Initial Thoughts
You may have seen their Instagram ads popping up, seen this mysterious grey puck around the rink, or recently in your local hockey shop and thought, “what is that?” While it resembles a standard hockey puck it is definitely not. It’s not weighted, or has physics features like a green biscuit. So why buy one for $18? Because, it’s truly the ultimate training pick. The puck slides literally anywhere! It’s feels like it’s gliding on ice without the ice.
I met the Xeno team at a corner booth at the Lets Play Hockey Expo with nothing but a stack of pucks on a table. I was definitely intrigued. They asked if I wanted to try and it was really amazing. I was stick-handling on a dirty concrete floor and felt like I had full control over the puck. The dirty floor I think even enhanced the experience giving the puck a little resistance. I suggested they should have brought a shooting pad, to which they replied they didn’t need one, the puck works everywhere. I did end up trying it at home on a shooting pad and the puck has a mind of its own. It’s almost too slick which is great for learning puck control. It’s the closest to on-ice experience off the ice. However, it truly does glide on anything. I tried it on my hard wood floors, tiles, concrete patio and at the rink and it slid extremely well on all.
Disclaimer: I’m a bit biased looking at this from an ice Hockey player perspective. They do have roller pucks designed to slide in a similar way. I personally have never played roller hockey so can’t speak to that.
Now the bad stuff
A major downside is that you can’t shoot the puck, especially at a net as it will most definitely break. A few reviews on their site confirmed this. I wanted to test and see if it broke but I also didn’t want to lose my Xeno puck.
The other downside is while its the same shape and weight of a normal puck, the sides are smooth. Whereas a regular puck has texture, There is a sticker with the brand logo that covers about ¼ of the side, which at first affected stick handing a bit. I found that when stick handling, the puck can slide away a bit. When the sticker picked up some dirt it actually got better. My recommendation to Xeno would be to add texture and their logo to the side walls (like a traditional puck) to increase control when stick handling.
Should you buy one?
In short, Absolutely! If you’re someone who wants the best off ice training puck, it blows the other ones out of the water. I so wish this puck could be used like a regular puck to shoot or play games outside because it’s amazing.
If you want to pick one up, you can get it from Pure Hockey or their website here.
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