SKATES:
Well obviously one of the things that has come the furthest in the last 20 years is the skates themselves. 20 yrs ago we had boots that felt like that came up to your knees, and you're only way to tighten them was to just tie them tighter. These were bad times indeed!!!! And lets be honest, for the most part a lot of them were really ugly. Fortunately for all, things got better, buckles were introduced, along with lace covers, and some where along the lines boot makers got a lot better at making skates no look like clown shoes. Today boots are stiffer, lighter, tighter, better looking, and just way better...UPGRADE
Next we go with the frames. Originally these things were pretty much just chunks of medal, that with wheels on them. I'm not sure if there was much strategy besides putting 5 wheels in a line. Soon things got better, frames had some actual design to them, and then they got shinier!!! So for a few years we pretty well designed frames, that looked pretty good, but you pretty much had 2 choices... stiff and heavy or flimsy and light. Now there's super light frames that are stiff, all kinds of different materials and you can pretty much get anything you want when it comes to a frame. There was also a few failed attempts at clap frames, they came..lots of people paid lots of money for them.. and then they were gone. One more major change was the mounting system from 195mm to 165mm frames, allowing the frames to be lower to the ground when one more things was changed.......
Wheels wheels wheels. Oh how far we've come. I remember putting on my first pair of inlines with 5 72mm wheels. I thought these were the fastest things ever created by man. Soon there after there was a jump to 76mm and then quickly after to 80mm. Now we got stuck here for like 6 or 7 years. Different formulas were made, but the next major jump was the HUGE jump to 84mm. Yes at one point 84 mm wheels were looked at as too big(some people even wore 82.5mm). The first practice I wore them, my coach and I had to discuss if they were going to be too big to turn and accelerate indoor.... ah we were so naive around that whole Y2K time. Around 2004 two things happened that changed the sport completely... We went from 5x84mm to 4x100mm. Sure at the time we thought they looked silly, but boy did they roll. And we liked rolling so they got to stay around. The other big change was the inserts in wheels. People had tried "dual density" before, but this is was different... it actually worked. Soon after, every where you went you saw people bouncing wheels, and flexing wheels in weird ways, inserts were there and we were hooked. But only for so long.. .b/c we wanted more. We said if 84mm were better than 80mm, and 100mm were better than 84mm, we decided bigger=better. And poof 110mm wheels were made. After a little arguing with the guys that run the sport, 110mm wheels were legal, and here we are today.
**ps... there are also rain wheels, but I'm more of a stay inside when it rains kinda guy.. so I don't really know much about them, but rumor is they're pretty good.
Technique
Ahh kids, the next thing we look at is the evolution of skating technique. You see in the early days, inliners didn't have their own technique, they had no one to learn from.. we basically had a combination of quad skating and ice skating. People began to learn how to go faster, people sat lower, and then there was Chad. I wasn't there, but from what I've heard Chad Hedrick comes in with this new "double push" and changed the way people skated forever. Now people could use their edges to create more speed, and suddenly the inline speed skating world had double push fever. But lately something crazy has happened.. the double push talk has kinda died down. All the top skaters still use their edges and body weight to go faster, but the super deep double push has died down. The most awesome thing about our sport, and basically any sport, is who ever is on top is how you're supposed to skate. So we follow the leaders, which ever guy comes in with something a little bit different and wins, that's the new trend. So every year we continue to evolve, or maybe it's de-evolve, just depends on who's on top at that time.
Track
At the world championship level this has been HUGE. In the early 2000, we were introduced to the track coating, and the rule that tracks could no longer be parabolic(well except this year, but shhh). Suddenly the multiple lines and passing lanes disappeared, and one rule was adopted. Protect the inside!!!!! You get to the front, and if someone is going to beat you, you make them take the long way around. Doesn't really make for the most exciting racing ever, and a lot of times when you're racing you feel like you're in a cage. You know you can go faster, but to try to move up means stepping out of the pack. And if you do that and you don't get by, suddenly you're pinned on the outside and you get shuffled back. Maybe the racing is a little bit more boring.. but wow coating makes it fun to grip! Plus times are way faster.. ex. 6.9 second flying 100 meters.
That was a quick little history lesson, but like I said earlier, our sport is young. In 10 years all of the stuff we see today will probably be looked at as ancient. Personally I would really like to thank evolution, b/c when you're super tall, it was terrible to skate on 80mm wheels. Who knows where we'll finally end up, maybe on one giant bike wheel per skate. Just know that we're still at the early stages, and a lot more will change, sit back and enjoy the ride.
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