Learn To Skate Outside & Blade Mastery Skating
Learn To Skate Outside, LLC & Blade Mastery Skating are educational entities centered around preserving the history of ice skating, both outdoors and the origins of figure-carving for advanced edge stability and control (Skaters in the 1800s were true masters of the blade!). We love all disciplines of skating and actively teach beginner-to-elite edgework to: Figure, Hockey, and Nordic skaters.
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The founder of Learn To Skate Outside & Blade Mastery Skating: Laura Kottlowski, is a Colorado, USA based human-powered high altitude and outdoor wild ice skating expert, athlete, instructor, pioneer and historian. She spends 200+hours annually skating on outdoor ice of varying strengths, types, altitude and locations around the world. Laura is the first known person to skate on the highest lake in the U.S. (Pacific Tarn 13,420’) and first to skate on Gokyo Lakes #2 & #3 in the Khumbu, Nepal (~15,200 & ~15,485’ respectively). Laura has been skating for 32 years. She is a U.S. Figure Skating gold medalist, U.S. Figure Skating coach, Learn To Skate U.S.A. instructor (the governing body for instructors of figure skating, hockey, and speed skating), and has been teaching ice skating for the past 24 years to beginning-to-elite figure skaters and hockey players ranging from age 2-80! She is a World Figure Championships Competitor, recognized as a traditional ‘special-figure-skater’ shedding a modern light on the origins of ice skating and art on ice. Laura is also a certified Wilderness First Responder.
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She enjoys sharing her passion for wild ice on social media and uses her platforms to educate and inspire outdoor skaters and enthusiasts around the world. She’s frequently featured in international media such as a feature story on ABC Nightline, The New York Times, The Wallstreet Journal, Vogue Magazine Online, she’s been on the cover of The Professional Skaters magazine multiple times, in SKATING magazine, Red Bull's 'The Red Bulletin', and she was consulted about ice safety in National Geographic’s ‘Explore Wild Skating’ article in December of 2020 to name a few. Together with the locals and Nepal Tourism she helped plan and co-host the worlds highest figure skating show and ice hockey match on February 14th, 2020 on Gokyo Lake in the Everest region of Nepal, bringing National and Olympic champion skaters with her.