Any grown men using a 7 foot radius out there?

[FlyingDutchman 3]

I ask because most senior skaters go about as low as a 9 radius and it seems to work really well for them. 

I learned something about what happens to your radius the more you sharpen your skates. Years ago I had a really good stretch of consistent play on a pair of skates. After a few years, and a lot of sharpening, those skates became so comfortable for me I was able to do things I couldn't do when I first had the skates. My feeling was I had broken them in and they were just hitting their stride, but they started to fall apart. After getting back into some new skates, and a 9 radius, everything sucked for me again. I couldn't understand why, though. 

 

Back to what I've learned about what happens to your radius the more you sharpen your skates: It makes the radius sharper and sharper. I bet I sharpened those 9 radius skates down to a 7 and didn't even know it, and that's why they became so comfortable for me to play on. 

I am going to test this theory out as I've recently taken a newer pair of skates and had them radiused to 7 feet. One reason I may benefit from such a sharp radius is that I'm pretty short (5'6") and I have shorter than average legs for a guy my height. 

 

Anyone other adult men using such a sharp radius? Do you have shorter than average legs? 

[puckpilot 312]

I think I have about the same body type as you. I'm 5'5 with short legs. I've never intentionally went down to a lower radius, but I sure as heck had one thrust on me by accident. I learned the hard way to choose carefully where you get your skates sharpened. Got lazy one time and just used a rink pro shop with inexperience kids. They basically ground my heels and toes off my steel. It made it so I skating on a very small radius. Don't know what it was, but since I use junior skates, it couldn't have been very big. 

Not exactly the same as what you're doing, but I found I wasn't a fan of the smaller radius. Sure I could turn easier, but I'm already pretty agile. I found I lost stability and some power in my push-offs. Ended up having to get new steel.

But my theory on equipment is try anything and everything. Tweak it this way and that. You never know what you'll like, and you'll never know what will help. Sometimes "crazy" works.  

 

[flip12 717]

3 hours ago, puckpilot said:

But my theory on equipment is try anything and everything. Tweak it this way and that. You never know what you'll like, and you'll never know what will help. Sometimes "crazy" works.  

 

Good advice for life in general :)

[BureKovy 20]

If you mainly like it for forward tight turns you could do a 7/9 combo.  This will give you more steel on the back end.

[qmechanic 17]

I'm 5'2" and I skate on a 7/12 combo.  The guy at No-Icing did it for me.  My runners are very short though, because my skates are size 2.5

[mickz 107]

Probably lots of guys skating on 7' profiles out there with the amount of banana blades I've seen

[FlyingDutchman 3]

I finally got on the ice with these and they're perfect. You do lose some forward motion with your straightaway stride, but the increased maneuverability makes up for it. I'm a better skater on a 7 foot radius. 

[FlyingDutchman 3]

8 hours ago, qmechanic said:

I'm 5'2" and I skate on a 7/12 combo.  The guy at No-Icing did it for me.  My runners are very short though, because my skates are size 2.5

 

How does a combo radius work? They are different on the fore of the rocker than they are on the back of the rocker point? 

[FlyingDutchman 3]

55 minutes ago, mickz said:

Probably lots of guys skating on 7' profiles out there with the amount of banana blades I've seen

 

This is a good point. I bet it is a lot more common than you would think. 

[qmechanic 17]

1 hour ago, FlyingDutchman said:

How does a combo radius work? They are different on the fore of the rocker than they are on the back of the rocker point? 

It's probably easiest to read the explanation on No-Icing's website: Combination Skate Radius

[FlyingDutchman 3]

5 minutes ago, qmechanic said:

It's probably easiest to read the explanation on No-Icing's website: Combination Skate Radius

Thanks for the link. It probably is a nice option for most skaters, but I think a big part of me appreciating this 7 foot radius, which has a neutral rock, is that it makes maneuverability better for me backwards and forwards. I'm not sure I would like a combination better.