Beginner Blades with 8' Rockers

I'd like to hear from coaches who teach beginners (children or adult). Are they better starting off with 7' or 8' radius main rockers? At one time the major blade companies (namely MK and Wilson) had 7' rockers on their beginner blades. Then Ultima came along and introduced 8' rockers on their beginner blades. In 2015, MK (which previously had maintained 7' rockers throughout their entire line) and Wilson introduced beginner blades with 8' rockers, while still offerring beginner blades with 7' rockers. Their current lines of beginner blades offer 8' rockers only. On the flip side, the entire Ultima line used to comprise 8' rockers, but within the past year or so they introduced a 7' rocker intermediate blade and a 7' rocker advanced blade, but no 7' rocker beginner blade. To my knowledge, the only major manufacturer with 7' rocker beginner blades left is Eclipse.

And then, when a skater moves from a beginner blade to an intermediate blade, the only intermediate blade with an 8' rocker is the Ultima Legacy. Wilson used to offer the Comet with a 8.5' rocker, but that disappeared from their website over the past year. Note that many discontinued model blades from various manufacturers are still available for sale.

So for the major manufacturers, we have the following sequence of rockers for currently listed freestyle blades (dance blades not being considered in this discussion):

Wilson. Beginner (8') -> Intermediate (7') -> Advanced (8')

MK. Beginner (8') -> Intermediate (7') -> Advanced (7')

Ultima. Beginner (8') -> Intermediate (7' or 8') -> Advanced (7' or 8')

Eclipse. Beginner (7') -> Intermediate (7') -> Advanced (8')

So, is there any advantage for a beginner blade with an 8' rocker? And does the following flip-flop sequence make sense

Beginner (8') -> Intermediate (7') -> Advanced (8') ?

I don't have any answers as I'm not a coach, but I have a related question... Do you think that a persons skating level or what jumps they're working on is even a very important factor in the analysis to determine what blade profile suits them? I have a feeling that a big reason the reason that manufacturers 'level' the blades in the first place is mainly to create different price points for consumers.

jf12 said:

I don't have any answers as I'm not a coach, but I have a related question... Do you think that a persons skating level or what jumps they're working on is even a very important factor in the analysis to determine what blade profile suits them? I have a feeling that a big reason the reason that manufacturers 'level' the blades in the first place is mainly to create different price points for consumers.

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I've wondered the exact same thing....since aside from the occasional upgrade to the materials, its still a piece of steel.

Here we use MK. I think '8 is fine enough.

I'm a beginner skater and 8' radius blades made learning quite difficult for me (especially edges and 3turns). I started progressing after changing to 7' radius blades.

I *think it's because:

As a beginner the 8' rocker makes you more stable. The extra stability for a beginner helps initially.

As an intermediate you are starting to learn more footwork and turns. The 7' rocker makes this easier.

When you are advanced, you can handle the footwork and turns on a 8' rocker, but now you want more stability for the higher level jumps you're doing.

But I'm no expert.

Not a coach, but I think Nimyue has a good point. Another point is that there’s a difference in the spin rocker between a beginner blade and an advanced blade, even if the main rocker on both is 8’. I just switched from Ultima Mirages to MK Pros and in looking at both blades side by side, there’s next to no spin rocker on the Mirage. I would guess that the Ultima Legacy doesn’t have this problem, even though it has an 8’ main rocker.

Nimyue said:

I *think it's because:

As a beginner the 8' rocker makes you more stable. The extra stability for a beginner helps initially.

As an intermediate you are starting to learn more footwork and turns. The 7' rocker makes this easier.

When you are advanced, you can handle the footwork and turns on a 8' rocker, but now you want more stability for the higher level jumps you're doing.

But I'm no expert.

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I do think that's theoretically why, but there's so much variance in individual skaters. Is the stability of the 8' only beneficial for people in basic skills? Most people actually learn 3-turns and start testing 3's while still in the beginner blades, and does this hinder them? Similarly, people in intermediate blades really differ a lot in what skills they are good at vs what they need help in, such that I couldn't say that rockier/flatter blades work better just based on their level. An additional observation, most of the adults at my rink who have been skating a long time, do a lot of footwork and zero high level jumps, axel at the max. They're almost all in top level blades, most in Gold Seal. Most of them have tried a lot of blades in the past.

I think intuitively, someone doing triples needs to be in top end blades, and someone in basic skills should not be in those. But don't you think the majority of people in the market for blades that are separate from boots, are actually intermediate level skaters (axel-easier doubles, juv-novice MIF, etc), and should probably feel free to choose the price, quality, and blade profile that suits their skating level no matter if the blades are rated for intermediate or advanced skaters.

So… another newbie question spawned by this thread (hey, it DOES say "beginner blades"!)...

I had no idea what rockers are (been skating 7 weeks now and still probably more ignorant than the average 5 year old skater) and so I Googled. Discovered the term “spin rocker” and tried to figure out where, exactly, that is on my skates. I’m assuming just behind the ball of my foot based on a picture I found and where I seem to balance most smoothly when doing two foot spins. Which brings me to my question… My coach is trying to help me fix my two foot turns. Spins are super quiet and smooth. Turns are… not. I don’t get it. Today after discovering the idea of spin rockers, I tried doing my turns while centering my weight the same way I do when doing spins and… voila, nice, quiet, smooth turns. But I don’t to keep on practicing something incorrect between now and my next private lesson, even if it seems to be working. So… spin rockers… located on your blade just behind the ball of your foot? Where you should center your weight during two foot turns?

wobblepro said:

So… spin rockers… located on your blade just behind the ball of your foot? Where you should center your weight during two foot turns?

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The spin rocker is the roundest part of your blade, right under the ball of your foot, behind the bottom toepick but in front of the arch of your foot. It is also the part of your blade on which you execute turns.