Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

TIL have a selection of merchendise available at Sheffield’s Derby Store including T Shirts, badges and stickers. Derby Store is also stocked with a whole host of derby goodies and is the only derby centric store of its kind in England. From the latest 187 derby pads to some super sexy Bont skates the store has a huge range of fantastic derby stock. If you’re in Sheffield any derby folk should make sure they have a visit, if not check out their website to see more.
Website: www.derbystore.co.uk

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/DerbyStore

Twitter: @derbystoreuk

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Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

Just get on with it.

Right. *taking a deep breath* In the world of skate manufacturers, assemblers, and tuners there are many fiercely held opinions as to what king pin angle is best.  The debate over ‘DA45 versus 10 degree’ is full of pontificating, trolling, and outright hostility on both ‘sides’ which sees many people who just want to skate being insulted or confused by the onslaught that follows an innocent question.

In my usual style, I’m going to try and break through the wall of BS, take a quick shower to get the smell off, then look at the pros and cons of this area.

The kingpins are the two big bolts you find on the underside of your skates, they carry most of the load, and the geometry in play when you go around a corner is complex and is affected by it’s angle.  Skate plates are commonly categorized by that angle, which is measured from vertical, and it’s perceived affect on the action (how the plate handles a corner).

One of these on each foot should do the trick!

Of course, by lumping different plates together there’s often a lack of consideration as to other subtle factors in a plate’s handling – the angle between the kingpin and the pivot pin (see my previous blogs if you don’t know what that is), the deck height (ie. the distance between the axles and the sole of your boot) and the axle’s relation to where the kingpin and pivot pin intersect.  These things have a subtle effect, which if all added together can greatly affect why someone does or doesn’t like a particular skate plate – so of course you need to do some research before putting money down.

As a general rule of thumb, the larger the kingpin angle from vertical, the more it will allow the wheels to steer around corners for you, when given the same amount pressure to the side of your foot.  A steep kingpin (say, 5 or 7 degrees) is commonly used for speed skating where going around corners isn’t a priority – extreme high-speed stability on a track much larger than our derby oval is whats needed.  Plates which fit this description are Boens (expensive, not currently in production), Prolines (just expensive), Reactors (a copy of the Proline plate which is not quite as well made, but still expensive), and Novas (cheap, but has some disadvantages).  Oddly enough, Sketchers skates (including the Britney Spears ones) have steep kingpins.

So very very steep - the Nova

Most beginner skates come with 10 degree plates.  A little more turny than the hardcore speed plates, they allow broad sweeping turns to be tackled without picking your feet up, yet still have straight-line stability as a priority.  Because many people learn on this, they prefer to stick with something in the same ballpark.  Examples of these would be Powerdyne Tritons, the unbranded metal plates that come on £40 beginner skates, and most rental skates.

At the 15 degree mark we start getting some interesting stuff – plates that are made for figure skating and roller hockey, and some of the better offerings on beginner skates.  This is where a compromise between stability and cornering begins and we start to see plates which allow non-superhuman skaters to achieve good all-round performance in derby.  Examples include Roll Line Variants (and their copies, such as Crazy Skates, Polar, and STD … that last one is a real skate brand in case you’re wondering), Sure-Grip Probes, and the new plates being made by Bont.

The Variant M: a lot of plate for about £120, better made than it's copies.

As we go above 15 degrees there’s a lull in the range of plates available, which is limited to ones designed for figure skating such as the Roll Line Nova and Ring, which are 22 degrees if my memory serves me right …

… until we reach the bad boys at the top of the list – the Sure Grip and Snyder DA45s.  Despite the name, the kingpin angle is actually at 30 degrees and is derived from a ’60s design which was made to replicate the handling of ice skates while on dry land for some of the world’s best figure skaters.  The way that DA45s are tuned affects them more than most other skates, and you can end up with very unruly skates that want to steer themselves or with two lumps on your feet that won’t turn at all, if it’s not done right.

The Snyder Royal; the Aston Martin of skate plates.

When tuned correctly for the skater, however, they can perform amazingly well for derby and are a dream for jam refs.  Moves like lateral cuts, weaving and skating backwards are made easier.  Examples of DA45 plates are the Magnesium Avenger (very very lightweight) and the Snyder Royal (very very shiny).  The DA45 requires a different technique, but does allow average skaters a large helping hand in maneuverability.

As of right now, I generally point people towards two different plates for derby use: Roll Line Variant Ms and Sure-Grip Magnesium Avengers.  For an average derby skater either will do an admirable job, are not stratospherically expensive, hold their resale value reasonably well, and have a low risk of parts failure compared to the competition – it just depends on how hard you want to be able to turn.  Caveat Emptor, however – do read up and if possible try out different plates before you buy, and remember, any change of plate will need a little bit of retraining for you to find it’s limits, although it’s not typically more than a couple of practices.

For more content like this, head right on over to The Inhuman League. Or get more from this author: Spin

Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

After an extended absence, I’m back! I gained some weight, lost some muscle, and the house is a tip, but it’s time to get back to skating! Oh dear, those derby skates of mine look like a right mess … I need to take some action.

No, not that kind of action...

The skates I use for derby are Rebel Invaders, in red because it’s my favorite color, and were a present back in the autumn of 2010. Apart from minor tweaks for comfort and to protect the boot all I’ve done is to tune them to my ability as I’ve progressed in derby, so they looked well worn but nearly bog standard.

Just a little dog-eared

Now, my bank account isn’t exactly bursting with cash, and given these skates are about the most comfortable footwear I own, rather than replace anything I elected to give them a makeover. And because this is me talking, it was an extreme makeover!

The first thing I did was to pull them apart and inspect everything. The boots were still basically sound, but they’re the cheapest leather ones you can get, and as such are vinyl coated rather than having a proper tannery treatment – where I had heavily taped up the toes when I first got them the vinyl had peeled away leaving a messy gray powdery surface.

Now they look even worse! What was I thinking?!

That wouldn’t do, and I had some left over red leather dye kicking around, so I used a sparkplug brush (basically a little and soft-ish wire brush) to take the toes down to the suede. I then added three generous coats of the dye, which resulted in nicely sealed presentable toes, although they still looked a little rough and the color didn’t match 100% (this was, after all, done with what I had laying around).

Next up I wanted to make some new toeguards. Unfortunately getting toeguards that snugly fit these boots is tricky, and I didn’t have a pile of leather laying around to make my own nice ones, so I elected to make what I’ve come to call ‘ghetto guards’. These are made from plastic milk containers (though you could use old ice cream tubs instead) and hockey tape – and they last ages.

Better, but it's still not looking great ...

You just form the plastic around the shape of the toe by making small cuts, overlapping the plastic to form the relevant curves, and then keep it in shape with the hockey tape, which is also it’s protective outer layer (pictured is one before I add the top layer of tape). I had previously made some in a hurry, which resulted in having one skate look like it had a bulbous toe, but by taking more care this time I ended up with both being tight fitting and looking pretty smart. I do still use my ancient and well-worn Sure-Grip guard straps over the top; I probably don’t need them with the ghetto guards, but I’ve had them forever and it would be weird to look down and not see them.  Belt and braces never hurt.

Another area that required attention was the side of the boot that goes under me when I do baseball slides, which had gradually eroded to the point where the velcro was coming away from the leather of the speed strap. I used a little dye to touch up the exposed parts of leather, then added thin strips of hockey tape vertically around the velcro and strap to hold them tightly together, but not cover a load of the velcro surface, then an extra bit of tape over the top edge of the strap, which is the area that gets the most abuse from falling that way.

Satisfied, I then went on to the plates. There was absolutely nothing wrong with them, which isn’t surprising given that there are people skating on Invaders that are over 30 years old out there, and they were once used by old-school derby skaters because of their strength as well as performance. Invaders come from the factory powder coated in black, and if I wanted to spend money on them I could have taken them to a powder coating place and had them acid-stripped an re-coated in the color of my choosing.

Given that I wanted this to be a budget makeover I decided to grab some car paint, gave them a quick rub-down with wire wool, and then a couple of coats of red paint. It was an improvement, but I wanted more, so I masked them off in a zebra-stripe pattern and applied some yellow paint over the top.

Unfortunately I only had cheap masking tape to hand, so when it was removed some of the yellow had seeped through, however from a distance they look just fine so for now I’m just rolling with it (ahh, I crack me up with my witty observations …).  The final touches came in the form of a second-hand set of wheels from a fellow league member, and some nearly-new Qube 8-ball bearings as a present from a friend (which came in kit form).

The wheels needed a thorough polish (not surprising considering they were third hand and cost £20) but came up nicely, and the bearings just needed assembly, though I did add some shields from a set of Romanian bearings I had laying around too, to keep the muck out (early 8-balls had shields with a small gap in them, so they usually get dirty far too quickly).

Before and after. I love my dremel!

And when everything was put together they look quite spiffy. So here’s to the next year of skating on my trusty Rebel Invaders!

Much more presentable

Next week I’ll be talking about kingpin angles, and why you should care about them. In the mean time keep on rollin’

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Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

Apologies for the absence of last week’s blog and the tardiness of this one, I was trying to work through being ill and it mostly resulted in being at work or unconscious, or unconscious at work. I’m now writing this while wrapped up on the sofa, with a mug of tea in my hand, hoping to be well enough to skate by Stuffmas.

looking considerably less glamorous than this

I promised a look at keeping wheels happy in the last installment. Wheels aren’t high maintenance items, but these are the things to know…

If you practice on dirty skate tile (ie. Skate Central in Sheffield), you’ll notice a layer of ‘floorskin’ on the outside of your wheels (some seem more prone to attract it than others), occasionally enhanced with a little bubblegum or other lovely additions. Elsewhere, your wheels may become coated in sticky dust, floor polish or grip compound. Going from one floor to another with stuff stuck to your wheels won’t help your performance.

Still, it could be worse

There’s plenty of ways to clean wheels, if you don’t want to take them off the skates a vigorous rub with kitchen towel or a plastic pan scrub will take a lot of muck off. For anything thats left, I use alcohol wipes which are sold for medical purposes (at the time of writing, £2 inc postage for 100 of them on ebay). Some people are under the impression that alcohol harms urethane, but thats not the case in my experience.

If your wheels are generally grotty looking, you can pop them out, remove the bearings, and clean them in regular washing up water with a plastic pan scrub – this will usually bring them up looking like new. There is a possibility for wheels to get a little water between the hub and tire, but I’ve not had problems with this myself and it’s a handy indicator of a problem where the tire pulls away from the hub – I’ll go into that further down, though.

Given regular use wheels do wear down, to this end if you notice some of your tires are more worn than others you should swap them around to try and get as even wear as possible; if one wheel carries on getting all the wear and tear it will end up being a different size to the others!

When the grooves are worn away from a wheel, it doesn’t mean it’s worn out. Some wheels will carry on performing in the exact same way – this is especially true of Atom Poisons, or similar hybrid wheels, thanks to their incredibly soft urethane. If you feel the performance is worse, you can get them re-grooved.

Excessive stops and slides can have the effect of ‘flatspotting’ your wheel, where a single part of the tire gets worn down to the point where it appears flat. You can minimize this by not putting your wheels at right angles when t-stopping, so the wheels on your back foot turn while you’re slowing down, by favoring Tomahawks (aka. ‘derby stops’) if you have toe stops and by switching around what stops you do, and which foot you use for them – this is good practice anyway! These can only really be removed by regrooving.

Coning is something that happens with softer wheels that have a lip, or if you do a lot of dance moves. The outside of the tire wears much faster than the inside, making it appear cone shaped. There’s not a whole heap you can do about this, but there’s no reason you can’t roll on coned wheels anyway, if they perform well enough for you. Buying wheels without a lip and paying attention to your technique are about the only things that can help avoid it.

Though some people like them that way anyway...

Some wheels have an issue with ‘chunking’, where a lump of the wheel comes off seemingly at random. If you get this on a new wheel, ask for a replacement from the manufacturer straight away, if it happens to an old one then consider swapping brand or model when it comes time for new wheels. Unless chunking is excessive it shouldn’t affect the performance a huge amount, but you should keep a close eye on it in case the wheel rapidly deteriorates.

If you pick up a second-hand set of old wheels they can often be glazed, where the outer surface of the urethane has hardened over time. To avoid this happening to your wheels keep them at room temperature and out of direct sunlight. Glazed wheels can be regrooved, or you can give them a good hard skate on smooth asphalt to scrub off the outer layer.

So what is this regrooving malarkey? Well, basically it’s using a machine to cut a new set of grooves into the wheel. Obviously you wouldn’t do this if you had a choice, since it’s shaving material off the wheel and thus shortening it’s life, but it is a good way to breathe new life into problem wheels. When getting wheels regrooved the whole set needs to be cut down to the same extent to avoid them feeling weird afterwards. Sometimes the cost of getting it done is uneconomical, especially on cheaper wheels, so check before rushing out to get those old Caymans done!

Now there are wheels which are notorious for having ‘tire separation’, where the tire becomes unstuck from the hub so it moves around, either causing them to handle badly or to make funny squeeky noises. Sure-Grip Power Plus wheels often suffer from this, but it can happen to plastic hubbed wheels too. If you wash your wheels in soapy water then find water seeps out when you skate on them, it’s a sure sign that this is happening. Ironically this is rarely a problem on wheels with removable tires such as the Vangard Fanjets.

If you have tire separation it’s easily solved – simply pull the tire away from the hub and slip a small amount of a suitable adhesive between the tire and hub (all the way ’round, and on both the inside and outside of the wheel too if possible). Don’t deliberately pull the tire away from the hub where it’s still attached, though! Suitable adhesives would be anything designed to stick shoe soles together, as these will properly adhere to both surfaces.

Just be careful you don't stick yourself to the wheels or something...

Ok, to wrap up for this week I’ll simply say that there’s a lot of wheels out there that aren’t getting used for one reason or another. If you have wheels you no longer want, which could be repaired and used some more, why not spread a little derby love by passing them on to a freshie who wants them? If they’re beyond help, you can always turn them into awards with the help of a little gold paint instead…

For more content like this, head right on over to The Inhuman League. Or get more from this author: Spin

Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

During the first season of Robot Wars in the UK one of the robots dominated the competition – ‘Road Block’.  It used the motors and wheels from an electric wheelchair, had a very low center of gravity, and could move fast and turn sharply.  The wheels weren’t all that grippy, and it wasn’t very big, but it could easily push someone several times it’s weight, sat on a normal school chair, around on a smooth surface … I know this because I got into trouble for being the person on the chair.

And then it started going on and on about 'danger' so we ditched it and went to the cafeteria

Now, when it comes to roller skate wheels, the same things affect how they perform – it’s not just about how much you weigh, it’s where you put that weight and how much power you can put behind it. On the path of learning to skate most people can start on almost any wheel, but as soon as crossovers and some leg muscles come along there’s a need for lots and lots of grip, so soft wheels, to reign in a high center of gravity without changes in technique.

As technique and strength improve many people will begin to look at harder wheels, so that they get ‘a bit of slip’ and in order to go faster – the less a wheel squishes under you, the more ‘roll’ it will have, letting you go faster for the same amount of effort. Also, other properties come into play – hub strength, tire width, tire lip, urethane thickness etc all sway the finer points of how wheels behave, and thus how you skate … and I think nows as good a time as any to go through what these factors might mean to you, and what wheel options are out there.

First up, a little technical information; Any modern skate wheel can go on any modern skate, provided you have the right kind of bearings to hand (either 7mm, or FAR more commonly, 8mm).The hub (the hard middle part of the wheel) can be made of different materials with different effects, nylon is the most common and is also the cheapest but you can also have delrin (a hard plastic with metal-like properties), aluminum or even hubless wheels. The tire that goes around the outside, for the purposes of this article, is made of urethane – a plastic poured with different ingredients to give it elastic or rubber-like properties.

Speed wheels are usually the default starter wheels in derby. 62mm high and 44mm wide, with a lip at the outside, on a middling size hub thats usually made of nylon. Designed for large oval track speed skating, the lip allows you to flick your toe out at the end of a stroke for a little more speed, and the diameter is designed to be comfortable for most adult skaters to handle when going fast.Good examples of these are Faster Grips, Sure-Grip Fugitives or Backspin Revenges.

Hockey wheels are made to be slid sideways and minimize the risk of tripping or interference with hockey sticks. Because of this they’re usually skinny (Roll Line wheels have down to 21mm width of urethane) and have a very thin tire with a stiff hub. They feel hard and make a bunch of noise when braking. Good examples of these are Roll Line Greases and Menighini Spiders.

‘Slim’ wheels are something thats gaining in popularity for derby skaters. These are constructed in the same way as speed wheels, however are around 38 or 40mm wide and have either very little or no lip. The theory is that you get a speed wheel, only with less chance of catching yourself on someone else’s skates when in the pack. Good examples of these are Atom Omegas or the just released Rollerbones Turbos.

Solid wheels are made up almost entirely of urethane, with only a minimal hub for the bearings to sit in. They’re not often seen outside of Europe for anything other than casual outdoor use (where having a very thick tire helps soak up the lumps and bumps), however if you’re not fussy about the increased weight there’s no reason they can’t be used for derby too. A good example of these are SFR Slicks.

Now, all types of wheels are available in different hardnesses, typically listed as a number followed by the letter a, which is on the durometer scale (basically a quantifiable denotation of friction that any given material can provide … sorry, slipped into academia BS mode there … it shows how grippy stuff is). These numbers can only be used as a rough guideline since manufacturers will only test once, but produce many wheels with a natural variation over time.And some manufacturers purposefully mis-label their products for marketing purposes (mentioning no names, but the most notorious for this begins with an A).

On a sliding scale, expect the following – 70a: marshmallow like longboard wheels that look like you have a flat tire all the time. 78a: a common hardness for good outdoor leisure skating. 84a: typically referred to as ‘hybrids’ as these can be used outdoors as well as in, these are about the grippiest any derby skater would want indoors … and about the hardest any uber serious outdoor skater could handle. 88/89a: this is the realm of the ‘pushers’, the’re what most derby skaters will want for very slippery surfaces and can be mixed with harder wheels as a compromise. 92/93a: softer speed wheels, about the most common hardness used by experienced average-weight female derby skaters. 95/97a: up into serious speed wheels now, these are useful if you’re on skate tiles, or you’re heavier than an average woman, or you’re very handy with the footwork.100a+: Bonkers territory, almost no grip but great if you need to radically improve your footwork or master plow or hockey stops.

Avoid using very soft wheels or before you know it, your iPhone will morph into a 1991 Nokia!

The smaller you are, the more comfortable you’re gonna be on soft wheels, and there are now good wheels available in smaller diameters too. 59mm diameter wheels won’t be as rock-steady as 62mm wheels at full pelt, but for petite skaters they’ll make getting up to speed easier; some tall blockers may find an increase in low-speed agility helpful too.

Anyone who, like me, is over 160lbs or so (about 11 1/2 stone) will notice a big difference in aluminum hubs, since they won’t deform under your weight. This converts to more predictable hopping around, improved top speed, and most importantly an improved feel as to what your skates are doing. I would heartily urge anyone who is on the heavy side to try some good metal-hubbed wheels!

Right thats all for now!  Next week we’ll be looking at how to keep your wheels performing well.

For more content like this, head right on over to The Inhuman League. Or get more from this author: Spin

Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

Toestops in derby are something of a necessary evil, they’re damn handy for specific tasks but when learning to skate they can become something of a crutch. I didn’t realize this until I got some Dance Plugs, which are just little nubs and go where your toestops are, and did a couple of derby practices … it was a shock to the system to say the least.

I fell. Lots. I swore, I hurt, and I fell more times than I would ever have thought! Now, however, I’m not rushing to put those stops back in. My footwork, especially hopping around in the pack, is much improved. Powerslide stops no longer scare me and I feel like I’m ready to start practicing hockey stops. Duck walking may look goofy but it works amazingly well.

So what are they good for? The first two strides off the Jammer Line, Tomahawks (aka. derby stops), sliding on when blocking while facing the wrong way, heel-toe running in the pack. Thats it – skaters at the highest level will have the ability to do without these things, but for those of us who are mortal, they give a distinct advantage.

If you’re in the market for new / different / better stops, what do you want to look for? Well, as you’ll have already guessed, the choice is a personal one. There are a myriad of different designs, but they can be boiled down to the following:

Regular roundies – circular stops, available in a variety of materials. If they get worn on one side you can just turn them around a bit. Originally designed to allow art skaters to perform jumps in the same way an ice skater uses their picks. At the time of writing Gumballs give the best performance for price, closely followed by Snyder’s large stops.

Shaped – featuring squared off edges that are designed to present a flat edge to the floor. Usually they only work one way around. Reidell’s Midi Grippers (that come with R3s) aren’t bad if you stop them from undoing themselves (see lower down), Sure-Grip Grippers in black are a good choice, unfortunately their colored stops are prone to failure.

Hockey – designed to put as much rubber on the ground as possible, these are huge. A good choice for those who want to do head-on blocking as they offer stability. Roll Line’s Professional Artistic stops are very nice examples, despite the misleading name.

Mini stoppers – not surprisingly, these are just regular stops with a tiny head. A good choice if you only want to do Tomahawks or if skate weight is imperative to you. You probably need to do some shopping in the US to find good ones.

Jam Plugs – little nubs that screw all the way into the plate, designed for dance move holds, they are functional if tiny. Reidell brand are unfortunately useless, despite being the easiest to buy in the UK. I found good ones on ebay.

Dance Plugs – these just plug the hole left by a toe stop and stop you accidentally scratching the floor if you fall. I ended up having to buy these from the US since UK skate retailers didn’t seem to know what I was on about!

Bell Stops – the big stops that come on cheap skates, not adjustable but can be mounted on a heel brake to make downhill outdoors less hairy. Kryptonics brand are excellent.

Important stuff you should know: There are three different threads used for toe stops. 5/8” x 18tps (Imperial) is used for most skates, specifically those made in/for the US. 7 x 1mm (Metric) is what European skates use, and Bell stops use a much smaller thread (something like ¼”, but don’t quote me on that).

Stop!

Anywhere that supplies derby gear will likely only stock imperial sized stops, and not mention what the thread is. Plates that take metric stops can be ‘tapped out’ to take imperial ones instead – this provides a greater choice of stops, but is a one-way street. Roll Line Pro Artistic, and some other European stops, are available in imperial at no extra cost, but be careful when ordering!

When it comes to securing your stops anything that uses a grub screw to hold them (which is most metal plates) can be set and forgotten about, but if you have plastic plates that use a securing nut chances are they’ll come loose under hard use unless you take precautions. Threadlock, available from places like Halfords and Screwfix Direct, is a light glue thats made to stop screws and bolts from coming undone; use it sparingly and you’ll have no problems taking out your stops when you need to, but they should be far more resistant to coming undone on their own.

Fancy footwork, helped by practice without stops

I would urge everyone who is serious about playing derby to live without stops for a whole month, having them taken away gives unexpected insight into skating and will make you a better skater. Personally, I’m only putting mine back in when ramping up to play a bout – I like skating without a whole heap more!

For more content like this, head right on over to The Inhuman League. Or get more from this author: Spin

Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

Are you sitting comfortably?

When you’re playing derby, or just skating in general, doesn’t it make sense to take away as many distractions as you can? Increasing your comfort within your Derby attire needn’t take a huge amount of effort and it may help improve your performance, especially when doing extended training sessions.

Lets start with your noggin – helmets can be tweaked for the perfect fit, if you can get your hands on small amounts of wetsuit material or spare pads from other helmets (I’ve raided bike shops for this in the past) you can tailor them into hugging your head just the right amount – I use sticky gum blobs that are sold for putting posters on walls to secure some of the padding in my helmet.

The buildup of heat under the helmet can be uncomfortable, you can make sure all the vents are clear of obstructions to help, or maybe look for a better vented helmet. I use bandanas (a whole £2 each from Rocky Horrors in Sheffield) across my forehead to act as a ‘swamp cooler’ by just soaking up sweat – this has additionally meant I’ve been able to remove the forehead pad from my helmet altogether. Also, wearing bandanas is cool.

Exhibit A.

If you find the chin strap chafes then it’s easy to make a little material cover to slip over it. Whatever you do, don’t loosen that strap as that would be very dangerous in the event of an unplanned faceplant.

If you find your gumshield is uncomfortable or restricts breathing then you’ll need to invest in another. On particularly bulky ones the back can be trimmed down, but be careful that this isn’t done to the extent that it reduces the protection it provides (also, Refs check for overly cut-down mouthguards as part of the pre-bout kit check).

When it comes to your other pads, hopefully they’re all the right size. You should not make modifications (beyond very basic repairs) to wrist guards as every part of them is structural, but the back-of-joint areas of knee and elbow pads can be modified if you find them too hot or if chafing happens (common with some pads when your joins are moving a lot … like when playing derby). In the back of sleeve-type pads a window can be cut in the sleeve, or it can be removed altogether, as long as the pad is still securely attached to your body when done up and there’s no bits hanging off.

It’s at this point I have to remind myself that I’m writing this blog from a men’s derby website, so there might be a larger than usual proportion of readers who aren’t familiar with how a needle and thread works … basically, you need to make sure you take steps to make sure seams don’t split and the edge of material isn’t going to tear under pressure. If you’re not confident in this regard, find someone who is since just taking a pair of scissors to your pads may leave them in a dangerous condition!

Now, if you suffer from skin complaints you might well find that just the act of wearing pads leaves your skin feeling uncomfortable in one way or another. A good solution to this is to use bandage material, old t-shirts, or holed knee socks as a source of more skin-friendly material to go between you and the pad – these can then be put on clean for every session.

Despite what some people fear, provided all velcro surfaces are matched up it’s ok to put your pads in the washing machine for a light warm wash; 30°, or 40° for boys, is plenty to get the funk out. Do this sparingly and they’ll be fine – your repeated pummeling during derby skating will wear them out long before washing does!

Don’t forget the little things – socks can be very important, seamless sneaker liners are amazingly comfortable, but good quality sports socks are another alternative. These are not to be confused with cheap sweat socks that have sports branding, which are far from ideal.

Thinner socks are preferable, no matter how comfy fluffy ones look

And as for the rest? Well, I see a lot of male Derby skaters wearing long heavy shorts and full t-shirts, who are then dripping with sweat. While this appears to be an area where girls generally make more sound decisions, they’re not immune to bad choices too. If sweat is collecting in your clothes and being held against your skin then it will affect your performance – the pores in other areas will have to make up the difference by giving out yet more sweat, leading to hydration and electrolyte issues. In extreme cases your body might just not be able to loose enough heat to keep going.

Tops made from sweat-wicking materials can be found very cheaply and do help loads, but even a regular t-shirt can be improved by opening the neck up or removing the sleeves with a pair of scissors. For me, despite the loss in shapeliness, a sports bra makes a vast difference too and I have a couple of sweat wicking tops with a built-in bra for when it gets stupidly hot. For the boys, have a look at swimming and basketball shorts, since these are made from lighter materials but still have the same shape as the long shorts that appear to be de rigeur.

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Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

So, you put your money where your mouth is and spent all your cash on some shiny shiny skates … but they don’t fit right, and now you’ve skated on them it’s too late to get a refund.  Don’t panic!

I spent HOW MUCH on skates?! (this is a regular scene in my home ...)

There are ways and means of improving the fit of skates without going to the bother and cost of replacing them, although some techniques may involve a fair amount of elbow grease!  Generally having skates that are a little too big is easy to deal with, so we’ll start there …

Laces

So, if your boots are too big, you can just lace them tighter, right?  No.  Hell no.  All that happens is that you’re likely to cut off circulation to your toes while the sole of your foot carries on swimming around.  To use laces effectively there are a couple of methods – you can use two short laces on each boot (if your existing ones are generous on length you might be able to get away with cutting them in half).  The first small set can be used for the bottom half of the boot’s eyelets, the second for the top half, enabling you to tie the top and bottom to a different tightness as needed.

The other smart way is my favorite, using waxed hockey laces (my personal preference is for Elite brand).  These are made for Ice Hockey players, the waxing on the laces means that once you’ve put them to a certain tightness, they will just stay there.  It also has handy side effect of making the laces very abrasion resistant (my Derby skates have a pair now that are 15 months old and not yet frayed) and they don’t get stuck on velcro either.

Insoles

Insoles are quite essential to your foot’s comfort, yet most skates come with paper-thin ones which can become a real hindrance after a couple of months.  You can get good quality insoles from good sporting goods stores, they vary in thickness but the ones designed for joggers typically have a good molded heel shape and extra arch support.  Having this style of insole has the handy side-effect that it takes out much of the vibration from skating outdoors on rough asphalt.

Ankle supports

Now, wearing a good quality ankle support over extended periods (unless medically advised to) can cause your joints to weaken, so it’s ill advised.  However, very cheap supports do very little actual support; what they do do is to provide a thick piece of wetsuit material thats perfectly formed to go around your ankle.  You can also make your own if you can lay your hands on suitable material, in the US beer koozies are a common source in a handy tube shape – I don’t know if these can be bought in the UK.

Thick socks

These can make a surprising difference, the first set of skates I bought for Derby were a little big so I just wore two pairs of thick socks.  This is very much frowned upon by experienced skaters, however it worked very nicely for me.  I’d advise using socks made from materials that don’t stick together though, so if there’s a rub it won’t translate into a blister.

Post-skating footcare might help, too, but buy a bowl to soak your feet. Seriously.

This is all well and good, but what if it’s the other way around and your feet are being squeezed?  Well there’s plenty that can be done about that, too.

Laces

Again, changes can be made in the lace department – the same changes I suggested for loose boots can be applied in order to open the boots up where needed.  You can also skip a few eyelets in problem areas to allow a bit more give – it’s not uncommon to see Sure-Grip Rebel owners skipping the first three pairs of eyelets, for instance.

Stretching

If you have boots made from synthetic materials then this is where things get tricky – over time your boots will stretch a little to the shape of your feet, however it’s not something that can be done overnight.  To avoid blisters you can use makeup pads in your socks where things rub the worst.

Heavily padded leather boots, such as the Reidell Carreras, are tricky too, you can hurry up the stretching process with a regular application of a leather conditioner such as saddle soap.  For small areas that are tight you can have them ‘punched out’ by a cobbler’s shop, or in Sheffield this is something The Puck Stop can do for you.  Despite the scary name, all this involves is stretching a specific area using a machine designed for the purpose.

You can also heat parts of the leather up by using a hairdryer or (very carefully) a heat gun, while pushing out from inside the boot with the handle of a screwdriver, or any similar implement you have to hand.

If you have leather boots with thin or no lining, then you can also try using Isopropyl Alcohol which can be bought at electrical parts shops such as Maplin.  This technique is handy when you have a lot of stretching to do and not a lot of time to get it done!  All you do is load the alcohol into an old squirt-bottle and spray it on the inside of the desired area until the leather is completely soaked through (if your boots have leather soles try to keep it away from them as you don’t want the sole stretching!).  Then, with a thick pair of socks on, put your boots on and lace them up tight – keep them on until all the alcohol has dried up, and apply a leather conditioner to keep it healthy and flexible.

Lastly, some boots are heat-moldable.  This generally involves putting your boots in the oven (without the plates etc attached) and then putting them on your feet as they cool.  If you’re contemplating this follow the manufacturer’s instructions very carefully, and if in doubt ask someone who has done it before to give you a hand.

Mmm, toasty!

If you’ve tried all this and your boots still don’t fit then it really is time to consider different boots, if you’re uncomfortable while skating it will affect your performance and hinder the learning experience!

Next week I plan on covering some other factors that can affect your kit’s comfort, so stay tuned …

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Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

In my last post, all about cushions, I mentioned pivot pins – they can often be ignored, however there’s a couple of points that anyone who wants to maintain their own skates should know.

Time to get your hands dirty!

While kingpins take most of the strain and are the securing point for the cushions, the pivot pins are the other, smaller, point of contact between the truck and the plate. They provide the fixed point that makes your skate’s geometry work, and as such their main job is to stay put.

On basic skates this isn’t too hard, they’re not made for precision performance and as such being able to adjust the pivots would be overkill. That doesn’t mean there’s nothing to do, though! Firstly, on all skates the Pivot Cups (the sockets into which the Pins sit) do wear out over time – if you have been skating regularly for a year or more on the same skates then do regularly check them by trying to wiggle the pivot pin from side to side. If you get a wiggle of more than half a millimeter, it’s time to order some more; if the cup wears through, your pin will start to grind it’s way through your plate!

Secondly, you might want to get a tiny little bit of white lithium grease (available at bicycle shops, car parts places, etc) into your pivot cups, to make them less likely to wear out unexpectedly. This is especially important on plates with metal pivot cups.

Lastly, if you have Powerdyne Thrust or Triton plates, as seen on R3s, Vixens, etc, you might want to take a fine metal file to your pivot pins to remove the casting lumps, so they look smooth and the cup will wear more evenly – just don’t go overboard and make them shorter in the process, because that would be bad.

And you'd know how this guy feels

Which neatly brings me on to adjustable pivot pins

Now, those of you out there with an engineering background will have already spotted that adjusting the pressure on your cushions moves the truck’s relative position to the plate, and you can’t just do that without affecting the pivots in some way.

On fancy-pants plates like Sure-Grip DA45s, Snyders, Roll Lines, Prolines, etc, the pivot is made to be adjustable so you can account for those changes and fine-tune the skate’s handling. They all adjust in the same manner, namely the end of the pivot pin is screwed in or out as needed then set in place with a locking nut – simple! The tricky part is knowing how to adjust them.

If you have your skates apart you can set the pivot pins to the right ballpark by putting the cushions nearest the plate on and resting the trucks in place. You can then adjust the pivot so it just about makes contact with the bottom of the cup when you have the truck sat square on the cushion while apply a little pressure (to simulate having the rest of the components in place and tightened up).

If, when all assembled, you can push the pin noticeably into the cup and have it come back out when you release pressure, then your pins are too short; the net effect this has is to make the handling sluggish and to put more pressure than is ideal on the kingpin. If your skates are entirely incapable of going in a straight line (ie. feeling like there’s a ‘hump’ in the middle which you can’t stay at the middle of without considerable effort), then they’re too long.

While your skates are assembled it’s a good idea to only adjust the pins a quarter turn at a time (or even a sixth of a turn if you want perfection) as small changes can make the difference between spot on and uncomfortably out. Don’t be surprised if all four of them end up at different stages of adjustment when you’re all done.

And remember, if you change your cushions or make large changes to their adjustment, you will need to check and adjust the pivots too.

At the end of the day, it's about getting your cushions juuust right

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Originally posted on The Inhuman League.

Today I’m going to be talking about cushions.  Yes, the rubber rings that look kinda like suspension under your skates.

Now cushions (often called ‘bushings’ by skateboarders and engineer types) are a vital part of quad skates - they control how your skates behave when you’re going in a straight line, going around corners, hopping from foot to foot, and wobbling on the edge of going out of bounds … they affect EVERYTHING.

But for many people they sit there for years, ignored, abused, and beaten on; hopefully by the end of this post you’ll feel you know enough about cushions to try making changes and maybe get a little love from your skates in the process.

The cushions which come with most skates are nasty rock hard things; given that their job is to regulate how much pressure is needed to lean your skate over in order to turn corners, and to control how quickly they return to straight up for going straight again, it means that these bad cushions are what you have to fight against and can often be the cause of foot and lower leg pain.

There are two kinds of materials used in modern cushions: rubber and urethane.  Both can compress at a similar rate and pressure, however rubber will generally take to its new squashed shape happily – ‘taking an edge’ as figure skaters would describe it, whereby the skate is set at the amount of turn thats needed – whereas urethane always works to get back to its normal shape.  This has the effect that urethane feels ‘springy’ and when doing deep crossovers and hopping around your wheels ‘snap back’ as soon as pressure is taken off, which means saving a lot of energy for jammers and upwardly mobile blockers.

As with so many things, the choice between the two is personal preference, however for Derby most people benefit from urethane cushions.

Most manufacturers offer at least three hardnesses of urethane cushion which are usually comparable, rubber cushions are generally harder although for some skates there’s a choice of hardness for them too.  Generally these come with a recommended hardness depending on the skater’s weight – this is usually completely meaningless though as they don’t take application into account, if you’re doing a lot of broke-leg spins in Jam skating chances are you’ll want everything rock hard, if you’re a positional blocker you may well need your skates insanely loose.

As most cushions are reasonably priced I’d recommend getting three hardnesses at the same time- start with the hardest and work your way down by swapping first only the bottom cushions, then all of them, to increasingly soft cushions until you find your personal sweet spot.  This can take a long time, especially when you factor in adjustment, which I’ll get on to in a moment … the good part is, you’ll have spare cushions you can lend, sell or give to others so they can start on the same path to skate nirvana.

Loads of skates take cushions that are the same size, so chopping and changing should be easy – the common exceptions are Roll Line plates and Powerdyne Reactors.  Other than that you might need different retainers, but these are very cheap and you only have to buy them once.

Right, time to cover adjustment.  I am not going to cover adjustable pivot pins, those will get a blog all to themselves – for now, if you have adjustable pivot pins I’ll just say if you want to change how they’re set get someone who definitely knows what they’re doing to change them, otherwise leave them be for the time being.

Adjusting your action involves turning the action nuts on the end of the kingpins, effectively squashing the cushions to the point where they’re springy enough for you.  The first step is to set all four to ‘zero lash’, this is just getting them from loose just up to the point where you can no longer turn the bottom retainer with your fingertips.  Remember with most nuts and bolts – righty tighty, lefty loosy (or, clockwise to tighten, anti-clockwise to loosen), if you have flash plates with locking screws for the action nut, this will need to be loosened first.

Now, when everything is at zero lash tighten the front action nuts up one full turn and the back ones up half a turn.  Try skating on them, if they feel too loose just tighten all four up a quarter turn and try again, repeat as needed until you feel comfortable.  If they feel too tight, let them out a quarter turn and test – if you feel the need to do this twice and still feel like your skates are too tight it’s time for softer cushions!

You may find that over time, and with practice, you feel confident going looser and on to softer cushions.  When you hit your limit you’ll know about it as you won’t be able to reign in the wobbles – at this point just tighten them up a bit and you’re good to go.  Personally I worked my way down to all very soft cushions set to zero lash all around, however I decided to go up in tightness a bit in order to help me hop around in the pack – all these changes are for you to find your sweet spot and everyone’s different, so experimentation is needed.

The Lingo:

Cushions: the rubber rings that control how much your skate leans over when you put pressure on it
Retainers: The cupped washers which hold the top and bottom of the cushions in so they don’t squish too far out of shape
Action nut: the big nut on the end of the kingpin
Kingpin: the big bolt that holds the trucks and cushions together
Pivot pin: the smaller point of contact between the plate and truck.  Some can be adjusted, most basic skates cannot.

(I’ll be adding pics to this later … right now it’s waaaay past my bedtime!)

For more content like this, head right on over to The Inhuman League. Or get more from this author: Spin