Having grown up in Beverly, Massachusetts much of my youth and free time was spent playing hockey and attending Red Foote's Hockey Clinics. Over the course of a season we would take what we learned at clinic and bring those skills to the local ponds and rinks.
When I finished playing hockey I joined the police force in Beverly and used my free time to be an assistant coach in the local youth hockey program. While I was helping I noticed that the coach spent little time addressing skating and skill development. So in 1971, I started reading and studying about hockey skill development along with many hours watching figure skating coaches teach their students edge work, balance and striding. After I became familiar with the teaching techniques and added my ideas I started implementing these drills into my practices. Over time the players started to improve and the parents noticed.
In a short time a group of parents asked if I would do a small hockey clinic for their children and thus Paul Vincent's was born. Over a short period of time and some serious thinking my wife Sylvia and I came up with the name "Dynamic Skating". Paul Vincent's Dynamic Skating was born in 1972 and through many years of reading, watching, studying, training and love of the game we have become the Industry Leader in skating and skill hockey development.
During the early years I would spend many hours with my friend John Cunniff picking his brains. We would throw ideas back and forth about hockey training and what was missing in today's players. He had one a the finest hockey minds and I learned so much from him about skating and skills and how to implement them into today's game.
Over the next seven years my hockey clinics began to grow and my student base became very large. Parent's thought I was hard but they understood that I wanted their children to improve to the best of their ability. This thought and belief continues to this day!
In 1979 my training made the big time. I started working with some of the local colleges. Harvard was the 1st program I worked with and from there I went onto Boston College (1980-1989) and RPI (1981-1986). With the college hockey season being long and the limited free time to do extra training I decided to do my training during the off-season. I could do more individual training and the development could be long term. After much demand I started a summer training hockey program for the elite college and pro players that continues to this day. Over the course of the summer months you'll see the areas top college and pro players training on-ice doing the same drills as we do at our summer youth hockey camps.
Today I currently work as the AHL'S Providence Bruins skills coach. As the game continues to evolve I as well as my staff continue to study and work at making Dynamic Skating the best hockey development program in North America. There are many programs that copy our ideas and camps, but they can't copy our love of the game, our beliefs and our teaching techniques that are needed to develop players today. That is why we are the Industry Leader!
Paul Vincent