PERSONAL HEALTH : Be a Good Skate: Exercise Care, and Don’t Forget Safety Gear

Those new in-line skates Santa dropped off seem just the ticket to keep you on the fitness track. But there are a few things you should know about skating safety before going off in search of a second childhood.

Once you get it together, in-line skating can not only whip you into great cardiovascular shape, it can also tone those prone-to-mush body parts, such as buttocks and thighs.

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A History: The first in-line skates, goes the folklore, were fashioned during the summer in the 1700s by a Dutchman who missed ice skating. He nailed wooden spools to strips of wood and affixed them to his shoes. But the sport didn’t catch on until the early 1980s, when hockey players rediscovered it as an invigorating off-season exercise.

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The Numbers: There are about 9 million in-line skaters, according to industry estimates, with about 800,000 of them participating in in-line hockey.

Prices for adult skates range from $75-$300. Annual sales are $660 million, says Mike Jaskwhich, product manager of California Pro, a manufacturer, and are expected to top $1 billion by 1995.

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The Mechanics: In-line skates, as the name suggest, have three to five wheels lined up behind each other. On most models, brakes are mounted on the back of one skate. Rollerblade Inc., a leading in-line manufacturer, will introduce a new braking system in March that will require only rolling one foot forward without digging in or lifting the toe, says Maureen O’Neill, spokeswoman for Rollerblade.

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The Good News (Calorie-Burning): Skate at a pace of 9 to 15 m.p.h. (15 is considered brisk), and you’ll burn about 285-570 calories during a half-hour workout, says John Porcari, executive director of the La Crosse Exercise and Health Program at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse.

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The Bad News (The Injury List): The most common injuries are scrapes, broken forearms and broken wrists, says Dr. Wally Ghurabi, medical director of the Nethercutt Emergency Center at Santa Monica Hospital Medical Center, who often treats injured skaters from the nearby beach. The fractures can require up to six weeks of casting. Ghurabi has also treated severe “road burn” of the buttocks and two patients with fractured tailbones “from landing really hard.”

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Staying Off the Injury List: Protective gear is a must, Ghurabi tells patients. Most important, he says, are a helmet, elbow pads, knee pads and wrist guards. Protective gear packages are often sold alongside the skates.

In recent years, the industry has placed increasing emphasis on safety. Lessons, offered through sporting goods stores and in-line manufacturers, are advised.

“Know the road,” Ghurabi adds. “If you follow safety measures and good sense guidelines, you can get away with scratches.”

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The Comparison Controversy: In fitness circles, there is some disagreement over just where in-line skating stacks up aerobically.

“Skating can be as good as running,” says Patty Freedson, associate professor of exercise science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. Skating at a brisk pace and running at a brisk pace probably results in the same energy expenditure, she says.

“In-line skating is probably not as good as running or cycling for aerobic benefits,” counters Carl Foster, director of cardiac rehabilitation at the Milwaukee Heart Institute and an exercise physiologist. In a Rollerblade-funded study published in the International Journal of Sports Medicine in 1993, Foster compared skating, jogging and cycling. He found that skating was not as intense an aerobic workout. But, he says, skating can build muscle strength, so if you are trying to develop muscles and get aerobic benefit at the same time, skating might be ideal.

Skating can tone hips, thighs and buttocks, he adds.

How fast?

“If you skate three times a week for 30 minutes, in a month you will notice a difference in your rear-end area,” he says.