Speed skating, or speedskating is a competitive form of ice skating in which the competitors race each other in traveling a certain distance on skates. Types of speed skating are long track speed skating, short track speed skating, and marathon speed skating. In the Olympic Games, long track speed skating is usually referred to as just "speed skating", while short track speed skating is known as "short track". The ISU, the governing body of both ice sports, refers to long track as "speed skating" and short track as "short track skating".

Essentially all of the regular ice hockey rules in able-bodied ice hockey leagues apply to ice sledge hockey. The only differences those necessitated by the ice sledge and the athlete. The first set of international rules was created in 1990 and was drafted from Canadian rules.