Underwater hockey ?? Another strange activity you're going to tell me? Well not particularly, it is a sport unknown and little practiced but it is just hockey (as its name suggests) but practiced at the bottom of a swimming pool.
How did the idea of this post come to me ?
One of my sisters has been practicing this discipline for several years, I thought that it could interest people and as I begin to be competent on the subject, I wanted to share it with you. She went to the France juniors championship 2017, not bad ^^? Besides, you will find at the end of this post a video showing part of this championship in which she participated.
I hope you will like this post and do not hesitate to ask questions ! Good reading 😊.
History
Underwater Hockey was born in October 1954 in the south of England. The discipline was reinvented in the United States in 1960 in the Chicago area. The game was based on the use of shortened ice hockey sticks, held in both hands, unlike the English game that was played with specific sticks of about thirty centimeters and held with one hand. It was in Montauban, in 1968, that the Hockey Subaquatic appears for the first time in France. The first championship of France was organized in Reims in 1982 and marks the true beginning of the discipline in our country.
Game rules :
Underwater Hockey is a game played at the bottom of a pool where two teams compete for two 15-minute halves. The goal is to progress, in apnea, pushing a puck of about 1.3 kilos, using a cross in order to make it enter in the opposite goal. Each team is composed of six players in the water and four substitutes who can come into play when requested by a player. Generally a team is made up of three defenders (the right pivot, the back (center) and the left pivot) and three strikers (right winger, center forward and left winger).
A player may be punished and sent to a "prison" as a result of certain mistakes. A prisoner is sitting on a chair outside the pool. The prison time varies depending on the severity of the mistake, it can be 1, 2, 5 minutes or a definitive expulsion.
To differentiate themselves in the water, each team is identified by a color that is found on the butt and the hat of the players.
In order to be more specific, I did a schema :
The referees:
The matches are usually refereed by three referees, two in the water and one out of the water. This last one activates, when a fault is committed, an aquatic and surface sound signal. The referees in the water are equipped with a distinctive cap and body jersey. The referees use a coded gesture to communicate with each other and with the players.
Finally, table referees can sometimes join the other three referees mentioned above to take care of the stopwatch, the duration of the match and the duration of the "prisons".
Players are permitted to wear:
- a mask (with safety glass)
- a snorkel
- a stick (made of a floating material)
- palms
- a protective glove (worn on the playing hand)
- and a cap with ear protectors (water-polo type)
As promised a small video uploaded by the coach of my sister’s team :
Want to know more ?
- If you want more details about rules of underwater hockey :
http://www.cmas.org/hockey/j
- General information here 😉 :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underwater_hockey
