# Responsiveness and Relationships of Shooting Performance to On-Ice Physical Performance Tests
## 4 Discussion  
Acute effects of the execution of the physical performance tests within the IHCT on shooting performance have not yet been addressed systematically. We hypothesized that performing the IHCT will affect puck speed and shooting accuracy. Additionally, we expected the reduced shooting performance to be related to athletes' physical capacity. The results of our study show that the puck speed was affected considerably by the standardized physical performance tests. However, the magnitude of puck speed reduction in the wrist shot was inversely related to the fHRR and the BLE. Surprisingly, shooting accuracy increased after the IHCT; this was not expected. \begin{table}
\begin{tabular}{c c c c} \hline \hline  & \multicolumn{2}{c}{**SS Puck Speed**} & \multicolumn{2}{c}{**WS Puck Speed**} \\  & & **Decrement** & **Decrement** \\ \hline Maximum heart rate (MHR) & [bpm] & \(-\)0.01 (0.96) & \(-\)0.20 (0.32) \\ Maximum blood lactate (MBL) & [mmol/L] & \(-\)0.08 (0.70) & 0.08 (0.70) \\ Functional heart rate reserve (fHRR) & [bpm] & \(-\)0.22 (0.26) & \(-\)**0.44 (0.02)** \\ Heart rate recovery (HRR) & [\%] & 0.04 (0.86) & 0.11 (0.59) \\ Blood lactate elimination (BLE) & [mmol/L/min] & \(-\)0.09 (0.68) & \(-\)**0.43 (0.02)** \\ \hline \hline \end{tabular} Pearson correlation coefficients with \(p\) values in brackets. Relevant results (\(\mid\!r\!\mid\!>\) 0.4) marked with bold.  
\end{table} 
Table 4: Relationships between percentage slap shot (SS) or wrist shot (WS) puck speed decrement and indicators of players (\(n\) = 27) physical capacity. Figure 3: Relative puck speed decrement (sum of all SS and WS trials) over an overall shot success score (positive values represent a higher shot accuracy after the IHCT). The findings of the present study on puck shooting speed confirm our hypothesis and are in line with previous investigations [12; 13; 14; 15]. The SS puck speed was found to be substantially higher compared with the WS puck speed. [PERSON] and colleagues [12] measured puck speeds using a radar gun and detected, on average, 108 or 71 km/h for SS or WS puck speeds, respectively, achieved by the skilled males. By utilizing a different methodology, [PERSON] et al. [13] analyzed the effect of different hockey stick shaft stiffnesses on SS and WS puck speeds, respectively. Their averaged results for the distinct shot types (SS: 125 km/h, WS: 96 km/h) are comparable with our puck speeds after the IHCT. The slightly lower puck speeds found by [PERSON] et al. [12] and [PERSON] et al. [13] can be explained by either the applied off-ice laboratory setup, the advances in material composition and technological developments, or the lower level of professional experience compared with our participants. Since the puck shot speed was shown to be related to players' upper body muscle power [14], it may be reasonable to assume that our participants had higher upper body strength qualities. The linear and COD speed tests considerably influenced the puck speed of both shot types. Specifically, for the WS, the degree of puck speed reduction after preload was influenced by players' cardio-metabolic fitness (fHRR, BLE). [PERSON] and colleagues [16] observed a negative association of elite players' aerobic capacity measured off-ice with the amount of fatigue occurring after six maximum efforts of 89 m linear skating on-ice. The ability to recover quickly from intense actions is crucial for intermittent sports such as ice hockey. The observed inverse relationships of the functional heart rate reserve (fHRR) or the blood lactate elimination (BLE) rate with the WS puck speed decrement suggest that players with a greater fHRR and a more rapid BLE cope better with the intermittent physical stress applied; this underpins the importance of whole body physical fitness when playing ice hockey [16]. A reduction in WS puck speed in advanced phases would limit game performance in critical game situations and thus the team's success. Contrary to previous research [14], our data showed that heavier athletes shot the puck with a higher speed.