Inline skating
Inline skating is a recreational sport practiced widely internationally. Inline skates typically have 2 to 5 polyurethane wheels, arranged in a single line. The in-line design allows for greater speed[citation needed] than roller skates and better maneuverability[citation needed]. The in-line wheels coupled with boots designed for skating of various obstacles Inline-skating is practiced and performed using inline skates designed for race tracks, skate parks, Urban areas, and off-road.
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[edit] Disciplines
[edit] Aggressive inline
In addition to speed, fitness, artistic, or recreational skating, some skaters prefer to skate aggressively. Aggressive skating is referred to by participants as rollerblading, blading, skating or rolling and includes a variety of grinds, airs, slides and other advanced skating maneuvers. Types of aggressive skating include Park, Vert and Street.
Park skating refers to doing tricks within a skatepark. Street skating specifically refers to tricks performed on non-allocated obstacles (i.e. not skate parks). Vert skating involves doing airs and tricks while in the air such as flips, on a large halfpipe known as a vert ramp.
There are three major types of aggressive inline skates: hard boots, soft boots, and skeletal skates. Hard boots are very rigid and often heavy compared to speed skates and recreational skates. Soft boots offer more flexibility and comfort than hard boots, and are extremely light. However, they are not very durable. Skeletal skates are mostly produced by the company Xsjado, and use a system similar to snowboard bindings. Specially designed shoes called footwraps are worn inside of skeletal skates.
Aggressive inline skates can also be fitted with small, hard, plastic wheels, used in place of the two middle wheels. These small wheels, or "anti-rockers," are used to help lock onto a ledge or rail when grinding. Anti-rockers allow a larger split between the 2nd and 3rd wheels, allowing a skater to more easily grind wider objects. While some prefer a flat wheel setup, in this case meaning all 8 wheels touching the ground, others find this wheel configuration limiting due to the body control needed to assume a lower center of gravity so as to avoid the 2nd and 3rd wheels, made of urethane, touching the grinding surface.
Aggressive inline saw a sharp decline in the late 1990s, but during 2000-2003 found a major resurgence for the sport when street skating became increasingly popular. At this time professional skaters including Brian Shima, Franky Morales, Chris Haffey, Dre Powell, Brian Aragon and Aaron Feinberg, among others were pushing unseen boundaries in performing seemingly impossible and dangerous stunts in mostly street settings. In addition, the IMYTA (I Match Your Trick Association) provided a venue for skaters to demonstrate these tricks. The IMYTA held contests at a street location and the skaters would have to match each trick in the first round of skating or be eliminated. The progression continued with the pool of skaters dwindling and more dangerous and difficult tricks would then be performed and a winner declared. Competitions such as the IMYTA encouraged skaters from many different countries to set up their own local real street competitions. Sadly, the IMYTA series grew too large and was riddled with legal difficulties when several hundred to a thousand inline skaters would show up to a contest, drawing a strong interest from local law enforcement officers wanting to see permits.
Currently, the aggressive inline industry is struggling in many ways. The two largest print publications, Be-Mag and ONE magazine, have dramatically scaled down production schedules due to rapidly decreasing ad sales. With internet marketing a much cheaper alternative to print ads, aggregate skating news sites popping up and closing down seemingly overnight and a well meaning, but largely unorganized competition series ranking system known as the World Rolling Series, money seems to be hard to come by without larger corporate sponsorship not seen in the industry since the 1990s.
Some Aggressive inline boot manufacturers are Valo, Remz, Razors, USD, K2, Shima Skate Manufacturing, Xsjado, USD and Rollerblade.
[edit] Freestyle skating
Freestyle skating is a form of inline skating performed on flatland and refers collectively to the disciplines for which competitions are organized by the International Freestyle Skaters Association. [1] Currently the IFSA has defined three disciplines which must be offered by any competition they sanction: freestyle slalom, speed slalom, and free jump. Two optional disciplines, high jump and jam, are also defined, but are at present considered optional.
[edit] Hockey
Hockey performed in a special ring on inline skates
[edit] Speed Skating
[edit] References
[edit] External links
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Look up roller skating or blading in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
Skate manufacturers:
Retail stores:
•United States
•Europe
Print/Online media:
- Balance Rolling Magazine
- Be-Mag Rolling Magazine
- Clac Magazine
- Edit Mag
- Eight Up
- How to be Unpopular (Podcast)
- One Magazine
- Rolling Revival
- Wheelscene
Other links:
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