Roller-skating sports include speed skating, hockey, figure skating, and dancing competitions similar to the ice-skating sports, as well as the 💹 vertical and street-style competitions common to so-called extreme sports.

Development of the roller skate The invention of roller skates has been 💹 traditionally credited to a Belgian, Joseph Merlin, in the 1760s, although there are many reports of wheels attached to ice 💹 skates and shoes in the early years of that century.

Early models were derived from the ice skate and typically had 💹 an "in-line" arrangement of wheels (the wheels formed a single straight line along the bottom of the skate).In 1819 M.

Petibled 💹 of Paris received the first patent for a roller skate.

Like previous models, Petibled's skate had an in-line wheel arrangement, using 💹 three wooden or metal wheels.