Inside the Dallas Stars’ Comprehensive Plan to Fight Jetlag to and from Finland

During the post-game presser after the Stars’ first loss to Florida in Finland, Peter DeBoer got a bit testy when asked whether the team hadn’t been ready to compete due to all the travel and off-ice activities. DeBoer was curt in his response: “Left our legs in the sauna? Is that what you’re saying? I mean, they were in the sauna too, and they showed up on time to play.”

It’s a valid response. The Stars a team built on the Jim Nill mantra of “no excuses,” and the Panthers had just as much fun as the Stars in their days in Finland—and a shorter turnaround, to boot. Even suggesting that the different setting of the games might have contributed to the Stars’ poor showing in the first period on Friday is a pretty damning accusation, given how much this game meant to the three Finnish players on the Stars.

But that doesn’t mean a trip like this isn’t a challenge, in many ways. Despite the fact that hockey players generally have bodies the fitness of which would rival Adonis (remember how Seguin had under 5% body fat for that ESPN photo shoot?), that doesn’t mean you can hit cruise control when it comes to preparation.

So, I got curious. What would the Stars’ plan be to mitigate the adjustment to a new time zone? How were they hoping to keep players in their same diets and routines despite the packed schedule, special meals, and everything else? In order words, how do you ensure that the team will indeed have “no excuses” when the games finally arrived, not to mention after coming back west after the trip with 71 games still to play.

On Tuesday, at Herttoniemen jäähalli (home of the best zamboni I’ve ever seen), I got a chance to talk with Mike Donoghue, the Stars’ head strength and conditioning coach who came aboard in 2023. Donoghue actually held the same role with Florida a few years prior to that, so it’s far from his first rodeo when it comes to prepping a team for long travel. Donoghue graciously answered a lot of questions about the whole process, and even gave me some tips for dealing with my own jetlag that will hopefully come in handy this week. (I’m writing this from the Helsinki airport on Sunday afternoon.)

The interview was really fascinating, so I’m including the entire thing here rather than chopping it up for an easier narrative.

Just as a primer for the below, I asked Logan Stankoven about the blue light glasses Donoghue mentions, and Stankoven said, “They were cool. I’ve never really tried that, but they were interesting. Everyone understands that you have to sacrifice and do those little things, even though it might be a bit annoying sometimes, but it’s gonna work out in the end.”

Stankoven said they’d heard of other teams struggling after European trips, and he just sees the plan as another way the Stars have to be “dialed in” as a team.

So, with that said, let’s get to the good stuff. And don’t forget that advertisers hate the final one, simple trick that Donoghue mentions for fighting jet lag. Am I doing SEO right, somebody help me.

Note: the below questions and answers have been lightly edited for clarity (mostly to make the intewier sound like he asked better questions than he actually did).

***

Robert Tiffin (RT): Tell me a little bit about how you had to adapt yesterday. (Quick background: the Stars’ plane was delayed over four hours on the tarmac on Monday in Dallas, after which they still had the entire 10-hour flight ahead of them.)

Mike Donoghue (MD): Yeah, so you you have like the most ideal scenarios that can be played out and then you plan, you know, option B, option C, option D, and you kind of you prep for some chaos.

You have an optimal plan that’s kind of organized. Everyone knows that, but then you also have to be ready to think on your feet. You get some delays, you get different scenarios all the time in our regular season, and having back-to-back games and flying, with Dallas being such a highly traveled team. You know, you have so many scenarios that always are changing, so just constantly adjusting and making sure that you understand what the coaches are asking, and players are asking. And what’s best at that time is sort of what you go with.

But you do think through a lot of the the chaos that could happen. Yeah. You know, making sure that you have those scenarios available to you especially on a trip like this where you can’t [order from] Amazon, you can’t make last-second adjustments. So you sort of have to be prepped for everything. So when you travel, our equipment guys, our medical guys, everybody’s got “panic bags” with all kinds of options for that as well.

RT: I’d imagine the focus is a little bit different on the front-end, versus the back-end of the trip, obviously jet leg and everything. But what about the front part of the trip, what’s the thing that you guys are really focused on? Is it, is it vitamins? Is it, sleep? Like figuring out how to keep the cardio up and everything?

MD: Well, you know what? Our guys have a really good system in play, so we we kind of double down on the things that we know are the most impactful.

The sleep is a big thing. Disturbing the sleep schedules is a big concern for us, just making sure that guys understand when to go to sleep, when to take naps and organizing that. Our entire Performance Department collaborates and puts together the best plan.

So, we’ve got apps on our players phones that are recommending, based off their individual needs, sleep times, nap times, adjustments to time zone. So, they’re getting a personal assistant on their phone almost, that’s updating them on the supplementation strategies and sleep strategies that we use.

RT: What about the food?

MD: Obviously, the food is another concern. You get like a totally different, you know, type of food here. I think a lot of guys ate reindeer, that’s not something that’s normally on our menu. These guys are such creatures of habit. It’s hard when guys try new things, but it’s customary for us to try it, right? Having Finns on our team, it’s really cool to see their their culture. From a diet standpoint, guys have been asking them all week, “What the food’s like?” or “What’s the sauna scenario going to be like?” So on the front end, it’s just organizing the best-case scenario for the schedule.

RT: With all the different facilities in a place like this, and having multiple travel instances on the trip, do you scout things out pretty far ahead of time?

MD: Yeah, we scout it out. Obviously in our normal season, we see all the buildings here, you can go online and you can get understanding for what the gyms have, what equipment they have. We also prepare for a lot of it, too. Space is our biggest accommodation. If we can find it…we got off the plane yesterday, and we had adjustments with our practice schedule. But we still ran a workout at the hotel. So, we’re able to do that because we prepped for it.

Our equipment guys also help us out a ton. (Author’s Note: check out Mike Heika’s great story on that group.) They’ve got our bags set so we can do our workouts and training at the hotel. It was supplemental, but it still allows us to do something.

RT: Is that just cardio? (note: credit to Donoghue for not guffawing when I asked this.)

MD: It’s everything. we’ve got everything we can bring. We can we can find ways to load guys with bands. Obviously all the soft tissue, mobility-type things. Those are pretty much staples. Then it’s getting a little creative with how you like actually load these guys. Because again, you don’t have a set of dumbbells on the road, but you have bands, so you find ways to get resistance.

RT: With back-to-back games, tell me about the challenges of that, especially in an environment like this.

MD: In the regular season, we’re traveling usually with them. So it’s nice being in one place. And then being against the same team is unique as well. Post-game, immediately after the game, we’ve got a plan for our guys to try to get them into a recovery state as soon as possible-

RT: Like a “flush”?

MD: No, it’s not just a flush but it’s from a dietary standpoint, too. Replacing their carbs, replacing their protein needs, and then getting them the adequate food right away. It’ll be a little bit more urgency [in a back-to-back] this time. Guys are a little bit more patient when there’s not a game the next day, but with this scenario to be a little bit more of an urgency to get into those routines right away. So it’s some similarities, but again, it’s just a little bit more urgency, and then once they do that, they’re getting the rest adjusting the next day to make sure the morning schedule is as best as you can make it so that guys are sleeping.

There’s there’s no substitute for sleep. So again, these guys are so charged post-game that they want to, you know, talk about the game, and so we want to provide guys with the opportunity to slow down. We’ll do some breathing with our guys. Some breathing work, some stretching, to kind of control that environment and get them to come down from their high. And then obviously, they get to sleep in the morning.

They’ll do some sort of routine, physically, to get going. That’s not a blanket statement for everybody. There’s a little nuances that everyone has. But ultimately, they’re they’re coming up with a plan on their own that we’ve talked about, and we’ve established, with these guys all season. Then we’ll make the adjustments based off whether there’s any constraints here that we’re not prepared for, or that logistically, we have to confine to.

RT: How you come back afterwards, obviously jetlag, tell me a little bit about what you all do to prepare both the front end and the back end.

MD: Yeah, we obviously talk about it as a group, and I think the biggest thing is like making sure, mentally, guys know that the resiliency is a factor. There’s a lot of struggle that is presented with the NHL schedule. The games are every other day, and there’s a lot of travel. There’s a lot of just mentally being resilient at times as well, so making sure that guys aren’t falling to the fragile side of it, but a lot of that comes with the confidence that we give them with a plan.

So we scout a plan out. When we come back, we say, “Guys, we got to make sure we control our controllables, the hydration, the nutrition, the sleep time.” So we go ahead and give those assignments. And then, from there, we just want to make sure that they’ve talked about it, that we’ve got a plan, so they build confidence. So that helps combat the mental resiliency on the other side when they get back. We’re not going to be a team that’s falling victim to the excuses of you know, “It’s hard.”

There’s no easy way about it, just making sure that they understand there’s a plan. On the way back, we’re making sure we’re giving exposure to sunlight at certain times. We’re making sure that if guys on the plane are on their phones, we’ve got blue light-blocking glasses.

Those subtle adjustments go a long way, and I think the guys build confidence in our strategies and, now they feel like a part of a solution to the the issue, right? There’s no perfect plan that we’re chasing, but we’re trying to chase a really good plan and get full adherence by everybody. It’s a lot of communication, a lot of just making sure guys understand we’re there for them, that this is how we support them, so this is the direction we’ll go—coaches and players. You know, we’ve got coaches and staff, you know, the health of everybody is important, so making sure that everyone is a part of. That’s really key for us.

RT: Finally, what’s something I can do for my jetlag on the flight back?

MD: Yeah, so the everyday tip for for the jet lag concepts are really just watching your sleep time, and then sunlight exposure to circadian rhythms.

The worst thing you can do is get sleep at the wrong time. So timing is key. You need your eight to nine hours minimum. So plan that out, and just a little bit of like, even today, do we stay up? Do we nap? Those discussions have been had with everybody here.

So for the everyday person, it’s just being a little smarter with that. And then the hydration aspect, making sure that you’re not dehydrated on top of the travel.

You know, you don’t have electrolytes on you, so just making sure you bring a snack on the plane, making sure you bring some water. The little things go so far. And then just prepping for that stuff, you know. If it’s the last-minute, you can’t pull a couple liters of water out here your pockets, you know. So that’s the best way to do it.