Skating Impressions, Day 1:
I sharpened these to a shallow 1/2" ROH to begin with to see how fast these blades felt. Thin blades and shallow hollows are generally associated with less friction, which can produce more speed. The verdict? - Yes, they were faster. It's not a huge increase, but it was noticeable.
However -unless I was stroking around with deep knees, I had slippage problems with a shallow 1/2" hollow. It was "skid city" with many figure skating turns. An exception were hockey turns where I felt like I was riding on rails. I have a very deep knee bend when doing them and probably look like a hockey player doing them. They did not skid, and it felt like the blades carved a tighter radius. Doing them was an absolute blast on these blades. I suspect that the amount of knee bend I employ for speedy stroking and doing hockey turns compensated for the shallow hollow.
But I can't skate around like that all session for all elements. I need more edge grip, so I'm going to sharpen to 3/8" radius for Wednesday.
Oddly, I didn't notice the shortness of blade at all. Some people can detect a change as little as a 1/4" difference, but for me it made absolutely no difference in skating feel. I did notice that I could do "neater feet" without fear of stepping on a tail, so that aspect of a short blade was very nice. That benefit alone is something I'm putting in the plus column for these blades.
The rocker is different from my favorite well-worn Aces, so that prevented me from doing any good front scratch spins today. Part of the problem is blade skidding at the beginning of the spin. I don't hook on a toe pick, but set my spins on a deep outside edge. The 1/2" hollow was working against me there. I'll test that again on Wednesday with the new hollow. Once the hollow is changed, then I can work on adjusting to the different rocker.
I didn't notice the rear stanchion height difference between my Aces and these blades. The Eclipse Dance blade is higher, but I couldn't blame any single difference in skating feel on that aspect.
I noticed that my weakest three-turn, the LBI, was difficult to do today. I suspect the rocker difference and my lack of comfort with that turn both conspired against me. My RFI brackets were fine, although I skidded some of them.
So, with the 1/2" hollow chosen for today's experiment together with a thin blade, I was skidding a lot. It was readily apparent that bending knees deeper would cure it, but I can't skate for 1-1/2 hours with my butt so low to the ground without my old knees complaining.
But the speed today was really fun!
Edit: My experience today appears to confirm my suspicion that the recommended 1" ROH for these blades on Riedell's web site is an error for all but patch skaters.