To skate properly or to learn to skate, the right equipment is absolutely essential. The skate is the first essential; one may skate fairly well with shoes which are inappropriate or costume which retards free action, but with the wrong skates it is impossible to learn the art.
The proper skate has two stanchions or uprights running from the blade to the foot and heel plates. There seems to be scientific warrant for the statement that this method of construction makes it “run farther.” The old pattern having three stanchions or supports has been discarded by the best skaters of all skating countries for years.
The toe of the skate should curve up and around the toe of the shoe, in many patterns even touching the sole of the shoe in front. This curved front is deeply cut in with very sharp sawteeth, and it is on these sawteeth that so many of my pirouettes and pivots and dance steps are made. The height of the foot plate from the ice is much less than that of the heel plate from the ice, which naturally throws the skater into a forward balance. Most of the time I am skating upon the part of the skate directly under the ball of my foot. The curve of the blade from toe to heel is about a nine foot radius.
My skates are very light, weighing only four ounces. I advocate a light skate, and I think that most of the skates being used are too heavy. As one becomes more expert, lighter skates become more important, for in spins and turns on one foot the weight of the shoe and skate can seriously affect the balance and throw the skater into a false curve.
For about two inches along the blade of my skate, almost directly under the ball of my foot, I have a slightly flattened space which permits the immense curves and spirals I execute. These would be impossible with a sharply curved blade. The blade of my skate is splayed—that is, it is wider at the centre than at the toe and heel.
I have quite a deep groove ground in my skates, and I have the outer edge of the skate slightly lower than the inner edge. The height of the skate above the ice is not very important. Some of the experts favor great height. My skates are built comparatively low.
The flat bladed skate ought not to be used by any one who wishes to learn figure skating. The hockey skate is the right skate for hockey, but the wrong skate for anything else. To learn on that type of skate means that the skater must learn all over again when figure skating is attempted.
I am glad to hear that some of the American manufacturers are even making their hockey skates with a curved blade, so that the simple curves can be learned on that type of skate. There are several excellent models of skates now being made in the United States.
The skating shoe should fit very snug around the heel and over the instep, and should be comparatively high, seven or eight inches being my preference. The heel of the shoe should be higher than that of the sporting or tramping or golf shoe now being worn by the American woman.
It is important to get such skates and shoes as will throw the balance of the body forward onto the ball of the foot when one stands on the ice. This can only be done by raising the heel of the foot, partly through the design of the skate and partly through the height of the heel of the shoe. But no such thing as French heels are intended or advocated, of course.