Fitness Skating

The term “Fitness Skating” is defined as skating for the specific purpose of improving ones physical and mental fitness. Henceforth I will use the term; “Fitness Skating” when discussing the extraordinary opportunities fitness skating offers to improve a person’s physical and mental fitness. Note: if you are serious about improving your overall fitness through fitness skating you may want to purchase a quality pair of Fitness Skates. Let’s start by examining some of the physical fitness aspects of fitness skating.

Physical Benefits of Fitness Skating

Aerobic Benefits: You can achieve a superior cardiovascular workout while fitness skating. With fitness skating, you will experience all of the outstanding aerobic benefits of running or jogging, without the pounding associated with running and jogging; this is a big plus for a lot of people. The absence of this pounding makes fitness skating far less stressful on your knees and other joints. You can significantly increase the intensity of the aerobic benefits of fitness skating by continually swinging your arms in concert with your legs. To attain the maximum aerobic workout, it is worth noting that you must keep moving; coasting will diminish the cardio benefits that can be gained from fitness skating. The two types of skating that offers the best fitness skating opportunities are inline skating and ice skating.

Lose Weight: Fitness skating provides for an unbelievable weight loss opportunity. The key to losing weight by fitness skating is time, distance and continual skating. When talking about time I am referring to how much time you spend fitness skating per day or week. Can you lose weight by skating 30 minutes a day, three times a week? Yes, but imagine how much more weight you could lose if you skate 100 minutes a day, three or four times a week. When referring to distance, I am talking about how far you fitness skate. If you are taking 30 minutes to go one mile then you will likely not lose any weight - but the upside is that your wheels or blades will last forever! In order to maximize your weight loss potential while fitness skating, you have to fitness skate for some distance. If you are fortunate enough to have access to a place where you can consistently skate - determine the distance, and time yourself as you skate that distance, then always try to beat your time. For example, skate for 5 miles without stopping and time yourself. Take a short break, then turn around and time yourself coming back. Each time you fitness skate using this route, try to beat the previous times.

Finally, let’s discuss continual skating. When I refer to continual skating, I am talking about fitness skating without stopping. Unfortunately, if you are inline skating, you may have to stop to cross roads, or maneuver around other obstacles, but aside from these unavoidable stops, you need to keep moving. At first you may not be able to go very far without stopping, but don’t worry about it. If you are persistent, in time, you will be able to travel great distances without stopping. Don’t be in a hurry. Take your time and start out slowly as you work on expanding your time, distance, and ability to fitness skate continually.

Endurance: Fitness skating provides a superior method for building a person’s endurance. The key to building endurance through fitness skating is to maintain a constant and steady pace, over a period of time, and over a specific distance. You cannot build up much endurance if you are only traveling short distances before stopping. With that said, start out with short distances and increase the distance over time. The same holds true for the time you spend fitness skating. If you only spend 15 minutes fitness skating a couple of times a week, you will probably not see an increase in your endurance. With that said, remember - build your endurance slowly.

Muscle Toning: Fitness skating provides an excellent method for toning your muscles. The major muscles worked when fitness skating are the legs - specifically the quadriceps and hamstrings. However, your entire body will benefit particularly your lower back and abs. How does it help the abs? The abdominals' purpose is to work in concert with the many muscles in the back to allow us to walk upright. For comparison, the next time you pet a cat or dog you will notice their abdominal wall is distinctly non-muscular with almost no muscle definition. This is a direct result of them not walking upright. Contrastingly, they have significant muscle mass in their shoulders and hunches, which is exactly what you need to walk on all fours. Knowing this fact, it should be obvious that the best exercises for abs are those that involve upright movement and fitness skating definitely meets this criteria.

Mental Benefits of Fitness Skating

Fitness skating can do wonders when it comes to increasing your mental fitness. Fitness skating offers a significant opportunity to engage in a physical activity that gives you a break from life’s daily stressors. This break from these day to day stressors can go a long way in making life’s problems not seem so overwhelming. Fitness skating cannot change the circumstances in your life, but it can help you better deal with those circumstances. If fitness skating outdoors, you will be exposed to fresh air and hopefully sunshine. In today’s society, most people spend too much time indoors. Outside fitness skating offers an escape from the daily (indoor) grind, and provides the fresh air and sunshine that your body and mind needs.

Self-Confidence: For children and adults alike, fitness skating can increase a person’s self-confidence by strengthening their mental and physical condition. Physically, fitness skating is an activity that requires body control and balance. For some people body control and balance will come naturally and be relatively easy. For others, these aspects may be more challenging and require an increased level of determination and commitment. Regardless of which category you are in, fitness skating can increase your self-confidence as you become a proficient skater.

Increased Mental Control: Fitness skating also requires good mental control (alertness, awareness, ability to react) to adjust to various circumstances and to the surroundings. If you spend time fitness skating each week, whether you are new to skating or a long time skater, you will be challenged mentally. Overcoming these challenges (rocks, ruts, hills, curves, cars, sidewalks, other skaters, bicycles, etc) will be easier for some, and more challenging for others, but again everyone can benefit from the increased level of mental control.