Not that this is relevant to anything on the boards. Ever. But just cause i'm curious how many people are still actually looking at this, I took up ice skating in early November and after skipping skating in December cause the holidays were WAAY to busy, Debbie and I started back skating in January.
My goal is to start playing hockey and I bought my gear a few weeks ago and now that the stitches in my back are healed and I have had a couple weeks to get my skates back under me I finally went out during my lunch hour today and skated in a subset of my pads (shin, pants and gloves) to see how much of a pain it would be to adjust to skating with the extra weight and limited mobility.
Let me tell you, hockey pads are AWESOME.
First, they are cool cause the model is basically roman armor with the exception of the pants instead of pteruges, which, cause I'm a geek, I think is cool.
Second, my god the weight to protection ratio is mind-blowing. My father is in law enforcement so I've seen my share of body armor for real life situations but it truly stunned me how strong and lightweight personal armor is in sports these days. Clearly, law enforcement is further behind the times only next to the military (and yes, I've worn military and law enforcement body armor so I have a basis for comparison).
The shipping weight of this stuff (and this is NOT the uber-expensive pro shit) was a whopping 11lbs. Yes, shipping, that means, boxes (it came in two boxes, cause the stick wouldn't fit in the other one), plastic wrap and wadded paper. I don't even FEEL the crap when I'm wearing it and yet, I have had my wife hit me with it and I can't feel a thing.
Third, now I can start showing up on Tuesday evenings from 9-10 to start practicing with Instructional Hockey League here and I am damned excited.
Fourth, and sadly, least, my wife has pointed out to me that this 23-ish chick that is one of the 8 people that show up for the 12:30-3:00 public skating times during the weekdays is all kinds of flirting and interested in me. She's giving me crap about her flirting with me. This is an ego stroke to an old, balding, beat up man.
Just my 2 cents.