So my first event was from Wednesday to Sunday last week. I skated every single day of it too! I think I can call at least that a win. That I actually went. I was a little in awe of the skaters there. I was one of the newest skaters and kinda got a little down on myself. I spent a lot of time on the outside (we don’t have carpet at all at our rink) practicing different things. I took a class and couldn’t get all the moves down. It was on NY/NJ style and while I could do the full pivot, I couldn’t catch the half pivots or the back 6. Like I would need a month prob to learn it while the rest of the class got it down within the hour 🥺 Other than that, I fully enjoyed it and was happy that I was on my skates so much. Now I just got a lot of work to do to try to get the moves down. Next event is in July!! Already have my hotel booked.

I’ve been skating on SureGrip Boardwalks and just (a few minutes ago) ordered a pair of VNLA Anniversary v2.0 Astro Indoor Roller Skates. One reason is that in the past 2 months I’ve been switching my shoes to “barefoot,” which have a flat flexible sole, a wide toe base, and no heel raise. They feel great—my posture and gait is better and my knee stiffness is almost gone. The other reason is that now my toes are feeling very cramped in the Boardwalks. So, since I can’t skate barefoot 🙃 I think VNLAs are as close as I can get—wide and no heel raise. I’m a little concerned about not having ankle support, and how the shift might affect how my skating feels. Any advice?