5 Must-Know Beginner Tips for Skating Outside

If you're about to skate outside, you need to learn this first, because I see all the time someone feels really good skating in their garage, they head outside and they kind of freak out because it's not like their garage at all. Everything feels different and suddenly you're not in control as what you thought. So I'm going to teach you five simple things that you need to know before you skate outside. Hey, I'm Tracy from Suns Out Skates Out and I teach adults how to roller skate with confidence both in person and online. And this is something I see all the time with my students. They feel really good practicing and then they go straight outside and they just don't know what to expect. So it really catches them off guard and it can feel super scary really quickly. So let's go through a few simple things you need to know before you start to skate outside. So you're aware of what's different and how to handle it so you don't get caught off guard. Tip number one is check the area before you skate. The first thing and honestly one of the most important is just checking the area before you even go and skate. Please just don't put your skates on and go for it. Take a second to actually go and look at the ground and assess it. You're looking for rocks, sticks, cracks in the path, little dips, slight slopes, something like a crack or a rock can stop your wheels pretty quickly. And I actually recommend doing this when you're not even planning to skate. So if there's a park or a path that you're wanting to skate, just go and have a look first because what I see happen a lot of the time is someone plans to skate somewhere, they get there, they put their skates on, then they realize there's heaps of sticks, there's lots of cracks, there's lots of little dips, and then they start to feel their hesitation kick in. But because they've already planned to skate, they think, I'll just do it anyway. Then that doesn't go as well as what they thought. And it knocks their confidence down straight away. Sometimes that's enough to make you not want to skate outside again for a while. So this step might seem really simple, but it makes a really big difference for your confidence once you've already checked out the spot first. So once you've got a good location, the next thing that really matters outside is your speed. And this is a big one. A lot of the time outside, it's not that you can't skate, it's that you start rolling a little bit faster than you expected, and suddenly it feels like your skates are getting away from you. That's because outside, you're not always on a perfectly flat surface. Even a really small dip can get you rolling faster without realizing it. So instead of thinking about stopping straight away the moment that you start to pick up a little bit of speed, I want you to think about controlling your speed as you go. And one really simple way to do that is a slight toe stop. Not a full toe stop. Think of this like a speed check. This isn't about stopping, it's about keeping your speed in range of where you still feel in control. The earlier you do this, the easier it will be so it doesn't end in an accident or panic. And if you're at the stage of not even knowing how to stop, I've actually got a video on quite a few ways that you can learn how to stop, which I'll link above. Tip number three, also I have to mention here, even if you are pretty confident indoors, please make sure that you wear protective gear outdoors, especially if it's your first time skating. The ground is a lot harder than what your nice wooden floor might be. So always make sure that you wear protective gear. Tip number four, there's one thing that can make outdoor skating feel way harder and way more uncomfortable than it needs to be, is having the right wheels. I'm going to be honest, if you're on hard wheels, this is not something that you're going to enjoy at all. It feels horrible. And in that moment, it's really easy to think that it's you, but a lot of the time, it's actually just your wheels. So harder wheels are going to feel every crack, every little stone, every rough patch that you come across. And softer outdoor wheels are designed to roll over all of that much more smoothly. So if outdoor skating feels extra hard, it might not be your skill level, it could just be your wheels. And this is a small change, but once you feel the difference between skating outdoors on hard wheels and soft wheels, you won't go back. This surface here, like an outdoor netball court, isn't too bad. I can't wear my indoor wheels here because it still feels too crunchy, too bumpy for me. So I still prefer to wear my outdoor wheels here. There could be a little stone or a stick that I've missed, so to help me roll over that more comfortably, I always wear my outdoor wheels. And tip number five, which is learning how to skate in a staggered stance. A lot of beginners skate with their skates parallel, side by side when they're skating outdoors. And outside, skating like this can actually make you a lot more unstable because if you hit something small like a stone or a crack, there's a higher chance of your feet slipping out from you backwards. So instead of skating with your skates parallel, we want them to go into a staggered stance. So one skate forward, one skate back, your weight is centred, your knees are soft. So by keeping your weight centred, you're offsetting any chance to slip forward or backwards. If a stone comes and hits your front foot, you've still got your back foot to catch you. And if something hits the back foot, you can use the front foot to catch you. So just skating and getting comfortable in cruising in this stance is really important. So this one change alone can make you feel so much more confident outside. So please learn how to cruise using a staggered stance. And if you're watching this and thinking my goal is to be able to skate outdoors but you're fairly new, then I have a free beginner workshop where I walk you through the exact three-step method that I teach all of my students to help them build confidence and progress faster. I'll link that in the description down below. So for outdoor skating, first take your time with it. It does feel different, but once it starts to click, it opens up a whole new world of skating. I hope this helped. Please feel free to like and subscribe and I'll see you in the next video.