Zak Trokker | Biography

[Peace 1,562]

ZAK TROKKER

BIOGRAPHY
A turbulent entry into the world of hockey

 

 

AT A YOUNG AGE

 

Let's be real, most kids don't remember being 3/4/5 years old, but any involved parent cherishes the memories of their child screaming with pure joy when the home team scores a goal. That horn is blaring, the crowd is roaring yet the only voice you hear is a kid looking half evil going 'yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah' until they're red in the face and out of breath. That passion develops into a favorite team, a favorite player, and steadily builds into a sometimes achievable goal of being a hockey player. For many it only ever remains a dream... for Trokker the road was there at a young age, right up until the road became too congested with cooler looking cars.

 

Zak was born and raised in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada; a city built for Alberta's oil & gas industry. By the age of six, Trokker was a firm fan of the Winnipeg Jets despite the influence from family and fans from every corner of the National Hockey League. Every Christmas Zak's father would purchase game tickets with a promise to make the journey to Edmonton or Calgary so the duo could watch their team together, thus further fostering his sons interest in the sport while simultaneously developing his desire to play hockey.

 

At seven Zak started skating lessons, then progressed to power skating before joining a youth development program. Through this program Trokker was able to meet several former VHL players... the what? 

 

 

EARLY HOCKEY

 

Like every kid starting out, Trokker's humble beginning starts with an intro into hockey. Daily skates, drills, and valuable teachings from an instructor built Trokker's capabilities prior to joining a minor hockey association; this is where he learned to skate, learned to stop at speed, learned to puck handle... yet it wasn't meant to be, but no one knew that at the time. Trokker tried out and made the U9 tier 4/5 team out of Fort McMurray which naturally included an extremely rough travel schedule. The team provided a bus from the lonely city into central Alberta, but often one of Zak's parents would have to make a several hour journey just for a sixty minute hockey game in Athabasca or even further south.

 

Everything was going great! Trokker's skills continued to develop as he rapidly climbed from tier 4/5 into tier 3, then into tier 2 and finally into the U11 - 1 league.

 

Unfortunately the NEAHL had other plans: for whatever reason, they closed every Fort McMurray team but the tier one U13, U15 and U18 Oil Barons. Travel costs, perhaps, or just a general lack of interest from an oil city meant more teams were struggling to find players at the lower tiers than before. With Trokker's team being closed, he was effectively pushed away from hockey at just 13 years of age. The Trokker family made multiple attempts to appeal the decision while Zak struggled to elevate to the skill required for U13 tier 1 competition.

 

 

LIFE AND HOCKEY

(or lack thereof)

 

After failing to secure a spot on the only remaining U13, U15, and U18 teams left in Fort McMurray - all tier one competition - Trokker's father essentially forced Zak into (temporarily) abandoning his dreams of playing professional hockey in favor of joining him in the oil and gas industry; it wasn't an appealing nor ideal career and left Zak sitting in the shadow of his parent. As a seventeen and eighteen year old the expectations for Zak were always higher for him than his coworkers, and the demand for superior performance compared to his peers started developing a hostile divide between Zak and his father. Several verbal incidents between the two forced Precision Drilling to step in and assign them to different drilling rigs, eventually accumulating in the termination of Zak's employment with the oilfield company. 

 

Throughout his unemployment Zak would attempt to interact with the hockey world in any way he could: he joined several shinny leagues, volunteered his free time as a skills coach, purchased ice time just to practicing in an empty rink or researched ways a twenty year old could get into the NHL. When not obsessing over hockey, he'd take hikes through the wilderness to escape the growing animosity at home, though he spent the majority of his time playing video games and ignoring his parents.

 

By 22 he was back working for Precision Drilling, though working on separate rigs than his father. For four years he imagined playing hockey, but instead quietly kept his head down and grinded away at life.

 

The desire to play professional hockey never died, so when the opportunity to potentially join the VHL landed in his lap, he quickly decided to leave Precision Drilling and relocated to Saskatoon for a summer program with the Peace Player Agency.

 

The Peace Player Agency [as they've done in the past for their now retired Hall of Famer] offered classes to Trokker based on his talents over a decade ago. Where there is potential, there is a VHL player, even if their fate is to be ejected from a VHLM team. Interested in an attempt at a VHL career, Zak begun training with Erik Killinger at 26 years of age. It wasn't the NHL destination Trokker had in mind, but the VHL was a growing league that had already spread across the globe; not even the NHL had done so (yet).

 

After a year of training with Erik Killinger, Trokker was ready for the VHLM; he joined the Philadelphia Reapers after Rylan Peace suggested it.

 

  

 

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