Skating should be fun. Nowhere is this brought home better than at the Renaissance Rooms in Vauxhall, London, where from Thursday to Saturday nights adults can get the ultimate roller disco experience.

It isn’t just kids who buy roller skates. We at Skates.co.uk supply customers from 5 to 85 with roller wheels. Adults buy them mainly for fitness. Skate parks are definitely the realm of teenagers on aggressive skates, while roller discos are just for kids, right?

Nothing could be further from reality. Roller disco in the Renaissance Rooms is just one of a number of venues where roller skates are limited to the over-18s.
Roller disco is usually a case of a sports hall, a leisure centre, and tinny “Now 2000” hits being played by a bored member of staff. However, things have changed. From the swish nightclub website, to the two DJ arenas (disco and funk or house and electric), to the Stag and Hen parties in the bar, the message of the venue is plain. Why should kids have all the fun?

The home page shows a retro chick posing with one skate on a glitter ball, and that’s pretty much the theme. Despite the fact booze is heavily on the menu (the gallery shows as many bar loungers as active skaters) helmets are definitely out. Wrist guards and knee pads are in, though. Hopefully, someone will find a way of getting fashionable Roller Derby protective head gear into the costume of ballet tutu and fishnet tights for girls, anything-goes for guys and quad roller skates for everyone.

Roller derby teams currently participate in thirty active leagues in the United Kingdom. It therefore makes sense to provide information on what the new phenomenon is all about:

•    Roller derby is historically an American contact sport, played for entertainment. The name was coined in the 1920s, when roller skating races on banked cycling tracks were reported in the Chicago Tribune.

•    In the 1930s, the game switched from an endurance sport to physical contact and teamwork - elements that remain today, along with the roller skates that are specified as a continuing rule.

•    Initially, teams were of mixed sexes, and the game was played at both professional and amateur level. It was promoted by Leo Seltzer, who trademarked the name Roller Derby for use by his professional troupe of skaters.

•    Roller Derby is today seen as a women’s-only amateur sport, although, like netball, men-only leagues exist (such as the UK’s MURDA).

•    Like roller blades and Hoover, what started off as a trade name has today become generic.

•    The game is based on formation speed-skating on an elliptical track. The rules are simple – overtake opposing team skaters by whatever means possible.

•    The sport attracts business professionals, students, solicitors and fitness fanatics. Although it is associated with feminism and punk, it’s also popular with your average lady wanting to get fit - for the price of a pair of cheap roller skates you can burn an average of 500 calories an hour.

We at Skates.co.uk sell roller skates in both single and bulk format, both quad skates and inline skates. One of our best-selling quad brands is RD, or Roller Derby.

Roller Derby is one of the fastest growing sports in the UK. Although it’s still thought of as an American sport, society dames have spread the news and once a few gap-year students saw what was happening in California, many of us were hooked.

Roller derby rules are simple. It’s a contact sport and, despite regulation body armour, pretty dangerous. It’s mainly played by women in their 20s and 30s, usually professionals who want to let off steam. The concept is based around speed skating, but with quad skates – no inline skates are allowed. Here are a few other relevant facts:

•    The first UK Roller Derby league – Roller Blaze - was established in 1999, after a group of Dorset skaters and fitness fanatics went to San Francisco and saw a Roller Jam in action. They bought cycling helmets, skate pads and retro roller skates and began practicing on promenades and in parks.

•    They held some unofficial races on a banked London cycle track, but it was too early – in 2001, the UK’s first Roller Derby club was disbanded.

•    However, the sport remained popular, and in 2006 London Rollergirls was formed.

•    In 2008 the UK’s first ever international league game took place, between London Rollergirls and Canada.

•     In common with squash and golf, there have been calls for Roller Derby to be made into an Olympic sport.

•    Although it’s often thought of as a women’s-only sport, there is a Men’s UK roller Derby Association (MURDA).

•    Roller Derby is a brand name as well as a sport. Luckily, we at Skates.co.uk provide a whole range of RD roller skates for whatever needs.

While generally people should not be judged by their gender, guys have their aggressive skates and girls have their roller derbies. Roller skates aren’t just inline – we at Skates.co.uk sell a wide range of quad skates as well, which are just as popular. We imagine some of the reason is the growth of roller derby clubs in the UK, since one of the unbroken rules is that you wear quad roller skates. What is a roller derby?

Like many things, it came from the United States. Initially a mixed sport of the Depression era, today it’s a ladies-only contact sport. Whereas guys win points with aggressive skates and a few challenging ramps, players win points by hitting their opponents with full body-armour force and a touch of glamour. Gum-shields, reinforced helmets and gold lame are the norm.

Today, the Roller Derby leagues number 135 in the US, and the sport is growing in popularity in the UK. The first club opened in London in 2006, and although the London Rollergirls is still the best-known Derby league, several more are springing up across the British Isles.

The rules of Roller Derby are simple – you whip round an elliptical track as fast as you can, winning points for each person you overtake. By whatever means possible. So long as contact is above the belt, anything goes. Broken limbs sometimes happen in the bigger leagues, which is why the average age is twenty plus. This is definitely not a sport for little girls on their first set of Disney roller skates.

Nobody would suggest that a young child just tottering on their first pair of roller skates should head for their nearest municipal skate park and join in with the aggressive skaters. However, there are plenty of ways to have fun in an environment where aggressive skates are the exception, rather than the rule.

The UK has some of Europe’s biggest and best skate parks where, once you’ve got to grips with the basics, you can tentatively try out your first ramp and pipe runs in complete safety. There are “mini-ramps” for tots and beginners, special sessions for the ladies and if your friends aren’t into rollerblades and skateboards there are facilities for BMX, scooter and even Heeley owners too. Best of all, they are supervised, so the problems usually associated with skate parks – bullying, intimidation, litter and rogue moped riders – are avoided.

Most of the outdoor parks are free. The indoor ones usually charge an admission fee, but it’s no more than a few pounds and you get a lot for your money. Some are almost like skating clubs, with special events, guest “stars”, cafes and discos. They’re not just for kids, either. We at Skates.co.uk sell roller skates to people of all ages, from 5 to 75, and that’s the age range you’ll see at a public skate board park.

Doing crazy stunts isn’t something we advocate, but swimming pools have flumes and wave machines, don’t they? So it’s only fair that skate parks have foam pits and army-style assault courses. Just as in a swimming pool, safety is paramount though, so always remember to pack your elbow pads and skate helmet along with your roller blades.

You don’t have to be a total beginner to be intimidated by some of the council-owned parks that are around. If you’ve just bought your first pair of aggressive skates, nothing’s worse than entering a concrete-ramped arena populated by the local clique of grinding, popping teenagers. A properly supervised park, where an eclectic mix of locals and visitors are coming and going all day long, is often pleasanter.

What makes a good skate park? Well, first of all it should be clean and well supervised, with personnel that are familiar with roller blades and can keep a sharp eye open for dangerous behaviour. It should cover a large floor area, with interconnected ramp areas (units) that offer safe passage away from the stunt zones. These should range from easy, entry level skating to advanced ramp-and-pipe areas designed for aggressive skates.

Taking one British park at random, one situated in Bolton offers pretty much all this – and more. It has an easy-to-use website with plenty of information on opening times, facilities and so on. A medium-sized indoor park, it offers 3 large interconnected units with facilities for roller blades, skateboards, BMX bikes and scooters. There are special ladies’ sessions, competitions and special events to keep the club active – and it’s very affordable.

A big plus is that a lot of the equipment is aimed at beginner to improver level, with miniramps, flat banks, quarter pipes, curved rails, grind boxes and moveable obstacles for all levels – from little kids to 17 + teens who’ve reached a proficient level on their aggressive skates.

We at Skates.co.uk always recommend you find a professionally-run skate park to try out your new roller blades.

Where’s your favourite skate park? Is it a smart all-weather facility with pipes, foam-pools, changing rooms and qualified staff? Or a couple of wooden ramps daubed with graffiti and scattered with broken bottles? Most of us would say the latter. It’s not perfect, you might say. However, it’s near home, it’s free and at least it is possible to wear inline skates without the fear of upsetting the local dogs.

There are plenty of commercial skate parks that are much better. They’re fun, safe and patrolled by personnel that know everything there is to know about aggressive skates. We at Skates.co.uk know which sort we prefer.

One of the oldest skate parks in the UK is in Romford, London. Built in the late 1970s, this skate park is one of the few original concrete parks left and attracts skaters from across the country. You could trace the history of inline skates from the marks left on its ramps, half-pipe, bowl, pool and moguls. We at Skates.co.uk can see a time when it may become a listed monument.

If you live in Scotland take your inline skates to the town of Livingstone. The top-rated Livingstone skate park attracts professionals like Tony Hawk.  Built from concrete like the Rom, this 20-year old park has something for all levels, from professionals to tots with their first pair of Disney kids quad skates. What’s more, it’s all free. Indoor parks, like Skaterham in Surrey, lay on special events and even organise kids’ birthday parties. So next time you want to take your inline skates out, consider your options.

When skate parks first opened, they were mostly aimed at skateboard users. However, as time went on (and roller blades became popular again) they became equally popular with roller skaters. Today aggressive skates have taken over skate parks a bit – but that doesn’t mean they own them. Whatever roller skates you have, be they quads or pro inline skates, you can have fun in a park.

Skate parks are thought of as bring outdoor places, but there are plenty of indoor parks for when the weather is bad. We at Skates.co.uk recommend the latter to nervous beginners – they are less intimidating than free outdoor parks and can be better run.

One of the best – and most unusual - indoor parks in the UK is Skaterham, at Caterham in Surrey. At one time, it almost folded – luckily, a massive rescue launch rolled into operation, and now it’s even got its own website. Skaterham is housed in a historic old church, part of Caterham barracks before it was developed for housing. Today, the stained glass and angels look down on, among other things, the UK’s first advanced foam pit.

If you thought your aggressive skates had done everything that was possible, a foam pit is a must. The one at Caterham has a ramp that propels you – one at a time for safety – to a 28 foot long raised pit full of foam blocks. It’s the inline skates equivalent of the ball pond you used to dive into as a little kid.

There could be an indoor skate park where you live; you and your inline skates can have fun whatever the weather.

Hockey ice skates and figure ice skates vary in the width between the two edges and the radius of hollow. Hockey ice skates tend to have a narrower blade than figure skates, with a shallower curve.

To begin with, you won’t notice a lot of difference. The ice skates we sell at Skates.co.uk are set up for the appropriate level and generally those blades will be the best ones for that level. Generally the ROH for novice to intermediate level is set at around ½”. This gives a good balance between glide, speed and grip.

Whichever ice skates you buy, the blades will need to be sharpened. Nowadays, this is done by machine. The metal used for ice skates is very hard, and it needs an abrasive wheel – doing it by hand won’t work. Most skaters opt for having their ice skates sharpened by a specialist, using a commercial machine. We at Skates.co.uk recommend you do this, rather than try to do it at home using a DIY power tool. Besides anything else, you could ruin your blades and it could be dangerous.

It’s essential the person sharpening your ice skates is skilled in using the machine. The hollow must be exactly central, and the edges ground so both are at exactly the same height. The tiniest error will make all the difference to your performance. The best bet is to find someone who has a computer-aided machine. Although expensive, these bring operator error down to a very low level and are unlikely to damage your blades.

Radius of hollow (ROH) refers to the size of hollow that’s cut into the blade of ice skates to provide the skating edge. Skaters use the edges of this groove to cut into the ice.

A large ROH (1 – 2”) gives a better glide but reduced sideways grip since the ice skates don’t cut the ice so deeply. This type of blade is best suited to experienced skaters who want to skate fast. The blades will dull quickly and thus need sharpening more often. Early figure skaters favoured wide ROH blades as they were marked on the patterns they cut in the ice. If both blades cut a curve they would be marked down, hence they wanted an almost flat blade.

The size of ROH you use depends on several factors:

•    Your body weight. Heavy people need a wider ROH. Light people need a narrower ROH as the blades of their ice skates aren’t cutting into the ice so deeply.

•    The temperature of the ice. The colder an ice rink is, the harder it is, and the deeper the ROH needs to be. Most ice rinks have an optimum temperature.

•    The level of skill you’ve achieved. Novice skaters are better off with a lower ROH. However, experienced skaters prefer a high ROH as it gives them extra speed and control.

•    The discipline you have chosen. We at Skates.co.uk will always help you choose the best ice skates to suit your experience and discipline.