Andrei Savu has a mean wrist shot.
Even when he has three hockey defenders on him trying to steal the puck, he effortlessly escapes and scores a goal.
The best part – he's holding his breath the entire time.
Savu plays underwater hockey, an under-the-radar sport that has actually been around for more than 60 years.
Trade in the hockey pads and helmet for a snorkel, swim cap, protective gloves and fins. You still play with a puck and a stick, but you fight for control at the bottom of a swimming pool not on the ice.
Savu, who has been playing for the last seven years, started an underwater hockey Meetup group nearly a year ago once he moved to Wilmington. The goal is to teach others about the sport, play pick-up games and offer a new, fun alternative form of exercise, he said.
"It doesn't matter what your skill level is. When you come we will teach you all you need to know," he said. He also co-founded the Swordfish Underwater Hockey Club in Atlanta.
But without the fins, he's not much of a swimmer, he jokes.
Underwater hockey's roots stem from the British Navy circa the 1950s, according to the World Underwater Federation. The game was initially meant as fitness regime to help keep divers fit and move efficiently under water. World Championships now have been held every two years since 1980.
"It's really good for everybody. It keeps you in great shape," Savu said.
The underwater hockey sticks are smaller, about a foot long, but the puck weighs about 3 pounds. You use your entire body – arm, leg and back muscles – as you go for the puck under water kicking your legs and taking shots. It's a low-impact sport with the water resistance, that makes the exercise easy on joints.
"Jogging was boring. If you asked me to just swim or run for an hour it kind of upset me," Savu said. "So this was the fun way of doing some exercise."
Intimidated? Savu says don't be; it just takes some patience and practice to learn the sport and then the fitness benefits will follow.
"You have to be comfortable in the water," he said. "So it took maybe a few months to get used to."
The rules are similar to soccer and hockey, where a team works to score a goal together, but differs in that you have to time breathing into the plays and there are no goalies.
The USA Underwater Hockey Governing Committee, an arm of the Underwater Society of America, states that players are underwater no more than 15 seconds during a play. Since you can't communicate underwater, you have to be extremely aware of where your teammates are, Savu said.
"It's a lot of intuition," he said.
Cheyne Ferrar, 25, was actually shocked she picked the sport up so quickly without much swimming experience.
"It's just different and it's intense," the Avonddale, Pennsylvania, resident said at a practice at Wilmington's Clarence Fraim Senior Center in mid-May. The hardest part, she added, was getting down the breathing and leg-work.
If you are playing just for fun, finswimming and breath holding workouts will prepare the body to play the sport, said Max Van Rechem, director of development and training for USA Underwater Hockey. People develop endurance as well as speed, power and strength.
Try swimming a few laps on the surface, breathing occasionally. They swim half a lap under the surface, gradually moving up to the entire length of the pool, Savu said.
Jenny Biener, of Wilmington is not a newbie. She played the sport at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, a private research university in Worcester, Massachusetts and has been taking underwater slap shots in Wilmington since February
"I was looking for a way to have fun," Biener, 22, said.
Savu's the tough one to beat, she joked. The good thing is, most practices they don't keep score.
"It definitely takes a lot."
Jen Rini can be reached at (302) 324-2386 or jrini@delawareonline.com. Follow @JenRini on Twitter.
Interested in underwater hockey?
To play in Wilmington contact Andrei Savu at (808) 345-3722
To find additional clubs go to the USA Underwater Hockey website here.
