Option 2:

It's simple: the best way to practice something is to do that thing again and again. If you want to develop a good slapshot, you take slapshots, you don't start hitting trees with your stick to learn how to brace for recoil or other kooky training techniques. So when Simo wants to improve his skating, he skates. During the offseason, after going back home to Finland, Simo took his skates and his car on a road trip up north to find a good river - something frozen over and frozen hard - and got to skating. Between having the stamina of a long-distance runner and legs the same size as the average tree stump, it's fair to say the world of cross-country skiing lost a star when Simo dedicated himself to hockey, but the proof has been in the pudding of his playing time; when you can lay out an opponent in front of your goaltender, launch a pass up ice and chase the play quick enough to screen the other goalie, then catch up with an opposing breakaway in a single shift, you can suggest his methods don't work.