Cutting-edge technologies and space-age synthetics are dramatically recreating ice hockey sticks today. But how does current scholarship view these high-priced innovations, particularly during performance of the slap shot, hockey`s most explosive maneuver? This literature review on both slap shot biomechanics and technological developments in ice hockey sticks suggests that player technique and strength exert much greater influence on slap shot puck velocity than does stick composition. Moreover, this study illuminates how stick flexibility, rather than composition, should be the key mechanical consideration in stick selection, since highly flexible sticks can enhance both stick deflection and strain energy storage, two important variables in the velocity of slap shots.
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