There is a big difference between dryland hockey tiles and synthetic ice. Although both are great types of flooring, they are designed with different needs in mind. Where dryland hockey tiles are made more for shooting and rollerblades, synthetic ice is made specifically for ice skaters and ice hockey. Both flooring types are great, so we will give you a rundown on both of them and let you decide which will be better for you according to your own needs.
Dryland Hockey Tiles
Dryland hockey tiles are great for practice for many reasons. The first one is that they are easy to install and can fit right into your home or wherever you want to install them. As long as you have a flat, hard surface that is level you are good to go. You can’t ice skate on dryland tiles, but you can rollerblade on them. They have a particularly smooth surface that allows for the pucks to travel across them as if they were on real ice. This makes it really nice to practice shots and stickhandling drills on. Since the pucks slike so nicely over the flooring it is a lot like shooting them on ice. This way when you practice you can carry the same skills that you learn back on to the ice the next time you are on it. Although there are some slight differences, the good thing about these differences is that they help you to gain strength and endurance. When you practice on flooring that causes you to use more energy when you do things, you build strength. When you go back out to the ice flooring you will instantly feel the difference and feel how much stronger you have gotten from practicing on the other flooring.
Synthetic Ice Flooring Practice
Synthetic ice flooring is great for practicing too because it will allow you to use ice skates just like you would be in a real game. Although there is a slight difference in the way that you glide across the flooring, as we talked about above, the extra energy that you exert to skate will cause you to build strength and muscle. Besides the slight difference in the energy that you will exert for skating, there won’t be much difference. You can skate on synthetic ice the same way that you do on the real ice. You can stop and skid your blades as you do on the ice, and everything else. Of course, there are many differences, but the main thing is that you can skate on this type of flooring without any more difficulty than you would have on a real ice rink.
Roller Blades and Ice Skates
Although these are both skates, and both have blades they are worlds apart in differences. Could you imagine trying to ice skate on a regular roller rink? How about trying to roller skate on an ice rink? This is why one is so much different than the other. You skate on either one of them, but the type of skates that you use can make or break the whole experience. For those of you that do not mind rollerblades, it might be a better solution to install dryland hockey flooring because it is just as amazing for puck and shooting practice as synthetic ice. Although there are differences in the way that skates glide across the surfaces, the pucks glide just fine on either one. This way you can sharpen your shooting skills just as hard and rugged as you would on real ice. Either way, the main point of all hockey training aids is that you use them in order to make yourself better at what you do every day.