What 'skating downhill' actually means

Skating downhill means your centre of mass is ahead of your base, so gravity is doing part of the work that most players do with their quadriceps.

The traditional coaching cue — get low, sit down, push long — puts your mass behind your feet, which means every stride has to first arrest you and then re-accelerate you. That is expensive, and it is why power skating produces players who are exhausted and not much faster.

Falling forward feels unsafe until the recovery under the hip becomes automatic. That order matters: build the recovery, then lean.