A few days ago I received a link to a video showing horse jump skating from Mike Van Erp, an instructor from the LondonSkaters. After a bit of searching, I found out that this roller sport is called kjoering. It is just like skijoering, with the exception that the athlete behind the horse is riding inline skates instead of snow skis. This difference allows kjoering activities to take place all year.

So far, I have found two types of horse jump skating. Some outdoor horse jump skating events are conducted outside on grass courses. Other indoor horse jump skating activities take place in arenas with sand along the course. Either way, the skaters use off road skating equipment that will allow them to skate over fairly rough, non-paved terrain.

Both kjoering and skijoering sports originated in Europe and only recently have been seen in the United States. If you want to learn more, visit the Offroad Kjoering website.

Liz Miller is passing the word, and so will I.

It looks like Ben Wilson from Portland, Oregon has an interesting new aftermarket accessory product for inline skates called a Flex Brake. This new skate brake product is intended to solve inline skating speed control and braking challenges. It is a simple lightweight braking system that can be installed on most inline speed skates or inline fitness skates with four or five wheels.

Ben hopes to help fund the cost of injection molding equipment needed for mass production via Kick Starter. If you would like to see, pre-order or help fund this new skating product, visit his page to help fund production of this new Flex Brake system.

Image © Ben Wilson

Now is the time to do a little SkateFarm-ing. Attending a SkateFarm workshop with Eddy Matzger will help get you ready for an event, teach you to skate on hills and burn more calories than you can imagine. These sessions teach and demonstrate essential skating techniques like stopping, turning, pacelines, body alignment and even the double push, too.

Participants should plan to arrive early and get settled one day ahead. These are the SkateFarm Virginia dates for this season:

1. May 31- June 4
2. June 7 - 11
3. June 21-25
4. June 28- July 2

Eddy Matzger's SkateFarm is located at 1438 Union School Road in Floyd, Virginia. You should reserve a spot as soon as possible by sending an inquiry to skatefarm@skatefarm.com.

This Skate-tv video shows event highlights from kids' events at the past 33rd Vattenfall Berlin Half Marathon and the atmosphere in the inline village at the Berlin Vital expo on April 7th. Julien Levrard and Katharina Rumpus were the winners of the race, and in keeping with the motto the best start into the spring, the participants were greeted by 200,000 spectators and plenty of bright sunshine.

There are more German race events this season:

• The 22nd Vattenfall City Night Inline Skating will take place on July 27th 2013.
• The 40th BMW Berlin Marathon Inline Skating will skate on September 28th this year.
• The next Vattenfall Berlin Half Marathon will take place on March 30th 2014. Online registration will begin on June 3rd 2013.

These SCC Events in Germany are just a few of many large marathon race events that recur annually. In addition to North American and International marathon events, there are fundraising races, festivals and local marathons that raise awareness and money for a lot of good causes. Many enthusiastic inline skaters use these activities and other competitive speed events as the foundation for vacation trips, especially since many of the destinations are good ones.