What Is Speedskating

Speedskating is going on your skates as fast as you can, as far as you can, for fun! It's racing across the ice, either to beat your previous personal best time, or someone else, or to just enjoy the sensation of gliding smoothly with the wind on your face. What do you want it to be? Speedskating started out as a means of transportation allowing Vikings to cross frozen lakes and rivers. The first skates were made from bones or wood. Metal edges appeared later, around 1400 and the all-iron skate in Scotland in 1572. The development of the skate and the abundance of frozen canals helped to develop skating as a national pastime for the Dutch and other Europeans. Speedskating was the first of the three ice sports (speedskating, hockey, figure skating) to develop into a sport which spread quickly throughout Northern Europe. The first known club was the Skating Club of Edinburgh in Scotland. The first competition is thought to be a 15 mile race on the Fens in England on February 4, 1763. The first U.S. speedskating club was established in Philadelphia in 1849 by skaters using the Schuykill River. The sport spread throughout New York state and up and down the East Coast from Boston to Washington, D.C. shortly thereafter. In 1850 E.W. Bushnell of Philadelphia made the first all-steel skate which was light and strong and didn't require frequent sharpening like the iron skates. This revolutionized the sport and increased the level of interest in it. Charles Jewtraw of Lake Placid, New York was the first Winter Olympic Gold Medalist winning the 500 meters in Chamonix, France in 1924. Speedskating has produced more Olympic medals for the U.S.A. than any other winter sport as well as several of the greatest feats of all-time in Winter Olympic history including the 1980 five gold medal performance by Eric Heiden of Madison, WI, and Champaign, IL native Bonnie Blair's five career golds over three Winter Games (1988-1994). In 1992 Cathy Turner of Rochester, NY won the first ever Gold Medal in Short Track speedskating in the 500 meter event. Speedskating is a great sport with many different options to choose from! You wouldn't buy a Game Boy with just one game cartridge, would you? You wouldn't wear the same clothes every day, right? Speedskating is an individual sport where you can choose what you do, what level you want to pursue, where you do it, and how often you do it. Yet, you get all the social and support benefits of a larger group - the camaraderie, the coaching, access to ice time and equipment - usually found in a local club that is sponsored by a group, a rink, a park district, a school, or some other community group like the Y, the Jaycees or the American Legion. Clubs. Individuals are members of the National Governing Body (NGB) for the sport in the U.S. which is U.S. Speedskating. The NGB organizes competitions, selects teams for international competition, sets racing rules, trains coaches, provides programs to develop skaters such as camps and clinics, and helps promote the sport by providing resources to clubs. U.S. Speedskating is a member of the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) which governs Olympic and amateur sport in the U.S., and the International Skating Union (ISU) which governs figure skating and speedskating in the world. As a speedskater, you can choose among many different paths to take or even mix and combine them! The major types of speedskating are: Short Track (done on a "short" track, usually 111 to 100 meters long, inside any regular size hockey rink) Long Track (done on championship size ovals of 400 meters, or on tracks set up on outdoor natural ice that range anywhere from 100 meters to over 1000 meters) Marathon skating (done either on 400meter oval tracks or natural lakes and rivers on tracks of varying size) Some skaters choose to only skate recreationally and not race. They practice, get coaching, work on their technique, work out to get and stay fit, or cross train for other sports. Other skaters like the thrill of racing and compete at a level in line with their ability. Competitions are available for novices on up through world level throughout the U.S. during the season in all forms of speedskating - short track, long track, and marathon. In addition, competitions are organized into different formats you can choose from. "Pack style" is the most common with a group of skaters going to the line all at once and racing each other for a finish position. "Time trials" or "metric style" competitions are also held where skaters compete only against the clock and themselves. s caSkatern be grouped by age class and/or ability to provide a fair and rewarding experience for all participants.

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