June 22, 2005
Skating the Park....
...Gallop park to be exact. With nothing to do this monday evening and in no mood to undertake the huge task of doing laundry(I still havn't), I decided to finally skate around a bit. Dumped the huge amount of equipment in the car and drove to the park. This park has nice smooth pathways that make is a pleasure to skate. Its a very popular place with quite a crown walking, jogging, cycling and skating on the trails. Our friday evening skate passes though the park too.
Arriving in the park, I met one of the guys from the friday skate, forgot his name. Unfortunately he recently got a broken shoulder from skating. So that brings us to the huge amount of equipment I carry. Most of it is the safety equipment, knee pads, elbow pads, wrist guards and the helmet. Not to mention the heavy skates themselves. It takes a decent 15 mins to just put all the stuff on properly. I also wear my contacts while skating, just a little more precaution does not hurt.
So that all brings us to the actually activity of skating itself. I started by going towards Dexter. THe slopes are pretty gentle and the ride is good. The return trip that side too around 20 mins. On to the other side towards Mitchell and this side has a small upwards gradient so its a little work for heavy me. My lower back hurts a little on upward slopes, but not too much, need to do some Pilates to strenthen those muscles. Closer to Mitchell is a wooden bridge that goes over the Huron river. Its a little rough and generally I am ok on the bridge going the other way. This time going upwards on the bridge got me. I stopped rolling and nearly fell. So I turned around and went downhill, much easier this way. On the way back, I pushed myself, its downhill and I went fast, boy it felt good and I had fun.
Arriving in the park, I met one of the guys from the friday skate, forgot his name. Unfortunately he recently got a broken shoulder from skating. So that brings us to the huge amount of equipment I carry. Most of it is the safety equipment, knee pads, elbow pads, wrist guards and the helmet. Not to mention the heavy skates themselves. It takes a decent 15 mins to just put all the stuff on properly. I also wear my contacts while skating, just a little more precaution does not hurt.
So that all brings us to the actually activity of skating itself. I started by going towards Dexter. THe slopes are pretty gentle and the ride is good. The return trip that side too around 20 mins. On to the other side towards Mitchell and this side has a small upwards gradient so its a little work for heavy me. My lower back hurts a little on upward slopes, but not too much, need to do some Pilates to strenthen those muscles. Closer to Mitchell is a wooden bridge that goes over the Huron river. Its a little rough and generally I am ok on the bridge going the other way. This time going upwards on the bridge got me. I stopped rolling and nearly fell. So I turned around and went downhill, much easier this way. On the way back, I pushed myself, its downhill and I went fast, boy it felt good and I had fun.
