How to Choose the Right Inline Skates

Out of all the hobbies out there, hopping on a pair of inline skates to explore the surroundings is one of the best ways to help you maintain a healthy weight, tone your body and improve your mood and overall mental health. But choosing the right pair of skates to “skate and feel great” is not a task to underestimate, since choosing the wrong ones can ruin your entire fun and experience. This is why we wrapped up a couple of useful tips on how to pick the perfect pair for your skating adventures.

Types of Inline Skates

When choosing a pair of inline skates, the most important is to determine the type that works best for you. Are you going to use your inline roller skates for travelling to your workplace on daily basis, recreationally skate around your city in your free time or you’re looking for a pair of skates to show off your best tricks at the skate park? Once you determine what kind of skating you’ll be doing the most, you can start exploring the huge range of inline skates Australia skaters love.

Recreational Inline Skates

This type of skates is the most popular one, and always the best option for beginners or anyone who wants to embrace the various benefits rollerblading offers. This makes a pair of recreational inline skates perfect if you occasionally want to take a quick ride around your neighbourhood or your nearest bike trail. But even though their relaxed fit is designed to give you comfort and stability, remember that recreational skates are intended for short and less demanding skating sessions.

Aggressive Inline Skates

Aggressive, urban or street inline skates are all referring to the type of skates used by the skaters to perform different tricks. These skates are designed to be easily controlled and endure huge loads during jumps and slides, which makes them perfect for street skating, skate parks and performing different tricks over obstacles. This is also one of the main reasons that the aggressive inline skates are packed up with a couple of safety features such as their unique boot design and their brake system.

Speed Inline Skates

Speed or racing inline skates are intended for all the skaters who want to activate their “fight or flight” hormone and are mainly used by experienced skaters and professionals. These skates feature advanced inline skating technology, which makes them incredibly lightweight and ultimately fast. Speed inline skates also come with a prolonged frame, where you can include 5 skate wheels instead of brakes to enhance your performance additionally. So, know that these skates are not intended for your occasional strolls around your neighbourhood, so make sure you “roll” them responsibly.

Inline Skates by Genders

When choosing the appropriate pair of skates for you, their type is not the only thing to focus on since once you start exploring, you’ll notice that inline skates differ by genders.

But it’s not just the colour and the skate aesthetics that determine the gender. For instance, men inline rollerblades are designed to fit men’s wider foot shape, while those for women are lower and with wider forefeet to fit the female body anatomy. But this doesn’t mean that you can’t find a pair of unisex inline skates Australia wide online or brick and mortar shops if you feel like the women’s options are lacking.

But if you decided to go for a pair of unisex skates, know that they’re usually based on men’s sizing, so make sure you check your manufacturer’s sizing chart before investing.

How Do You Know What Size Inline Skates to Get?

While we’re at inline skates’ sizing, choosing the right size is essential to provide proper support and therefore a great skating experience. Choosing a pair that is too big for you will sit loosely and cause hindering as well as annoying and painful blisters from your foot moving around the skate. On the other hand, choosing skates that are too tight and small will make the entire experience painful and will irritate your skin to bleeding.

Even though your usual shoe number may be the optimal size for you, know that there’re a couple of tricks to determine the right size. So first of all, make sure you consider the amount of room in the toes area. The proper skate for you will feature enough room for your toes to be barely touching the front of the toe box while being comfortably settled, but not crunched. If your toes are being fitted correctly inside the skate, your ankle should sit right in the padding surrounded area where it feels most comfortable.

But it’s not uncommon for people to struggle to fit their toes and ankles properly. If that’s the case with you, it’s best to consider getting footbeds or performance socks along with your inline skates. Such accessories will give your feet the support just where you need them for the most optimal and comfortable fit.

Understand the Parts

Parts are as important as choosing the right fit since they’ll determine your performance and your comfort while skating.

Frames

Starting from the frames, they’re the part of your skates’ undercarriage responsible to fixate your boot determined by your skating style. Longer frames are more suitable for endurance or speed riding, while shorter ones give you greater control of your skates.

Since it’s one of the most important parts of your skate determining your entire skating, make sure you choose the ones made from high-quality and durable materials only. Plastic frames are the most common choice since they’re less expensive, which makes them a great choice for beginner skaters. But know that plastic frames are not stiff at all, which makes them not that durable option that will serve you for years. They also tend to weigh more, which automatically increases the weight of the skate and therefore makes skating harder.

On the other hand, aluminium frames are way more lightweight and stiffer. They’re also more rigid, which allows them to transfer better power from the boot to the wheels and won’t twist and bend under your weight and pressure, which makes them more durable than the plastic ones.

Wheels

Your skating wheels may not determine durability, but they’ll definitely determine your performance. For this purpose, make sure you decide on two things about the wheels- their diameter and their hardness.

So if you’re a beginner, make sure you start with small wheels. They’re better for keeping balance and make turning around and learning new tricks easier. But if you want to cover larger distances, make sure you skip them because they reduce your speed so you’ll have to skate harder. Not only larger wheels give you the ability to cover larger distances faster, but they’re also more comfortable and feel more lightweight. But on account of that, they require great balancing skills since their larger frame is intended to hold larger wheels which significantly decreases their maneuverability.

On the other hand, wheels made of rubber are soft, very comfortable and offer great traction. But on account of that, you’ll have to change wheels more frequently since the rubber wears off quickly, or choose wheels made of sturdier materials. Not only harder wheels are more durable, but they also help to develop greater speeds faster. But this makes them cause more vibrations and reduce the traction, so make sure you choose what’s the most optimal for you.

Brakes

Even though not all inline skates come with brakes, know that they’re a very important part of them, especially if you’re a skater who just got introduced to the skating world. Most brakes are made of enforced rubber attached to a plastic extension on the right skate. Some brakes can also be detached and switched on the left skate for the skaters with the dominant left foot.

On the other hand, some skates such as the aggressive and hockey ones don’t feature any brakes. Even if they do, the experienced skaters tend to remove them since they get in their way while performing tricks. But if you’re seeking stability and more relaxed riding, make sure you don’t skip them.