The Voice from the Pacific Northwest Newsletter
Fitting
Your Skating Boot....continued
By Glenn
Koshi
In
my dealings with speed skaters over the years, I’ve come to
realize how little is known about the care and fit of leather
speed boots, especially ones that use carbon fiber or Kevlar
for support. This is not intended to be the final say in boot
care and basics, and different manufacturers may have different
instructions. However, after working with speed boots for over
fifteen years, I hope to at least shed some light on what seems
to be an elusive topic
Custom
Boots
People
sometimes view full custom boots as the final say in boot fit.
Well, sorry for this bit of news, but making a custom boot is
not an exact science. I figure that we’ll one day be taking
a computer aided three-dimensional schematic of the foot, sending
the file off to the boot manufacturer, and have them create
a perfect duplicate of the foot in some sort of resin, using
lasers, but that day (for us) is a long way off. In the mean
time, we have to resort to the different methods of making casts
that are available to us. One result of this is that the boot
can only be made as good as the casts themselves. For instance,
molding swollen feet (after exercise) can affect the accuracy
of the casts. Molding a pronated foot will result in a pronated
boot.
Then,
every custom boot is hand-made. Another factor is that feet
change over time. Therefore, when you get your new custom boots,
expect to break them in slowly. It won’t be as slow or as potentially
painful as breaking in stock boots, but rather much, much less
time and virtually no pain. While I do have a customer who skated
52 miles the first day he put on his custom boots, that’s not
something I recommend. Go a few miles at first. As you’ll read
further down, frame adjustment will be crucial. Socks and lacing
are riding a fine line between too thick/tight, or too thin/loose.
No matter what your skating experience, one very common side
affect of new boots is cramping. Basically, you will be using
muscles in your feet that you’ve not used before. By putting
them to work now, you’ll discover that dull ache that tends
to get worse when you take your boots off. This seems to be
more the norm than exception…but it will go away. Tell yourself
to relax your feet! Clenching your toes doesn’t do much but
cause problems. One coach told me to rub Ben Gay on my feet
(to help the cramping) before skating – I tried it a few times
and it actually seemed to help.
If
you clench your toes or feet because your heel won’t stay put,
then it’s time to either pinch the Achilles area of the boot,
or get new boots. Toe-pushing is also a cause of heel lift,
no matter how well a boot fits, if you push with your toes,
you’ll lift your heel in the boot, causing blisters in the inside
or outside of the heel!
Boot
Fit & Socks
A
good fitting boot is normally not easy to get on or off. For
instance, there's no such thing as just "popping"
on a custom boot. When lacing, you'll need to loosen the laces
most of the way down the boot. This a good sign; if they are
easy to slip on, then the boots are probably too big. Additionally,
nearly everyone makes the mistake of buying stock boots that
are too big. These are not tennis shoes, and should fit tighter
than probably anything you’ve ever put on your feet, including
ski boots. When trying on a stock boot, prior to heating, make
sure your toes nearly touch the front of the boot. Kick your
heels back as far as they will go first, then lace them up,
stand and bend your knees. You’ll see that this will bring your
heel back even further in the boot. So remember, if the boot
is on the snug side, that's a good thing. Making a boot bigger
is easy, just heat mold them (yes, the initial heat molding
will probably make them bigger). Still, the boot will “grow”
over time anyway, as the leather in the toe area will stretch
eventually. Don't rush the process with any kind of leather
conditioner.
For
socks, make sure you are using a thin liner of man-made material
(Coolmax is great), cotton will promote blistering, and the
ribbing at the top can be excruciating. Take the new socks with
you when trying on new boots. You’ll find that there’s a fine
line between a sock that’s too thick, and too thin. Once you’ve
found the right sock, buy stacks of them! Plug: Check out www.EZeefitSports.com
for a great new product, which will eradicate any blister problem.
Lacing
Make
sure your laces are laced up going over the top of the eyelet.
In other words, as you lace up the boot, lace in the next eyelet
by going from up - down through the hole. Don't do this on the
last eyelet, though. Be aware; there's an extremely fine line
between lacing too tight and not tight enough, similar to having
a sock too thick or too thin. Take your time lacing up, and
unlacing when you’re done skating. It’s not uncommon to have
to re-tie in the middle of a skate, either to loosen the laces
up a bit, or tighten them. These are the trial and error parts,
and eventually you'll know how tight to lace, and which sock
to use.
Frame
Positioning
Side-to-side
adjustment of your frames – this is always a long subject of
debate. I believe that since everyone is different, it all boils
down to personal preference. Unfortunately, it's trial and error
to find the sweet spot. There are going to be a lot of people
that disagree with this…I've heard people (including pro skaters)
give out frame positioning advice to skaters that they just
met, and had never seen skate. How do they know where someone
else’s frames should be positioned, if they haven’t seen them
skate?
Here's
my take on it (and I've adjusted thousands of skaters' frames):
a large percentage of the skaters out there pronate, which means
their ankles collapse towards their arches. This is easily corrected
by moving the frame in towards the arch, which stands the foot
up. A lot of people will tell you to move the toe end in, and
not the heel. However, I believe you need to move the heel-end
in too. The reason: if you only move the toe end in, you will
be changing the frame angle in relation to the direction of
travel. You will have to compensate for it by toeing out even
further on the set-down. This of course may not apply to indoor
skating, or even double-pushing. Still, I’ve heard respected
people in the industry tell others that, “Your frame should
be centered, and you should learn how to skate with them like
that.” While there is some truth to this statement…if you can
move your frames to help, and possibly make you a faster skater,
why not move them?
Supination,
the opposite of pronation, is a better of two evils, because
you want to set the wheels down on their outside edges anyway.
Correcting too much supination is just a matter of moving the
frames outwards, away from the arches.
I like to make the first frame adjustment drastic. This will
speed up the trial and error process. A drastic frame placement
move is about ¼”. If you pronate, move the frame ¼”
towards your arches, and skate. If you now supinate to a point
of a lack of balance, start moving the frames back, 1/16” at
a time. I prefer to set frames to favor supination, to help
in the set-down (just a bit). To help speed the adjustment process
up, you can leave the second and fourth wheels out (of a five
wheeled frame), skate and adjust.
Remember
that the frame position can also move, alleviate or
create pressure points on your foot and ankle. This
is important to remember if you are about to have your boot
stretched to relieve a spot that’s causing you discomfort. Make
sure your frames are where you like them first, before stretching
a boot, or you may be stretching it unnecessarily. If it's the
top boot cuff digging into the ankle bone, this is normally
a result of pronation or supination, and boot stretching is
almost undoubtedly not the right thing to do. This problem is
nearly always alleviated by moving your frames. If it's pronation,
move your frames towards your arches, both the toe and heel
end. If it's supination, move them away from the arch. Picture
this: you're pronating on your boots. Look down, and see where
the cuff will pressure your ankle? On the top, above the outside
ankle bone. This is the most common pressure problem of speed
boots. Now remember, if the boots are stretched there unnecessarily,
because you didn't move the frames in, then that part of the
boot will become a source of instability. Nearly every customer
who comes to me with boot pain in the upper part of the outside
(or inside) ankle and makes these frame placement adjustments
has written back, telling me that the different frame position
alleviated the pain.
These
are just my rules of thumb. I don’t believe there is any one
solid answer on frame positioning for everyone. Ultimately,
listen to your body.
Front to Back Adjustment
Front
to back...really, there's only one correct position...as close
to 50/50 as possible. The old, old (Dutch) theory was to draw
a vertical line from the back heel of the boot, and that would
be where your rear axle lined up. This really meant that there
would be too much of the frame/wheels protruding in front of
the boot. A second generation of thinking, promoted by Dante
Muse, was incorporated into a Muse Mogema frame, which actually
had a bit more frame/wheel protruding from the rear, than the
front, to accentuate a heel push. However, for the best push
and easiest to do cross-overs, centering your frame is optimal.
Taking
Care of Your Boots
The main thing is to let your boots air dry THOROUGHLY after
you're done skating. Leave them opened up, and store vertically,
on their wheels. Don't leave them lying on their sides, especially
in a hot trunk.
If
you have one of those old skate bags that stored your skates
on the bottom pocket, with all of your gear on top of them,
it’s time for a new bag. Also, if your bag stores your boots
inside a zippered pocket, just make sure that they are completely
dry before zipping them up. It’s the acidity in your sweat that
will prematurely break down the leather liner of a boot. Making
sure that your boots dry fast and thoroughly after you skate
will be your best defense in preventing the leather rot. One
method is to stuff newspaper or paper towels in the boot, to
absorb the moisture, especially after skating in the rain.
Following
these instructions will undoubtedly add months to the life of
your boots, and keep your feet happy.
Glenn
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