Rules

Speed skating is currently conducted on outdoor or indoor ovals, often with artificially frozen ice. For the Olympic Games, rules demand a closed (indoor) oval-shaped track. According to the rules of the International Skating Union, a standard track should be either 400m or 333.3m long. 400m is the standard used for all major competitions. Tracks of other, non-standard lengths, such 200 or 250m, are also in use in some places for training and/or smaller local competitions.

On standard tracks, the curves have a radius of 25-26m in the inner lane, and each lane is 4-5m wide.

All races are held in pairs, for which two lanes on the track are used. Skaters wear bands around their upper arm to identify which lane they started in. The colours are white for inner lane and red for outer lane. At the back straight, the skaters switch lanes which causes them both to cover the same distance per lap.

Occasionally, quartet starts are used to allow more skaters to start in a shorter time. This involves having two pairs of skaters in the lanes at the same time, but with the second pair starting when the first have completed approximately half of the first lap. The skaters in the second pair will then wear yellow and blue arm bands instead of the usual white and red.