Learn Ice Skating by Yourself

Learning to ice skate without the help of a partner takes a tremendous amount of balance. To ice skate by yourself, follow these steps.

Steps

  1. Stay near the sides of the ice rink. Doing this will allow you to hold onto something if you feel that you are going to fall. Hold onto the walls to steady yourself while you get a feel for the ice, then let go when you feel ready.
  2. Keep your knees bent. Resist the urge to straighten up, especially if you feel you’re about to fall. Bending your knees will improve your balance and keep you steady.
  3. Walk in place in your skates. Practice little marching steps without going anywhere. This will help teach you how to keep your ankles from bending. It may feel silly, but not as much as wobbling your ankles in front of everyone will.
  4. Walk over the ice with your skates. Take small steps until you’re a few feet away from where you started. To prevent the foot you’re pushing back with from sliding backwards, keep both feet at a diagonal by pointing them outwards (like a duck’s feet). Get a feel for the way your skates want to slide on the ice and learn to correct it.
  5. Practice falling safely. Falling is inevitable, so don’t be embarrassed. Instead, learn how to fall safely. If you begin to lose your balance, try to squat down into a safer, more stable pose. If you must put your hands out to stop yourself, curl them into fists so that nobody skates over your fingers. Try to land on the flat parts of your fingers between the knuckles (as opposed to directly on the points of the knuckles) to make this more comfortable.
  6. Look in the direction you are skating, not at your feet. This will help you keep your balance and go in the right direction, as your body tends to steer toward wherever your head is pointing. Moreover, it will help keep you from colliding with another skater.
  7. Skate gently forward. Place your weight on your dominant foot and place the weaker foot slightly behind it and at an angle. Then, push gently with your weaker foot, gliding slightly forward on the dominant one. Allow yourself to stop naturally, then repeat with the other foot until you are comfortable keeping your balance on both sides.
  8. Combine left and right strides. Once you can stride forward on either foot, try to transition between striding on the left foot and right foot with little or no pause in between.
  9. Teach yourself how to brake. One way to do this is to shift your weight to your dominant foot and drag the point of the other skate on the ground behind you (much as you do with the rubber brakes on the fronts of rollerskates). Another, more advanced way to do this is to place your weight on the foot in front of you, twist it at an angle across your path, and lean your weight away from it so that it cuts/scrapes the ice in front of you to slow you down. This takes much more practice and balance.
  10. Improve your balance on either foot by skating in long strides. Push off with one foot and glide on the other as before, but this time, do it a little harder to give yourself more momentum and glide much farther across the ice. Lean slightly into the glide and test your balance by lifting the other foot slightly off the ground. Brake or allow yourself to slow naturally. Repeat on the other side.
  11. Lengthen your left and right alternating strides. Now that you can both alternate strides and balance on either foot, combine these methods to skate like a true ice skater. As you get better, your speed will increase naturally.

Tips

  • Don't be embarrassed if you fall, just get up and laugh it off. Everyone was a beginner once!
  • Think about balancing, not falling.
  • Put on a thick coat. It will keep you warm and if you fall over you won't hurt your arms.
  • Put on gloves. Even if your hands are hot, keep them on. They are protection against the ice and other skates, if you fall.
  • Thick cotton socks are best. The thickness will help your skates to feel smooth and being cotton will let your feet breathe.
  • Keep calm. If you panic or mess around with your friends or family you are bound to fall to the ground.
  • Stay in your safe zone. You are a beginner, so it is best not to act like you know it all.
  • Don't forget to lean into your movements; this way you won't fall backwards.
  • Keep it slow and steady.
  • Don't attempt harder moves like turns or jumps. It's best to have a professional teach you these moves step by step.
  • Be careful not to rely on the toe pick for stopping! Especially on rental skates - the edges may get dull and stopping will become much more wobbly and increase your chances of falling over.

Warnings

  • Brace yourself for hard falls. Even if you’re careful, the people around you may not be.

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