Beginner roller skating
Backwards Skating Starts at Your Knees
The hardest part of going backwards has nothing to do with your feet. Your knees have to stay pressed together, and holding them there is hard work, which is why most people give up on the position before they give up on the movement. Toes together, knees squeezed, and the skates roll where you want them. Let the knees drift apart and the whole thing falls open. Quad technique, from Najete Kada, a French champion in artistic roller skating.
The hardest part of skating backwards has nothing to do with your feet. It is your knees, and specifically the fact that they have to stay pressed together and holding them there is real work.
That is why most people give up on the position before they give up on the movement. The feet learn their job in a few minutes. The legs get tired in about thirty seconds, the knees drift apart without being told to, and the whole shape falls open — at which point the skates go wherever the floor sends them.
The position is three things and no more: toes together, heels apart, knees squeezed. Held together, the skates roll where you point them and you steer with your hips instead of fighting each leg separately.
Treat it as a strength problem rather than a skill problem, because that is what it is. Practise holding the shape standing still, before you ask it to work while moving. Quad technique, from Najete Kada's Tuto roller series. She teaches quad skating and skates it herself; nothing on this page is a claim about inline skates.
Keep going: this is one section of the full Roller Skating for Beginners guide — sizing, gear, stopping, and where to skate, in one page.