Winter Hockey

The Winter Hockey Season is underway for my Renegades Hockey Team.  I felt I was getting too old to play with all the young players back in 2013 when I turned 50.  I tried to turn the team management duties over to someone else and retire from the team.  But the guys insisted that they wanted me to keep playing and keep running the team.  So, seven years later, here I am retiring from my day job and still playing hockey.  Many of the players that I play against are 20 to 30 years old.  There is no way that I can keep up to them, and I never was a very good player, even in my younger days.  But, I play for fun and exercise so I will keep going as long as I can.

We moved the team over to a new league to start this winter season.   The season was slightly delayed due to Covid, but things got underway in late September.  We have to wear masks to enter and exit the arena.  Time in the dressing room before and after the games is limited to 15 minutes, and the showers are closed.  We are limited to a roster of 16 players, and play in a cohort with two other teams.  Over a period of about three weeks we play these other two teams three times.  Then we take a two week break and enter a new cohort with two new teams.  We don't have to wear masks on the ice, but the referees and timekeepers do.  Electronic whistles are used and there are no floods between periods.  So it is all a little weird, but at least we are getting out to play and getting some exercise.

The Renegades have now played three games and sit tied for second place in our division.  On September 20th we played the Knights at Argyll Arena and won the game 6-4.  On September 21st we played the Outlaws at Argyll Arena and lost 9-3.  Then we took a two week break.  We entered a new cohort last night and played the Generals at KofC Arena.  We won this one, a closely fought game, by a score of 7-5.  There is a bit of a break for the Thanksgiving weekend and then we will play five more games in a stretch of about 10 days.