Ice Skating Facts
Ice skating is traveling on ice with skates, narrow (and sometimes parabolic) blade-like devices molded into special boots (or, more primitively, without boots, tied to regular footwear).
It is possible on canals and lakes, etc. after it has been freezing for some time, and at indoor and outdoor skating tracks and areas with artificial cooling.
Ice skating is believed to have been started in Sweden over twelve hundred years ago by the Vikings.
In the 18th century, ice skating became known world-wide as a sport and the Dutch created skates with much longer blades.
Ice skating works because the metal blade at the bottom of the ice skate shoe can glide with very little friction over the surface of the ice. However, slightly leaning the blade over and digging one of its edges into the ice ("rockover and bite") gives skaters the ability to increase friction and control their movement at will.
They can also create momentum by pushing the blade against the curved track which it cuts into the ice. Skillfully combining these two actions of leaning and pushing - a technique known as "drawing" - results in what looks like effortless and graceful curvilinear flow across the ice.
Research in materials has come up with a number of theories explaining the true nature of skating. The issue is that the precise mechanism by which the low-friction is generated is not fully understood, though a number of plausible theories abound usually involving explanations of air-ice boundary layer water and/or friction generated through the skate bottom.
In the 17th century, canal racing on wooden skates with iron blades was popular in the Netherlands.
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