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Former conditioning coach speaks about Souray and Oilers’ fitness

Kings blog Mayors Manor has a very interesting and revealing interview with private strength and conditioning coach Chad Moreau today, that sheds some light on some issues that the Oilers and other NHL teams have dealt with regarding the fitness of NHL players

Chad is the older brother of Ethan Moreau and before entering the private sector, was the strength and conditioning coach for four seasons, starting in 2005 when he was hired to re-work the conditioning program for the players. \

n the lengthy and extremely interesting interview, Moreau says that it was Chris Pronger that helped him find a perfect balance for conditioning during the season:

So, having Pronger almost demand that he gets time in the room to train and work on his fitness benefited the whole team because the coach would say ‘Look, if we’re going to give Pronger the day off the ice, why dont we do the same thing for some of our veteran players?’ So, sometimes I’d have 9 or 10 guys in the weight room. The only thing they would do that day was train in the room.

He goes on to say that after Pronger left and the team became younger -- and started to lose -- the team started to focus more on taking the ice during the season instead of getting work done in the weight room. Moreau says that because players spend less and less time working out during the season, especially Western conference teams with brutal schedules, that teams are losing strength as the season progresses.

Moreau also addresses criticisms by Pat Quinn on his time time as conditioning coach, supposedly pointing the finger at the former coach for the team’s struggles this past season.

First off, let me say that I’ve never met Pat Quinn or had a chance to speak with him about this. However, to criticize the strength and conditioning coaches I think is unfair. The coach needs to share some of the blame in that becuase a team that isn’t fit by the end of the year...the coaching staff has the ultimate control over how much time a player spends in the weight room. So, I somewhat look at that with a grain of salt.

In the interview, he also addresses Souray’s claim that he was forced to return from shoulder surgery too soon, how players can approach the off-season workout program and how lost man-games does not necessarily translate to on ice success or failure -- it’s the overall conditioning of the team that counts.