February 2023 Flight time 10h 23 Time difference 8h Waking up in my lovely room in San Jose, the local time is 4am. One glance at the clock tells me to go back to sleep, no jet lag allowed if the skating doesn’t start till 7pm! The Aloha Rink in Eastridge has got quite a following. It attracts a varied group of skaters of all abilities,  and offers public sessions as well as dance classes. The highlight of the week is the Rhythm skate night on a Thursday and I absolutely have to be there! The second time I wake up it’s 7am. Time to grab a quick breakfast in the lounge, before goi ..read more

Have you ever practiced a skill for several weeks or even months and STILL not been able to do it Many people experience this with many new skills they want to learn. If practice did make perfect, then no one would struggle with new skills after some ‘practice’. I see a lot of time being wasted by skaters ‘practicing’. But practice is good, right? We all need to practice, otherwise we won’t progress? Well…. it completely depends on WHAT YOU ARE PRACTICING. No one is talking about what differentiates between ‘good practice’ and ‘trying it over & over’. I see the majority of skaters mak ..read more

Back in 2005 I started teaching Mark to skate at age 57. His doctor had told him to get some aerobic exercise and to lose weight and he was scared because his father died at age 60 of heart disease. All his life he had always wanted to skate but never had. He hated running and saw skating as his only chance of exercise he might enjoy. But he was terrified. He had already had two lessons with two other non-Skatefresh instructors who both told him he couldn’t skate and shouldn’t pursue it.  He hadn’t managed to skate in those two lessons without grabbing the instructor or shaking uncontro ..read more

I recently received this question from a student using the Skatefresh Beginner Online Course. I think so many wish they’d asked this question but  “heel brake shaming” is still so prevalent it’s probably why they didn’t ask. “I want to become very skilled at urban skating for personal reasons. I live in an area with very steep slopes so I haven’t ventured on an urban skate yet. I want to have a very solid stop and be comfortable going up and down curbs first. I have been practicing the heel brake since day one and I feel like I can brake almost as well as I would on a bike ..read more

Wizard skating is the new name given to a style of freestyle skating popularised by Canadian aggressive skater @LeonBasin and his friends from @Mushroomblading. They came out of the skate park and started using “flat ground” for tricks, transitions, jumps and flowing sequences of footwork. (For a thorough history of Leon’s journey and the origins of Wizard skating, check out the video link at the end of this Blog) Leon designed the first wizard frame with a slight rocker (plus variable frame lengths & wheel options), to facilitate the manoeuvrability of the wizard footwork. This new “genre ..read more

“When I started to skate aged 69, I think my friends and family were as surprised as I was that I could. I only heard encouraging things from them, along with amazed laughter: those who felt otherwise didn’t say anything.” – Edwina (now 74) This kind of reaction is not surprising given the daredevil nature of strapping wheels to your feet. The common belief that you “learn from falling over” puts off many people (of any age) who have an inkling they might want to try skating. And this leaves just the truly brave ones who ignore the doubts that ‘50/60/70 year olds shouldn’t start skating’ and d ..read more

How do your hips and glutes feel after you’ve been for a skate? Most people report to feeling more open and energised in the hips and glutes due to the added muscular load that skating puts on these muscle groups. They can feel tired, stretched, used or tight and sore, depending on your individual starting point and what you did while skating. Check out this popular video and follow along with Asha for some movement positions designed to bring ease and good feelings to your hips and glutes. The correct, knee bent stance that skating needs puts a surprisingly large amount of physical demand ..read more

In the northern hemisphere the weather is getting colder and darker and I can feel this change in my joints…. I need a little more time to warm up and stretch after skating so I don’t get stiff and achy. Do you have any pain after you skate? Where in your body do you feel it? Feet? Knees? Hips? Lower back? I’m tackling each of these skater problem areas in a short video series called “Yoga for Skaters” with simple follow-along formats.  This first video in the series of 4 focusses on the feet and ankles and gives you several movements to try out as you watch the video, so just follow al ..read more

My father has lived in Uganda for over 25 years and after not seeing him for almost 3 years due to the pandemic, my 3 siblings and I decided to spend Christmas 2021 with him. We had a fabulously relaxing family holiday together, spent mostly at my father’s lakeside, off-grid, solar powered eco home. I did however manage to get some skating in (I never travel anywhere without my skates). With the help of the Ugandan Skating Federation and the Skating Club of Kampala, we organised a day of free training workshops for the local skate community. Check out the video we made of the day. The local ..read more

At some point in your roller skating journey you will want to try and skate backwards. It’s fun, it’s different and looks kinda cool.  At Skatefresh we try to show and help skaters of all ages and abilities how to learn new skills efficiently, without trial and error, using specific, tested techniques. This video series of 2 tutorials shows you how to get going backwards if you’ve never tried it before. If you missed Part 1 of “How to Skate Backwards on Quads” you can find it here; Part 1 – Balance and propulsion Part 2 – Steering In this latest video, I show and explain how to accur ..read more