Ice Skates

Every four years when the Olympics come around, one of the most popular events that gets tuned into is Ice Skating.  Whether its figure skating or speed skating, most people have seen a competition at least once in their lives.  The speed, accuracy and grace it takes to move over the sheet of ice are hypnotizing.  But how did an event, which started as something meant only for a means of transportation, turn into a spectacular world wide event?

Ice skating is a sport that involves people strapping specially made boots with steel blades attached to the bottoms on and gliding effortlessly over sheets of ice, whether it be lakes, ponds, or artificial indoor rinks.  There are two major types of competitive ice skating; speed and figure.  In speed skating, skater’s race around an oval shaped rink, attempting to make the fastest time around a pre set distance.

Figure skating is a combination of dance and acrobatics, making it more like an art form.  Both take incredible grace and stamina, and most athletes spend several hours a day on the cold ice trying to better themselves.  Ice skating is also essential to hockey players, who use their speed and balance to race back and forth across a rink while trying to maintain control of a puck, which is a small black disk, and score points by shooting the puck into the opposing teams net.

Ice skating is also popular as a recreational sport, especially in cold countries, but can also be enjoyed in indoor rinks.  It’s very important that you dress properly, wear proper equipment, and follow safety procedures when you ice skate because the blades of the skates are extremely sharp and you could get really injured if you are unsure of what you are doing.

Ice skating can be traced back to over a thousand years ago on the waterways of Scandinavia and the Netherlands when people needed a sure footed way to travel across the frozen lakes.  They would strap animal bones to the bottoms of their boots and glide easily across the ice, making travel quicker and easier for transporting goods.  In the late 1500′s and early 1600′s, most countries would not allow woman to skate. In some places, it was alright for all classes, while in others only royalty and members of the upper class were allowed to participate.

Right before one of the worst winters in England’s history, Charles the second travelled to Holland and learned about canal skating.  When he returned to the horrible winter, he as able to introduce what he had learned, bringing ice skating to England.  In the middle of the 1600′s, ice skating finally spread to North America and ice skating exhibitions were put on in Nova Scotia by stationed British officers, allowing the sport to travel through the country very quickly.

It wouldn’t be until the 1600′s when skating became more than just a way to travel.  In 1642 in Edinburgh, a skating club was formed for fans of the increasing sport. They took great pride in digging images into the ice with their new skates which included the first crude blades. In North America, the Philadelphia skating club had a rule that every skater was required to carry a rope in case they needed to rescue a fellow club member since they skated on frozen lakes.

It was very common for the ice to be too thin unexpectedly, leading to severe injuries and deaths from the bitter cold of the water. It wouldn’t be until 1763 in England that the worlds first speed skating competition would be held, and in 1772 they would publish the first “how to” book on ice skating.  In 1889, the Dutch created several separated race guidelines for the first world competition with distances of 500m, 1500m, 5000m and 10000m. However, it wouldn’t be until the mid 1900′s that figure skating would become popular. In 1892, the International Skating Union was formed to make standard rules for dancing, speed, and figure skating competitions.

Several other unions, both national and internationally based have been formed since then to make sure that competitions can be judged fairly and accurately when separate nations gather.  It took over three hundred years to evolve into the sport that so many people are familiar with today