank on them all season long—one that had secretly been preparing them to hoist the Stanley Cup.
To make it through an entire NHL season and playoff run, players need to practice and work out—a lot.
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Stanley Cup exercise
Off-ice training is highly varied and designed to build strength, mobility, explosiveness, and endurance. And when you have Rod “The Bod” Brind’Amour as your head coach, you do as you’re told—even if it seems a little odd.
Throughout the season, Brind’Amour had all of his players lift a 35-pound block above their heads during practice, calling it the “Blue Collar Press.”
“We call that our Blue Collar Press,” conditioning coach Bill Burniston told Daily Faceoff. “I grew up in a blue-collar neighborhood. Maybe one of the most important blue-collar jobs is the mason. The mason builds the foundation of buildings, your homes, and what have you. Basically, what we ask the guys to do is one press and think of those blue-collar moments that got them here, and somebody who helped them get here.”
Rod Brind’Amour’s brilliant prank
None of the players questioned the exercise throughout the season. Practice after practice, they lifted the block above their heads without knowing its true purpose.
Then, after securing the Stanley Cup, Rod Brind’Amour finally revealed the brilliant prank. The concrete block had been specially made to weigh the exact same amount as the Stanley Cup.
So when the players finally got their hands on hockey’s most coveted trophy, they had already spent an entire season unknowingly training to lift it.
You can watch the video below.
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