Beginner roller skating
Three Edges, and Beginners Live on the Inside One
Every wheel can roll on three edges: inside, centre, outside. ICP-certified coach Asha Kirkby describes where each level lives. Beginners and advanced beginners have no notion of an outside edge yet: they are still correcting pronation on the inside edge and hunting for the centre. The centre edge is the first goal; the outside edge is the door to the next level.
A wheel can roll on three edges. Tipped towards the middle of the body, it is on its inside edge. Straight up, it is on its centre edge. Tipped away from the body, it is on its outside edge. Every move in skating is a choice between the three.
A certified coach describes where each level of skater lives. Beginners and advanced beginners have no notion of an outside edge at all. They are still busy with the inside one: correcting the pronation that tips the skate inward, and hunting for the centre edge that lets a single skate roll straight.
The centre edge is the first goal, and this site has already given you the drills for it — the scooting drill, the toe roll, the four-metre pause on one skate. Those are all centre-edge work: getting the skate to roll upright under a bent knee.
The outside edge is the door to the next level. It is not a beginner skill and nobody should feel behind for not having it. But it is worth knowing the map: inside is where you start, centre is where you are heading, and outside is what the intermediate moves are built on.
Technique from Asha Kirkby of Skatefresh, an instructor certified by the Inline Certification Program. She teaches inline skating, and that is the discipline this page is about.
Keep going: this is one section of the full Roller Skating for Beginners guide — sizing, gear, stopping, and where to skate, in one page. Free, no sign-up, nothing to buy.