Holiday Gift Guide For the Lacrosse Goalie in Your Life
Christmas is right around the corner which means some cold weather lacrosse is coming up.
Unless of course you’re living in Argentina, like I am at the moment.
In which case, it’s summer. It’s the most bizarre thing to me. Christmas in the summer time? Santa wears shorts down here.
With the holiday season coming up I wanted to put together a quick gift guide for those parents who are lucky enough to have a goalie in their life.
New Goalie Gear
What goalie doesn’t want to wake up Christmas morning to some fresh new lacrosse gear?
I’ve already written a full lacrosse goalie gear guide which is a great place to start if you’re buying gear for the first time.
However here a few additional gear ideas for the Christmas season.
Lacrosse Goalie Training Videos
Shameless self plug coming at ya on this one.
A great option for lacrosse goalies who want to level up their game is getting them access to some amazing training video content that they can devour and learn from.
The best option is this: The Lax Goalie Rat Academy.
It’s just $40/month or $360/year and is full with more 200+ hours of video content that will teach your young goalie everything they need to know: mental game, stance, different types of saves, fixing bad habits, college recruiting, etc. etc.
You name it, it’s covered inside the Academy. Plus you’ll get private access to Coach Damon to answer any questions.
New Chest Protector
Starting in January 2021, a new rule goes into effect.
The new chest protector rule states that lacrosse goalie chest pads must have a reinforced heart in order to help prevent commotio cordis.
If your goalie is playing with a really old chest pad, the odds are the protection isn’t sufficient.
So this holiday season might be the perfect opportunity to upgrade your goalie’s chest pad.
Below are my favorites at the moment. All 3 of these chest protectors are on the NOCSAE approved list for 2021.
New Lacrosse Goalie Stick
If your goalie is getting serious about the position, one of the first pieces of gear I’d recommend upgrading is the stick.
If you ask me, the industry standard right now is the STX Eclipse 2. It’s what most of the pros use and in my opinion is a perfect blend of strength and lightness. However in 2022 both Warrior and ECD came out with new goalie heads that amazing options too.
New Lacrosse Goalie Gloves
Another solid option for a goalie who is starting to gain interest in the position is to upgrade the gloves.
Lacrosse goalie gloves provide additional thumb protection and padding that helps reduce (but not eliminate – sigh) injuries to the fingers.
Here are 3 solid options for lacrosse goalies gloves:
More Protective Gear
In addition to chest pads and goalie gloves there are some additional protective items that I’m sure every lacrosse goalie would love to get for Christmas.
Lexi Shield
The Lexi Shield is an awesome after-market protection device to help prevent concussions for goalies. In addition to an awesome protective device they’re also really good folks. They sponsored the last Lacrosse Goalie Summit giving away 22 free Lexi Shields!
The Nutty Buddy
On the promo video on their homepage the owner and inventor of the Nutty Buddy takes a 95mph fastball to the junk with a smile on his face. That’s good enough protection for me. Lots of goalies swear by the Nutty Buddy.
Buy the Nutty Buddy
Pants and Shin Protection
Let’s face it – getting hit in the shins or the legs sucks. A solid shin shot can take the wind out of the sails of a young goalie who was having a great training session.
In fact I think it’s only a matter of time before the rule committee makes some sort of shin and leg protection mandatory. Kids are just shooting too hard these days.
Brine Triumph Goalie Pants
While I don’t think any company has yet to the perfect the lacrosse goalie pants just yet, these ones are an ok option.
G-Form Pro-S Elite Shin Guards
Lots of goalies have written me saying these are the best shin guards they’ve ever used.
New Training Equipment
In addition to lacrosse goalie protective gear and equipment, a great gift for the lacrosse goalie in your life is other training equipment they can use to improve physically.
Jump Rope
As a high school wrestler I spent many hours jumping rope. I think its an amazing exercise for any athlete who requires footwork, speed, and hand eye coordination.
Agility Ladder
A lot of goalies write me asking what goalie workout they can do alone. The agility ladder is a key component of that. Putting in work on the agility ladder increases your fitness, your explosion, and your footwork – all vital elements of the elite lacrosse goalie.
Heco Stix
HECOstix is as simple as playing a game of catch, but it’s a little more intricate.
The device consists of three color-coated ends, shaped like sticks. The game involves a passer that throws the device, and a receiver that will catch the device.
Standing at least a few feet apart, the passer will throw the HECOstix to the receiver while simultaneously calling out a color and/or hand to catch with (for example: left red, or right blue).
The goalie will then try to catch the device at the location that corresponds with what the passer calls out.
Swax Lax Balls
Whenever we’re going a pure goalie drill that involves a lot of in close shots in a short amount time, we should NOT be using lacrosse balls.
One awesome option is Swax Lax balls which have a similar size and weight has normal lacrosse balls but don’t leave those devastating bruises.
Get the goalie pack which have numbers on them and you can use them in other drills to call out the number as the ball is thrown at the goalie.
Reaction Balls
These balls are a classic goalie training device to work those quick reactions required to make saves on high speed shots. They’re funny shaped and take weird last minute bounces really requiring the goalie to focus and make a quick save movement.
Resistance Bands
I love training goalies with resistance bands!
Throw it around their waist to increase difficulty of the walk the line drill.
Attach one end to the goal post and increase difficulty of making saves.
All of sudden, when you remove the resistance you feel sooooo much quicker!
Be sure to get the thick resistance bands, like these ones:
SKLZ also makes a great product for resistance training. With this one you can attach it to your waist or even to your wrists to build up your speed.
Lacrosse Goalie Bag
After awhile every goalie’s lacrosse bag starts to stink.
There are certain things you can do to help remove the lacrosse pads funk, however at a certain point it’s just time to start over
Lacrosse Goalie Books
Here are a few books you can get the lacrosse goalie in your life.
Thinking Inside the Crease
Coach Chris Buck has presented twice at the Lacrosse Goalie Summit and he’s also written what I think is the best mental training book for lacrosse goalies out there.
You should also check out Coach Chris Buck latest book the Sport of School which is all about how lacrosse goalies (and all athletes) can improve their grades in school.
The Lax Goalie Bible
Shameless plug alert – this is my book. But I honestly think it’s one of the most comprehensive lacrosse goalie training manuals out there.
For years I’ve made it my craft to study the heck out of this position and this book is the compilation of everything I’ve learned.
In it’s 134 pages you’ll find 20 years of goalie and coaching experience that shows you everything you need to know to be elite goalie.
Buy a copy here
The Power Within
This book is written by 2 professional ice hockey goalies however it hits on many of the same factors that lacrosse goalies must deal with to become elite.
In fact if you replace the word “puck” with “ball” and “ice” with “field” – you might think this book was written for lacrosse goalies.
Conclusion
In a sport that requires so much protective gear it’s not hard to find the lacrosse goalie in your life a great item to gift around Christmas time.
The purpose of this post is to you give you a few additional ideas so that the young goalie has a huge smile on his face when he or she opens up that Christmas present.
In addition to protective gear, books and other training items make for a great goalie presents.
Until next time,
Coach Damon
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Note – all the links in this post are affiliate links meaning I make a small % of the sale if you decide to buy one of these items. Regardless of affiliate I endorse all of these items and if you’ve gotten value out of my blog, I appreciate the support.
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