Ok, so you just started skating and you barely know anything about it. When you start getting a hang of walking on a straight line of wheels then your first thought is probably
- How do I stop?
- What if I crash into someone or something?!
- I slam into the wall every time I need to stop.
Well, If you’re thinking about any of these things and want to learn how to stop on inline skates then just give this article a quick read and you’ll learn how to stop in no time (with enough practice of course),
I’m going to explain three ways to stop so if you are having a hard time with one, then just try the other ones and if all of them are difficult then pick the most comfortable one and start practicing.
How to Stop on inline skates – The 3 Ways for Beginners
Getting Ready – Protective Gear
First of all, you want to physically and mentally prepare yourself to learn how to stop, because it might take a while to stop comfortably at high speeds and in awkward situations so keep practicing and remember to wear some protective gear:
Now that you’re ready to endure some falls if you have to, let’s dive straight into it.
1. T-Stop
The T-stop or the drag stop basically means to drag one foot behind the other one and pushing it against the surface to create friction which will slow you down and eventually putting you to a stop. Stuff you’ll need to learn before attempting the T-stop:
- First of all, practice skating on one foot for a small period of time.
- Now, the basic position you need to be in is to put the dragging foot at a one-foot length behind you and your toes pointing 80 to 90 degrees with the ground.
- Your shoulders and head should be facing forwards
- Try to keep your front foot straight, as it will turn on its own when you’re starting out.
You should also try to alternate feet so that you can learn to balance on both sides of your body and will help with wheel wear.
When you start, at first you’ll find yourself drifting to the side and not going in a straight line. You might also lose balance but hey, that’s what practice is for.
To slow down faster you can put more weight on the dragging foot but it’s harder to balance while doing this
2. Parallel Power stop
I’ll be teaching a very simple version of the power stop and there are more advanced versions. You can learn the advanced versions later.
Anyways, here’s what you’ve got to do.
- Take wide turns from side to side.
- Try to keep your feet fairly close together when you do this. You can also put a cone or something similar to make a focus point on where to turn.
- Practice until you feel comfortable on each side
- Now turn a little faster and do sharper turns
A good way to practice on alternate feet is to do this exercise in a figure of eight. Make your turns tighter and tighter gradually.
Now that you’ve got the practice exercise done, it’s time for the actual stop:
- Start to turn your inside food towards the cone while your outside foot continues in an arc around it.
- The inside foot points towards the cone and the outside foot continue in its arc around the cone
- Keep practicing and eventually, you’ll naturally come to a stop
Combing the T-stop and Power stop
Ok, so now that you can do the T-stop and the Powerstop, you can also combine the T-stop and the Powerstop to get something even better, “The Drag to Powerstop”.
Note that you can only do this if you learned both of the previous stopping methods. To do this, you can:
- Again, use a cone as a reference point
- Now start to drag your outside foot behind you
- As you approach the cone, turn your inside foot towards it and start to arc your outside foot around it
This combined technique does require quite a bit of practice and there is definitely an element of feel to it that is hard to describe so keep practicing and eventually you’ll be able to do it. Practice even more and you’ll be able to comfortably do it in awkward situations
3. Powerslide
Now the third and last technique is called the “Powerslide”. This is a controlled slide that will bring you to a stop extremely fast but this also requires quite a bit of practice and is quite difficult to pull off for beginners that is. That’s why you need to learn it step-by-step.
There are two main parts to it :
- The transition backward
- The slide to stop
Let’s start with a backward transition.:
- Face forwards.
- Keep your feet in a staggered or scissors position.
- Lift up both your heels and pivot on the toes, from forwards to backward.
- Pivot your toes in the direction from your front foot to your back foot.
- Place your feet back down again.
- You need to take no more than a split second to do this.
That’s the basic movement. Practice it, and you’ll get a hang of it pretty quickly.
Once you’re comfortable transitioning from front to back, we can start learning the slide to stop:
- First, when your going backward, your feet are slightly scissored.
- Then you lift one foot and turn it about 90 degrees towards the back of the other foot, as you do in a T- stop.
- This time, push off your fit far towards the back as much as you can.
- Place it down at a small angle with the ground, and you’ll automatically slide backward and come to a stop.
This stop is sort of a backward t-stop, but better and more effective.
Conclusion
So did you try one of the 3 ways listed above?
I won’t be surprised if you staggered and fell when you tried them for the first time. That’s how learning works. So don’t forget to wear your protective gear, because those things can save you from the nastiest of the falls. With smaller falls, you won’t feel a thing while wearing protective gear. Anyways,
Good luck and have fun skating!
