How to choose a hockey stick flex without testing it first

You can’t feel flex through a screen, and honestly you can’t feel much of it in a store either. So use numbers instead. Start at half your body weight in pounds, adjust for the shots you actually take, and subtract for anything you plan to cut off the top. Ours is simpler than that: one flex per size.

Why the rack test tells you almost nothing

Flex is a force number. A 77 means it takes roughly 77 pounds to bend the shaft an inch. When you pull a stick off a rack and lean on it with your hands, you are nowhere near that force, and you are not loading it against the ice with your weight behind a shot. So the aisle test tells you the shaft bends. You already knew the shaft bends.

That is reasoning, not a measurement. We have not put a hand test on a scale and we are not going to publish a number we did not take. The point survives either way. The thing you cannot do online was never the thing that would have decided it.

The weight rule, and where it runs out

Half your weight in pounds is the standard starting number. Weigh 150, start near 77. Weigh 100, start near 50. Hockey stick flex by weight is the page for that rule and for what the number actually measures.

Two limits worth knowing before you lean on it. The rule was built around adults of average build, so it drifts at both ends of the scale. And it says nothing at all about how you shoot, which is the next thing to account for.

Read the stick you already own

This is the best data you have and it costs nothing. The flex number is printed on the shaft, usually up near the butt end. On ours it reads FLEX 77 on every Senior. Go find yours and write it down.

Then be honest about three things. Did you ever feel that shaft load and snap back on a shot, or did it just feel like a bar? Did it fold when you leaned into a slap shot? And how many inches did you cut off the top?

Now you have a number, a feeling and a length. That is a real reference point, and one season with a stick beats thirty seconds with one in a shop.

Let your shot nudge the number

Quick wrist shots and snaps taken close to your body: go a little softer. You load the shaft fast and you want it to give.

Winding up for slap shots from distance: go a little stiffer, so the shaft does not fold under a heavy load.

Do both, like most players, and you stay where the weight rule put you. No single flex is best at both ends of that range, so choosing one means giving up a little at the other. That is a preference, not a spec, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something.

Count the inches you plan to cut

Cutting a stick down stiffens it. Take length off the top and the shaft plays stiffer than the number printed on it, roughly a few points per inch. A 77 trimmed by two inches is not playing at 77 any more.

So length and flex are one decision, not two. Buy for the length you will actually play and the flex you picked is the flex you get. How to cut a hockey stick goes through where to measure and what the trim does to the number.

What our answer actually is

Here is the honest version, and it makes us a simpler shop rather than a cleverer one. We build one flex per size.

• Senior: 77 flex, 385 grams, about 65 inches (165 cm).
• Intermediate: 50 flex, 320 grams, about 62 inches (157 cm).
• Junior: 20 flex, 260 grams, about 58 inches (147 cm).

One flex and one build per size. Only the hand changes, left or right, and every color costs the same. There is no flex menu on this site, so picking your size picks your flex, the same way it picks your weight.

Which means your real question is a size question. The two question size finder names your class from your height and weight. The hockey stick size chart is the longer version of the same math. If what you want is to shop a 65 against an 85 in one size, we are not that shop, and we would rather tell you than pretend to offer a choice we do not stock.

What we are not going to tell you

We will not tell you which flex makes your shot fastest, because we have not measured your shot. Nobody who has not watched you play can, and a single confident number for that is a guess wearing a lab coat.

We also will not line our 77 up against another brand’s 77. We have not tested anybody else’s sticks, so we have no honest way to say whether two sticks with the same number feel the same in your hands. If that question matters to you, your own hands on both is the only thing that settles it.

Common questions

How do I choose a flex if I can’t hold the stick first? Use the three things you can check without it. Half your body weight in pounds for the starting number, the way you shoot for the nudge, and the inches you plan to cut for the correction. If you are buying a Maila, the flex follows the size: 77 in Senior, 50 in Intermediate, 20 in Junior.

How do I tell what flex my current stick is? Look at the shaft up near the butt end, where the number is printed. On ours it reads FLEX 77. If you cut that stick down, remember you are playing something stiffer than the print says.

Is a lower flex easier to shoot with? It bends under less force, so it is easier to load. Easier to load is not the same as better. Too soft for you and the shaft gives way on a hard shot, which costs you the snap you wanted in the first place.

Pick the size, and the flex is settled

Flex looks like the hardest spec on the list, and it is the one you can reason your way to without ever holding a stick. Half your weight, a nudge for your shot, minus what you cut. How to choose a hockey stick puts it next to length, size class and handedness. Stuck between the two adult sizes? Senior vs intermediate is the one to read. Once you know your size, the sticks are here, in every color except black.