What is this place?
I have recently taken up inline speed skating for fun. If
you don't know what I'm talking about at all, there's a great
wikipedia article about inline speed skating. If you don't
feel like reading the article, the main thing to note is that
inline speed skating is done on skates with wheels, NOT on ice
skates. Also, for a helpful description of roller
speedskating taken from Derek Parra's autobiography, Reflections
in the Ice,
click here.
How did I get into this?
I love skating. I don't even remember when I learned to
roller skate. When I was seven, I had a skating birthday party
at a neighborhood gym that rented skates. I must have already
been skating at least occasionally before that. I remember a
time when I was little when the skates I rented at the rink were
fastened by Velcro, so that once when I fell down, one skate fell
off and rolled away from me! For a while, I had white Minnie
Mouse roller skates of my own, but kids can't wear the same footwear
for very long, and I don't think those skates got a whole lot of
use. Actually, I think I had plastic preschooler skates before
that - they were adjustable and strapped onto the outside of the
shoe. Anyway, so much for ancient history. (And no, I
don't remember the metal strap-on skates like the ones you
might have had when you were younger.)
My friends and I had many skating parties in elementary school.
I fell in love with a rink called All-American Skating in Stone
Mountain, GA. Also, I signed up for an after-school skating
program in Atlanta's Piedmont Park. As a group, we'd walk to
the park, rent skates, and skate. At some point I decided to
rent rollerblades instead of quad skates. When I'd learned to
skate well on them, I decided I wanted rollerblades of my own.
I got some in middle school, and, because my feet haven't grown
since then, I've had them ever since. I wore out the original
wheels on the skates and had to get new ones, so now the skates are
black and purple but the wheels are light blue and clear. Go
figure.
In high school, it was difficult to find other people who wanted
to go skating. As a kid, it had been something that everyone
did, but as I got older, people were less familiar with this
particular skill and more likely to get hurt if they fell.
This was annoying. To them and to me. But I skated
anyway, and I occasionally managed to drag a few of my more-patient
but less-proficient friends with me.
I didn't skate much in college, although I do remember rolling
around on campus a couple of times. At least the campus was
flat. I never went to a roller rink in Chicago, though.
I did go ice skating a couple of times. But mostly, I didn't
have time, and I didn't know other people who liked to skate.
Aquinas and I moved to Princeton, and naturally, I started
looking for a place to skate. I heard about a roller skating
rink just past the 7 mile marker on Route 27, north of Princeton, in
Kendall Park. I went to a couple of public skating sessions,
but got frustrated with the crowdedness. (Not that it's always
crowded -- it's just that you never know ahead of time.)
However, I learned that there were speed skating lessons available
on the weekends, and I decided to try it. I didn't know what
was involved, but I figured I'd get to skate with skaters, and that
would be an improvement.
I was right!
Now I'm on the NJ half of a PA/NJ team called Fast Forward.
Commitment
Those rollerblades from middle school didn't cut the mustard.
I mean, hey, I love the things. I can do anything on them...
except speed skate. My old skates had several failings.
The wheels weren't made out of the right kind of plastic, and
occasionally made me slip. (That's scary when you're leaning
around a corner!) The boots came up too high to allow the
necessary ankle flexibility. And the bearings were noisy and
slow. Plus, you just can't engage in a specialized sport if
you don't have the specialized equipment. Or at any rate, not
without feeling more than a little left out. So I bought
myself some skates. Thanks to my wonderful coach Donn and his
assistant Steve, they weren't as expensive as they could have been.
My skates:
Progress
January 17, 2005
Bought speed skates!
February 26, 2005
I'm closer to competing than I was before. I went to watch
a huge invitational skating meet in Philadelphia. There were a
lot of skaters! It was quite something to watch, and quite
something to aim for.
March 23, 2005
I'm closer to competing than before. I now have a uniform
which fits. You have to have a uniform to race indoors.
It doesn't have to fit, but I figure I'll be self-conscious enough
without a uniform that's a different shape than my body, so I had
mine altered a bit to be shorter in the torso. The lady at the
dry cleaner who did the alterations was duly impressed.
April 10, 2005
I have now skated a practice at the outdoor parking lot track.
This is a very different sort of undertaking. For one thing,
in my opinion, it requires wrist guards which keep your palms from
being torn up if you fall on the asphalt. I bought some.
However, I managed not to fall this time... phew!
April 17, 2005
At the regional or league race at Mays Landing at Young's
Skating Center, I competed for the first time. The doors
opened at 5:30am (so that the races could be over in time for public
skate in the early afternoon), and I had to drive an hour and a half
-- in the dark -- to get to Mays Landing, so I was up pretty early!
After watching many events for other ages and abilities of skaters,
I skated in a 1000-meter race (10 laps). I won first place!
But that's only because there was no one there to race against me.
Later, in the 500-meter race, (5 laps), I won first again, for the
same reason, and despite falling down in the middle of the race.
(I got nasty floor burn on my elbow, but one of my teammates gave me
a Tegaderm bandage for it, and it's healing almost painlessly.)
I didn't have to skate by myself, though: I skated with two younger
skaters, both faster, but because we were in different divisions, I
couldn't affect their placement and they couldn't affect mine.
And now I have two very generic-looking first place medals, so
there.
June 19, 2005
At the regional race at Bensalem at Cornwell's Skating Center, I
earned a not-so-generic looking medal. I was very happy to
find out that there was another skater in my
age-group-division-thing. She and I skated two very exciting
races, a ten-lap race and a five-lap race. In the ten-lap
race, she got ahead of me at the start, but I slowly caught up and
passed her, and won. In the five-lap race, I had a great
start, but faltered at a corner and got passed, and she won. I
won overall, because the ten-lap race counts more. But what
mattered to me was that we were not so unevenly matched that winning
would have been easy for either of us.
August 2005
I took a break from practice. Most folks concentrated on
the outdoor races and practices, which I'm not interested in at the
moment.
September 14, 2005
First fall practice for me. Ouch. Vigorous exercise
is difficult unless habitual.
October 2, 2005
First real fall practice for me. We recommenced doing
drylands, which are drills done in shoes, rather than skates.
Basically, they are slow-motion strength and balance drills.
Double ouch. But I did learn how to get my left skate out in
front of my right skate around corners: I'm supposed to put all my
weight on my left leg. Too bad I seem to be right legged as
well as right handed!
October something, 2005
Team gets re-organized. Practice to include lotsa muy
macho dryland exercises.
November 13, 2005
Race at Frenchtown. The good news is, I've got competitors
now. The bad news is, I've got competitors now. Four of
them. I fell in the 1000m race when a new skater tried to pass
me. The fall ripped a bloody hole in my thigh, bruised my left
hand and my right wrist, but I finished the race (slowly). I
fell flat on my back at the start in the 500m race, bruising my rear
end and knocking my helmet hard. Please, someone remind me how
much fun this sport is. . . .
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