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Creating a hockey training room at home is a major decision for many hockey families, to be sure. There is the financial investment, the sacrifice of “space” (i.e. are you willing to dedicate a basement, garage, or other room) and honest assessment of whether your kid loves hockey enough to want to get better.
The families who push ahead with a dryland hockey room, however, will undoubtedly see a return on that investment in player confidence and performance. More touches with the puck will result in improved puck control and hand-eye-coordination while on the ice, while more shots at home will result in increased shot strength and accuracy. There is simply not enough time during team practices to put in the work required to build individual skills.
As the market leader in dryland hockey tiles and other home hockey products for over twenty years, Snipers Edge has a unique perspective about how to evaluate the level of home hockey investment that is right for you.
Are dryland hockey tiles better training surface than concrete?
Absolutely. At first families with concrete in their basement or garage may believe that the slipperiness of concrete is sufficient for their player. This is logical at first glance, but upon deeper analysis you will conclude that training on concrete has some fatal flaws:
- Concrete is a much harder material than dryland hockey tiles, so will gradually chew away at the bottom of your stick. A blade protector might minimize this effect, but a stick accessory will alter the training experience AND is a hassle to put on and off with each training session.
- The concrete hardness will not allow enough flex of your player’s stick when shooting, resulting in more sticks breaking sooner! For families who consistently shell out $300 every few months for another stick, why increase breakage risks any further?!
- Regular rubber pucks will often encounter friction on concrete, so you may need to invest in dryland specific pucks or biscuits (which are not only more expensive than real pucks, but have a different feel).
- If you shrug off all of these decisions, consider how tapes and pucks will cause damage to your concrete floors.
In contrast, hockey training tiles protect floors and sticks and offer great puck glide for whatever puck type you want to train with.
How much space should I dedicate for hockey training at room?
There’s no wrong answer to this question, as it comes down to your player’s age, availability of space in your home or apartment, and budget.
You can start with a single box of hockey tiles and train in literally any room in your house. With around 20 SF, you can create a small area for stickhandling, or a pad from which to practice passing or shooting. Tiles can be arranged in a square-like shape, or arranged in long but narrow shape to stickhandle while moving, or use passing aids.
With 40-60SF, you can start to build a larger training area using hockey shooting tiles for shooting at a distance, wider range of motion for stickhandling, and passing. You can create unique configurations to allow your player to be 10-15 or more feet back from the goal to allow more space for longer shots.
If you are shooting against a net or hockey shooting tarp, you might want to allow your players up to 10-15 feet away from the net or tarp. For younger players (5-8 years old), a distance of less than 10 feet is totally fine. And for older players (12+), consider whether you can get shots. For reference, the hashmarks on the faceoff circles are 20’ from the goal line. However, even a majority of NHL shots occur from inside the 20’ mark, so there is no need to have your hockey tiles for shooting extend out to the blue line.
If should aim to have at least the width of the goalie covered with tiles so that there’s an area for pucks to drop and easily retrieve back to your shooting area, but whether you choose to make your space 10’ or 16’ width if you have a hockey shooting tarp is a personal preference.
For families looking for the best dryland hockey tiles and more space available, you can start to evaluate the space required to create the shooting room of your kid’s dreams. As a reference, a standard single-car garage stall is generally around 12’ wide by 20’ to 24’ deep, offering 240–288 of potential square feet. Two-car garage stalls are generally 22’ to 24’ on each side, resulting in 484-576 potential square feet.
The best part about hockey shooting tiles? They are modular. They snap together like LEGOs for hockey players. You don't have to build the NHL-sized basement rink on Day 1.
If the brand you choose offers free shipping, then there’s no harm in starting small and expanding over time.
How many hockey tiles do I need?
Once you know where you want the tiles to go and calculate square footage, the next decision is knowing how many boxes of tiles are required.
The math for the Snipers Edge dryland hockey tiles is easy: each tile is 12” x 12” (1 SF), and the white and ice blue boxes come with 20 tiles (20 SF). Once you calculate your square footage, divide by twenty and that’s the number of boxes you need. You can either round up to higher box and keep a few extras, or buy handful of single tiles to complete your space.
In contrast, many competing tile brands could not make it more difficult. Some brands sell tiles that are sized 13” x 13”, 33cm x 33cm, or 18” x 18”, and come in boxes with varying number of tiles. So how many square feet per tile, or per box? We don’t have a clue either.
Many companies make you dig around on the page before you can even figure out the math. It shouldn’t be that complicated.
You can instantly know whether you are purchasing US-made products or imported products based on how the math is presented. If your tiles are presented in centimeters, or 13”, then you have your answer.
How to calculate the best value between the brands?
With different sized tiles and square footage, the best way is to calculate the dryland hockey tiles investment on price per square foot basis, which should consider the unit price, plus shipping, plus sales taxes.
Are any discounts available if you sign up for email or texts? You should sign up for a few different companies and see what they offer. You can always unsubscribe later after you get your discount code if the emails get pesky.
Once again, with Snipers Edge the math is easy: the unit price divided by 20 is the price per square foot. Plus tiles ship free to US customers. In other words, 1 box of Snipers Edge tiles is calculated as: $124.97 per box of 20 12”x12” tiles + FREE Shipping = $124.97 total ($6.25 PSF).
Now let’s compare to two other quality tile brands:
• Brand A (Canada): $149.99 for a box of 10 18”18” tiles (22.5 SF) + $24.99 shipping = $174.98 total ($7.78 PSF
• Brand B (Europe): $139.95 for a box of 10 18”18” tiles (22.5 SF) + $14.99 shipping = $154.94 total ($6.89 PSF)
What else do I need besides the tiles?
Once you confirm the size of your dryland hockey tile room, consider the accessories that are needed to elevate your player’s experience. For shooting, the best products are a hockey shooting tarp that protects walls and windows, and allows a puck to hit and drop. If you’re not worried about errant pucks that ricochet off the crossbar or side post, then a hockey net with shooting targets are the way to go. For stickhandling, the Attack Triangle, Sweethands and hockey stick handling balls are winners. And for passing, look no further than the PASSMASTER passer and rebounder.
A home hockey training room is an outstanding investment for any hockey family, and will provide an endless amount of fun and training benefits for your players to help them reach their full potential. The neighborhood kids and teammates will want to hang at your house, and your player will start to see how putting in the extra work at home will translate into on-ice performance. Whether your goal is to make an elite team, build confidence in game situations, or just get more playing time, make the dryland hockey tiles by Snipers Edge part of your hockey journey.
