How to Stop in Roller Derby Skates

Video Transcript

"In this clip, we're going to talk about how to stop. Once you start roller skating, it's so much fun to get going, but then you realize pretty quickly you need to learn how to stop. The first way I'm going to teach you how to stop is what's called a "T" stop. "T" stop is an artistic dance skate move, but it's very effective in derby too. Watch as I show you the "T" stop. The "T" stop is going to be taking one foot behind the other in a "T" position and dragging the foot. You want to drag with all four wheels on the floor. You don't want to use this stop too often because it will eventually wear down your wheels and you'll get a little flat spot. This is what it looks like in action. The next stop I'm going to show you is called the snow plow. If you've ever skied, you've done this on skis. Basically you're going to move forward, you're going to bring your feet together and come to a stop by making a "V" with your feet. This requires a lot of thigh muscle movement, so work on those thighs. Make sure you can bring those feet in and you don't want to put the emphasis on your knees because that could hurt your knees. Let me show you one more time the snow plow. The next stop I'm going to show you is a bit of an advanced move. This is called the tomahawk stop. Tomahawks are a little difficult to execute and I would recommend that you start off with the "T" stop or the snow plow. You will start off skating forward, you will turn yourself backward and then you'll go up on both of your toe stops. And that's how you'll stop. Let me demonstrate."