Inline hockey Roller inline hockey, or inline hockey is a variant of hockey played on a hard, smooth surface, with players using inline skates to move and ice hockey sticks to shoot a hard, plastic puck into their opponent's goal to score points. The sport ...

and skater hockey are team sports, similar to

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

. In the UK, there are two associations that govern inline hockey. The British Inline Puck Hockey Association (BIPHA) govern the sport with rules using a Puck. The British inline Skater Hockey Association (BiSHA) is different from BIPHA as BiSHA uses a Ball,

Inline skates Inline skates are a type of roller skate used for inline skating. Unlike quad skates, which have two front and two rear wheels, inline skates typically have two to five wheels arranged in a single line. Some, especially those for recreation, ha ...

and

roller skates Roller skates, are shoes or bindings that fit onto shoes that are worn to enable the wearer to roll along on wheels. The first roller skate was an inline skate design, effectively an ice skate with wheels replacing the blade. Later the "quad ska ...

and is played to full-contact rules. GBinline, Inline UK and BRHA, are minor association within the country. The BRSF is recognised by

UK Sport UK Sport is the government agency responsible for investing in Olympic and Paralympic sport in the United Kingdom. It is an executive non-departmental public body sponsored by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport. It was created ...

Sport England Sport England is a non-departmental public body under the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport. Its role is to build the foundations of a community sport system by working with national governing bodies of sport, and other funded par ...

Sport Northern Ireland Sport Northern Ireland ( ir, Spórt Thuaisceart Éireann) is the regional government sports council (funding body) for Northern Ireland. History It was established under the Recreation and Youth Service (Northern Ireland) Order 1973 as the Spor ...

Sport Wales Sport Wales ( Welsh: ''Chwaraeon Cymru'') is the national organisation responsible for developing and promoting sport and physical activity in Wales. Working alongside partners such as governing bodies of sport and local authorities, they aim t ...

and

SportScotland Sportscotland (officially styled sport), formerly the Scottish Sports Council, is the national agency for sport in Scotland. The Scottish Sports Council was established in 1972 by royal charter. The body works in partnership with public, pri ...

as the National Governing Body of Roller Sports in the UK, its members include BIPHA, BiSHA, NRHA, FARS,

UKRDA The United Kingdom Roller Derby Association (UKRDA) is the National Association for roller derby in the UK. The association was formed in 2010 with 15 member leagues, and was recognized by the British Roller Sports Federation soon after. The UKR ...

and Skateboarding. Clubs and teams who wish to be recognised by UK Sport and the four Home Countries must be registered to one of the members of the BRSF. BIPHA has nine current regions spread across the UK, regional league winners and runners-up progress to national finals held in Rotherham each summer. BIPHA provide leagues for players at several age groups including Under 08, Under 10, Under 12, Under 14, Under 16, Junior Men and Women, Senior Men and Women and Masters. The association also sends teams to compete in the

FIRS Inline Hockey World Championships The Inline Hockey World Championship is an annual inline hockey tournament organized by World Skate. Prior to the creation of World Skate in September 2017, the championship was administrated by the Comité International Roller In-Line Hockey ( ...

at Junior, Senior and Masters level and to the AAU Olympics at Junior level held in the United States. BIPHA has two specific Inline hockey venues. These are used by each of the associations. Simply Skate Arena, in

Rotherham Rotherham () is a large minster and market town in South Yorkshire, England. The town takes its name from the River Rother which then merges with the River Don. The River Don then flows through the town centre. It is the main settlement of ...

, has two small sized pads and is the home venue of BIPHA. Also, the Lord Roberts Centre in Bisley,

Surrey Surrey () is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in South East England, bordering Greater London to the south west. Surrey has a large rural area, and several significant urban areas which form part of the Greater London Built-up Area. ...

, has a similar sized rink. For Regional Leagues, often Leisure Centres are used due to the lack of specific venues. BiSHA has four current regions and is more popular in the South of the UK with only one league covering the North of England. Similarly to BIPHA, BiSHA holds national championships for league winners and runners-up. BiSHA also sends teams to represent the country, the BiSHA Great Britain team competes in the iiSHF European Championships. Often, players will play in one or more associations, this is generally due to the lack of players and available teams. Some players will travel to other regions where the standard of hockey may be higher than in their own region.

References

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External links

British Roller Sports FederationBritish Inline Puck Hockey AssociationBritish inline Skater Hockey Association