NEW YORK — In Olympic years, the training never seems to cease, making a heart-rate monitor a constant companion for women’s hockey star Hilary Knight.
“I almost feel like it’s glued to my body, essentially, at this point with all the training on and off ice,” she said.
Knight, 28, a two-time Olympic silver medalist and arguably the world’s best player, has been playing with the U.S. senior national team since she was 17, during which time she’s seen everyone getting faster and strong. Team USA’s off-ice workout programs have changed dramatically during the past decade, in part thanks to all of the available data.
“I use a lot of tech, actually,” Knight told SportTechie while appearing at an event held by Olympic sponsor Visa. “It’s just the world that we live in. It’s almost like you need to keep up but then, at the same time, as an athlete and trying to be the best competitor in the world, you’re looking for that one percent. That’s what having all these wearables helps you access, trying to come back to the drawing board and seeing what works.”
While the heart-rate monitor has become an extension of her person, Knight also wears a WHOOP and keeps an eye on her sleep patterns.
Asked how stringently she adheres to the results, especially after a restless slumber, she said, “I’ll change the factors in the environment that I’m in. The biggest thing I’ve learned is don’t look at it if you’ve got a game because that’s all that matters, is to play well in the game, and it can’t mess with you mentally. You see patterns and that’s what either helps you or hurts you is the consistency with which you go about your routine.”
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As a star for Team USA and the face of the nascent National Women’s Hockey League, Knight has spent considerable time in the spotlight and grown comfortable in front of cameras, so much that she has taken to recording ice time, workouts, leisure activities, trick shots and everything in between. (Detailed topics include “TrainCation Tennis,” her dog’s first New York City trip, an Aruban getaway, and advice on how best to wash smelly hockey equipment.)
Whether the videos are posted on her own YouTube channel or through third-parties such as Team USA, Red Bull or GoPro, Knight is an avid producer, almost all of it narrated with a smile. The training content is aimed to helping younger players.
“There’s some top secret stuff so I never really let everything get out there,” she said with a laugh, before adding more seriously: “If there’s a way that I can positively impact someone else or change the way they go about their routine or maybe introduce someone to a workout routine that they’ve never seen before.”
She’s particularly fond of the first-person vantage point and has worn a GoPro camera while hiking mountains, riding Boston’s T or training in the rink.
“I like to do the first-person stuff when I’m on the ice because it just gives people a better understanding of how hard it is to be on the ice and do what we do,” Knight said. “It’s also a really cool point of view.”