Ice Hockey at IMGA Master Games
Ice hockey is a contact team sport played on ice, usually in a rink, in which two teams of skaters use their sticks to shoot a rubber puck into their opponent’s net to score goals. The sport is known to be fast-paced and physical, with teams usually fielding six players at a time: one goaltender, and five players who skate the span of the ice trying to control the puck and score goals against the opposing team.
Ice hockey is most popular in Canada, central and eastern Europe, the Nordic countries, Russia, and the United States. Ice hockey is the official national winter sport of Canada. In addition, ice hockey is the most popular winter sport in Belarus, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Age categories
The teams will be assigned to one women category and three men categories based on 10 years‘ age groups. The youngest team member determines the applicable category. Team members may be older than the age group requires.
Category Ladies 30+ 30 years and older
Category Ladies 40+ 40 years and older
Category Ladies 50+ 50 years and older
Category Men 30+ 30 to 39 years
Category Men 40+ 40 to 49 years
Category Men 50+ 50 years and older
Category Men 60+ 60 years and older
Masters competitors must have reached their 30th birthday by December 31st of the year prior to the event to be permitted to take part in the WWMG. The age at this date further defines the athletes age category.
Special regulation for goaltenders: Goaltenders in the categories Men 40+ and Men 50+ may be up to 5 years younger than the age group requires. Goalkeepers in the category Men 40 must have reached their 35th birthday, goalkeepers in the category Men 50+ must have reached their 45th birthday by December 31st of the year prior to the event.
Grade definitions
Teams can be graded into divisions based on a formula that uses an individual player’s age and an experience factor based on the highest level of play the player attained.
A different experience factor scoring system will be used for the men’s and women’s division.
Check Ice Hockey results previous events
The IMGA doesn’t allow building new venues and encourages the host cities to use existing facilities to keep the costs lower. Therefore, the following information is subject to changes depending on the venues available.
