Roller Hockey

Roller hockey is a form of hockey played on a dry surface using wheeled skates. Most professional-inline hockey games take place on an indoor or outdoor sport court (a type of plastic interlinking tiles used to create a skating surface). Otherwise, any dry surface can be used to host a game, typically a roller rink, macadam, or cement. The term "Roller Hockey" is often used interchangeably to refer to two variant forms chiefly differentiated by the type of skates and sticks used. There is traditional "Roller hockey" (Quad hockey, Rink hockey), played with quad skates, and "Inline hockey", played with inline skates. Combined, roller hockey is played in nearly 60 countries worldwide. A minor variant of roller hockey is called skater hockey, played on both quad and inline skates.

Roller Hockey is played on both Quad skates and Inline skates, have different rules and equipment, and involve different types of skating but share the category and name of Roller Hockey. Roller hockey (Quad) is played using traditional quad roller skates, affording greater maneuverability to the player - this results in games filled with fancy footwork, tight maneuvering, and is more similar to football or basketball. The stick is more or less the same as in bandy and shinty. Roller Hockey (Inline) bears close resemblance to ice hockey and is played on Inline skates, uses an ice hockey stick and includes a lot of fast "racing back and forth" action. Inline hockey goalies use a glove called a catcher to catch shots made on goal, and a flat, usually square, mitt called a blocker which is used to deflect shots on goal. The Quad hockey goalie uses a flat batting glove that provides rebound characteristics when blocking a shot on goal.

Quad hockey is a variation of roller hockey. Roller Hockey is the overarching name for a rollersport that has existed long before inline skates were "re-invented" in the 70s (They were actually invented before quads, in the 1760s). Roller Hockey has been played on quad skates, in sixty countries worldwide and so has many names worldwide. Sometimes the sport is called Quad Hockey, (PT), (NL), (DE), International Style Ball hockey, (FR), (IT), (CA), (ES), (DA), (S), (ET) and Hardball hockey (US), depending on which region of the world it is played. Roller hockey was a demonstration rollersport in the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.

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