Roller skating: You gotta roll with it

"RIGHT girl, are you ready?"

I’m standing on a pair of roller skates for the first time in over 30 years and I can feel my heart exploding against my ribcage. Santa brought my first pair of skates when I was 8 and in weeks I was the best skater on the road, but now with knee, arm, wrist pads and a helmet on I feel the adult panic and want to bail out. Recognising my fear, skate instructor, Caroline Brady shoots me a smile and somehow I have the confidence to step onto the rink. Within minutes it all comes back to me and I’m grinning from ear to ear just like when I was a kid and more importantly — I’m not falling down!

“It’s the fear of falling that’s most scary, but when you have all the protective gear on the fear goes and the memory and movement comes back,” Caroline explains as she glides alongside me at her Skate Fit class at Rollerjam.ie Limerick.

For the first time in years, roller skates of the 1970’s and 1980’s variety, are back in vogue; the four wheels have taken over from the blades and people in Cork, Limerick and Dublin are enjoying roller rinks, availing of roller disco, skate fit, figure skating and adults and kids beginners’ classes once more.

Under Caroline’s tutelage I practice basic manoeuvres and even master (sort of) an in-out leg movement called the lemon.

Amazingly, Caroline, a Cork native from Ballincollig only learnt to skate a few years ago, and now as well as teaching she’s a valued member of the Limerick Roller Girls and is on the Ireland Roller Derby Squad — one of the fastest growing sports in the world.

“I was never a sporty person. In school I played a bit of hockey but that’s all. I never learnt to skate as a kid. I remember asking Santa Claus for skates and getting a letter back saying I was a bit too young yet. I did get them eventually, but the footpaths were so broken and gravelly, there was no protective gear, this was the 80’s you’d fall, you’d hurt yourself, you’d try again and then eventually give up. I never lost the love though and a few years ago I signed up for roller derby. When my friend heard what I’d done, she laughed, saying she remembered how awful I was skating as a kid but I taught myself and now I teach others twice a week,” she explains.

In fact, it’s her own recent skate conversion that makes Caroline such a good teacher — her classes are upbeat and active but nobody is pushed beyond their abilities.

Jeanette Ferguson is one such newbie to Skate Fit who says she’s now hooked.

“I’m 40 this year and I think my workmates think I’m having a midlife crisis. This is only my second class but it’s so much fun I’m trying to encourage more people to give it a go,” she laughs.

Paul Earls (50) from County Limerick says his only experience of skating as a child was holidays in Ballybunion, Co Kerry, when he rented skates in the town. Now he is a proud owner of four separate pairs. “They’re all for different things; I have blades, I did figure skating here as well. I went to the gym for years but this is more natural, you’re using your whole body and doing something you enjoy. He says more men used to come to Skate Fit but they moved onto the new men’s Limerick derby team. “I’m not competitive though, I love skating and the social aspect — you meet the loveliest people skating,” he says.

Owner of Roller Jam, Ronan Ryan, opened the Limerick venue 3 years ago and the Cork rink a year ago with business partner, Catherine Tiernan. “A lot of our business at Rollerjam would still be children. In Ireland we’ve a wet climate and parents are conscious of obesity and not everybody is into competitive sports. We don’t have enough indoor facilities in this country and skating is an activity that’s fun. Adults often get into it when they see kids skate at birthday parties or maybe they come here on a Hen and think it’s something they’d like to try again or maybe they skated in the 70’s or 80’s and loved roller disco. All ages are discovering skating — the oldest skater we’ve had was a very young 72 who used to come and skate with his grandkids. Adults are also interested when they hear skating burns 600 calories an hour,” says Ronan.

In the 1980’s there were rinks in Dublin, Limerick and Cork, but they closed down. “Anyone we’ve talked to said they were sad at the closures and they’re delighted there are places where they can skate again,” Ronan said.

At the moment, only Cork, Limerick and Dublin have dedicated roller rinks and two of them are owned by Rollerjam. While Ronan says he wouldn’t rule out expanding elsewhere, he says the setting up and maintaining rinks involves so much work that for the moment Cork and Limerick keeps him busy enough.

As I leave my lesson, where I’ve had a fantastic workout, I’m asked by the skate group if I plan to return. I do. I even have the girlfriends singled out for the next lesson — all big kids like me who never really grew out of their skates and who enjoy having a good laugh!