San Diego Gulls head strength and conditioning coach, Justin Roethlingshoefer, is keenly aware of the difference between training professional athletes on an individual basis and in a team setting. This acknowledgment from a coach is critical in differentiating a good team from a great team.

When it comes to keeping the Gulls in peak condition over the entirety of a demanding American Hockey League season, Roethlingshoefer has devised a conditioning plan that not only focuses on each player getting the most out of each training session, but provides reasoning as to why they’re being put through that workload.

The Gulls, an AHL affiliate of the National Hockey League’s Anaheim Ducks, are among the collection of professional sports franchises and collegiate athletic programs that rely on the Polar Team Pro system. These teams are not only monitoring how players are reacting, responding and recovering to and from training workouts, but understanding the critical, analytical data over time, like Roethlingshoefer does with his players.

The data and analytics that Polar Team Pro produces have allowed Roethlingshoefer to better serve the athletes he trains, which in turn, produces more effective results for the Gulls and Ducks over the long haul.

The key, he said, is understanding and analyzing the data correctly to make sure he is assisting with player development rather than taking away from it.

“Our guys want to know, ‘where am I physically at’? They know how they feel, but they want to know where their [training performance] numbers are at to help validate how they’re feeling,” Roethlingshoefer said. “By doing that, we’re able to create a holistic system – not only in athletic development, but injury prevention and career longevity.”

“If you can pair those three things together, you find the motivating factor from an owner to a GM to a new coach to the athlete and the agent. If you can find that motivating factor with all of those people, you get the buy-in and it goes through the roof.”

In the Gulls’ case, the buy-in to this technology has been impressive, especially among “old-school” players that Roethlingshoefer admits are sometimes reluctant to rely on in training. The data that can be gleaned from Polar Team Pro is so detailed, Roethlingshoefer is able to justify the use of technology to those players, which in turn, makes his job easier.

Roethlingshoefer’s athletes are being given longitudinal reports that show them precisely how their body is responding to specific workouts. They are no longer questioning why they are being asked to do what Roethlingshoefer is asking of them on a daily basis. Based on the data he receives, Roethlingshoefer is able to generate better training schedules that will keep players healthy and performing at top levels throughout the season. The data also allows him to know whether he can push players harder or, at times, if he needs to back off.

From an individual player perspective, Roethlingshoefer has seen veteran players in their late 20s and early 30s acknowledge that their bodies feel better than they did in their early-to-mid 20s. On the other hand, from a team perspective, the Gulls have not lost players to preventable issues such as groin injuries, lower abdominal strains and sports hernias.

Although Roethlingshoefer still has players who have always depended on the training philosophy that the harder they work, the better the results, he has seen the Polar Team Pro system win over the majority of the athletes he works with.

That’s also been the case with front office executives and agents, who Roethlingshoefer has seen the proverbial light switch click over when he shows them how the analytics from Polar’s state of the art tracking technology have prevented injuries and led to higher performance levels on the ice.

“It creates that buy-in that [convinces people that] maybe what we’re doing isn’t so crazy,” Roethlingshoefer said.

The secret, according to Roethlingshoefer, is making the most of technology that ultimately convinces players that when it comes to training – particularly in-season – it’s about learning how to work smarter in addition to putting in the kind of hard work they are already used to.

The formula that Roethlingshoefer relies on is simple.

“It’s about finding the minimal dose (of stress) to find maximum results for each individual,” he said. “This isn’t an excuse to work less or do less. It’s actually in some cases an excuse to do more because it’s all measurable.”

That measurable factor – much like the Polar Team Pro system itself – has proven to be a game-changer in the way that trainers and conditioning coaches across the country approach their jobs.