Wearing glasses under your goalie mask

I got a very interesting email the other day. I thought that this might make a good post for anyone else out there looking for similar info.

“i was looking for info on goalies w/glasses. did you wear glasses under your mask? i was hesitant to wear glasses because of perspiration factor & have never tried contacts. Any suggestions or advice? thanks”
– Neil

I’m not sure how this guy tracked down that I used to play goalie, albeit roller hockey[wiki], but the fact that he had some insight to the fact that I currently wear glasses. I also wear contacts, probably 70% of the time. I need to update my prescription and get new lenses, hopefully in the next three months. I probably played with glasses for the first couple of years because I didn’t even own contacts.

I also did what I could with just my two eyes, but the glasses made obvious sense. If you can see better overall, then you’re going to see the puck a whole lot better. Even though my nearsightedness, or myopia[wiki], isn’t as bad as some, it’s enough that correction makes the movie theatre experience better, have the newspaper headlines appear readable from ten feet away, and bus numbers are viewable from two blocks out.

When I started out playing in front of the net, it was your atypical group of Midwesterners not having a lot of equipment to play, not to mention a good idea as to everything that we needed. We just wanted to play, period. I started out with a catchers mask, of course, with my glasses underneath. If you understand anything about summers in Iowa, it’s hot and humid. Sweat constantly got onto my glasses.

Like anything else, you can learn to adapt. Those little beads of sweat do get into your field of vision, but you can only handle so much until you simply cannot avoid their distraction. A simple shake of the head can help, but avoid wiping with your fingers. That will only lead to smudges in your field of vision, yet another distraction.

I graduated from the catchers mask to a hockey helmet and mask/cage combo. I didn’t own this wonderful upgrade because I met some friends in college who would lend this to me, and it was those folks that taught me a huge amount about how to play the game, not to mention how to be a better goalie.

That cage allowed for a good amount of room for my glasses, but I realized how important peripheral vision was. When the game picks up pace and one-timers or redirects come into the game, you need that extra vision to pick up subtle locations of where those other guys are, as well as the guy with the puck at the point. On top of that, the helmet would trap heat and fog up my glasses from time to time, giving me no ability to see. Quite frankly, that’s bad for a goalie.

Needless to say, playing with a group of folks like that, in a handful of intramural tournaments in college, I wanted contacts.

Now, don’t think that lenses on your eyeballs are an end-all solution. It takes a bit to get used to them, and everyone is different. Once you get beyond that, you also have to worry about that sweat, which used to be an external problem with your glasses, getting in your eye.

That salt can sting, and the tear ducts will go into over drive to get that stuff out. That will also loosen the contact lens, and this is a problem that still creeps up on me when I go running. Keep your eye closed and dab the problematic eye with your shirt or jersey sleeve. The lens will settle down and not want to fall out, but nothing is more embarrassing that having to stop play because your contact fell out.

For me, this was a night and day difference. My confidence level went way up and never feared busting my glasses if I took a shot off the mask, which I did graduate my way up to. In fact, there would have been no way that I could squeeze my glasses inside that mask, not to mention the trouble of putting on or taking off that helmet would cause with my specs tucked inside there. Perhaps a larger mask would make that less of a problem, but I went with the more snug mask because I didn’t want it bobbling all over my head.

I’m sure there are some out there that play with glasses that don’t have many problems with having glasses on behind the mask. There might be some who will speak to the safety factor of something so close to your eyes and the potential for serious injury. Maybe even sports glasses or goggles would be more effective if contacts are not apart of the solution.

It makes me curious to think about how many goalies in the NHL wear contacts or have had laser eye surgery.