Gnitko Dmitriy

The methodology of training a hockey player demonstrated its effectiveness in my example. Yes, I did not play in the NHL, but only a small percentage of hockey players around the world actually play there. Wherever I played as an adult, it was always easy to fit into the team and take on leading roles thanks to the methodology and training I underwent. Some of us (such as Yakushin, Zubrus, Matthews) made it to the NHL, some played in other strong leagues, but all of us from “Druzhba-78” were always visible and useful to our teams thanks to the fundamentals provided by our trainers in the very beginning.

The 90’s were a tough time, it was difficult to survive and develop players, so the “Druzhba-78” had to travel to Canada and the United States over the summer, play exhibition games there and hold practices where we were joined by local players and as an international team, we continued to win.

Many years later, for various reasons, the school stopped its existence, but the methodology did not die. In Ukraine, my comrade Barankovsky, a fellow student like me, revived the school for Ukrainian children, and today’s students are among the best who have gone through the methodology.

The same is in the United States, the famous coach Boris Dorozhenko, who has studied and preserved the methodology, complemented it and now trains children with great success and solid results.

Our team’s idea is to spread this training methodology throughout Europe, and that’s why we’re now founding the “Druzhba-78 EU” school to teach the basics of skating that we’ve been taught for many, many years to children in Europe.

My already extensive experience as a coach shows that I am good at it. The guys (Cholach, Sokhanevych, …) who have been trained by me achieve results, which I am extremely happy about, it obliges me to continue so that children can learn and become champions and in the future follow our joint methodology. Since hockey moves rapidly, it is always necessary to find new solutions to keep up with the trends.

Nowadays we do not have a permanent place, we do camps, because the main moments are laid exactly in the systematic, constant, long, exhausting and monotonous training. Sometimes you don’t understand why you’re doing it, but after a couple of years of such camps for 4-8-12 weeks a year, you realize why you needed it and what you were striving for. My deep conviction is that even the seemingly untalented athlete can become a real professional hockey player. You just need to follow the methodology and our recommendations.

I also want to tell the parents: at first our school is frustrating, sometimes disappointing, but after you start seeing results – you won’t be drawn away from us, you will always be with us until your child becomes a grown-up and great hockey player!

We teach skating, we teach power skating, we train endurance, we give those basics, which will make your child more noticeable on the ice among the others, but it is a meticulous work of both child and parent, so before you start, each of you must decide whether you need it or not. But I’ll answer for you, YOU NEED IT! Because every parent sees their child as a champion and we will make one! That’s for sure.

I also want to appeal to the coaches of various teams in different countries: if you are interested in the development of your students, we can organize a 2-3-week camp with your team in your country, on training days, but this time must be at least 2 weeks (to have a result) and during this time games cannot be held due to the increased load on the athletes.