I feel that this weekend is the start of my getting my derby shit together.

Last Wednesday I had an “MOT” with Chris Baird at Motive8. A few of friends at work have him as a personal training. When I was training for the Abbey Dash 10k in 2012 I went to the weekly boot camp sessions that he ran. I really rate him.

He’d asked me to keep a food diary. At the MOT he took fat measurements at various points and from that he’ll be recommending dietary changes. My disc injury limits what exercise I can (should) do and he’ll be taking that into account. Already though he has confirmed that swimming a good aerobic exercise.

The Men’s Roller Derby World Championship also took place in Birmingham over the weekend. I couldn’t afford to travel down for it, but I spent much of Friday evening, Saturday and some of Sunday cursing the Livestream feed for failing just at interesting points. As expected Team USA won by an easy margin, but this was not the main take away from the weekend. The Japanese and Argentinian teams won the hearts of the derby community, travelling great distances with small teams and little resources. When it transpired that the Argentine team had run out of money a hat was passed around the stadium and a collection of over £1,000 raised for them. On a personal level I was pleased to be able to say to my kids “I’ve skated with…” or “I know him/her”. Two people I want to mention are Captain Malice, who did a damn fine job commentating. I’ve bouted with him! Also Beat Monkey. He was blogging the event but did so anonymously.

Early Saturday I’d been swimming but my arms were tired and I felt that I’d made a poor effort. I came away rather disappointed; the MRDWC gave me the perfect excuse to mope around the house. My son came down later in the day, so we watched a film while I tried to fix his very dead laptop.

Sunday was a slow start and it seemed that I wouldn’t make it to Skateful practice. The trains weren’t running (again) due to engineering works and my usual lift was down in Birmingham. But it all ended well. I managed to get lifts to and from practice and was so pleased that I made it.

Some of us got there early and did 30 minutes off-skate warm up. Perhaps over-did would be a better description. I’ve been advised not to run (repeated jarring) but managed five laps of the tennis courts (yes, it’s a tiny distance, but after nine months off I was quite pleased with myself). Then we did various activities to really work our thighs.

The session was all minimum skills. I loved it! Hardly any hitting but skating non-stop in derby stance. That pretty much finished off my legs. Today I’ve found going down stairs progressively more painful as the day has worn on – a good pain though – one that I haven’t experienced in ages.

When I got home I had a sensible dinner, joined a gym and prepared a healthy lunch for today! Then I went to bed at 10.30 so I’d get a good nights sleep.

The first steps on my journey to building a stronger me :-)

This weekend has been packed full of roller derby goodness!

Friday

Carly and Buckingham invited Skateful Dead round to theirs for a bit of a social. It wasn’t a big turnout but it was good fun. We watched the video of the open co-ed scrimmage that we’d hosted mid February. This was accompanied by chilli, nachos, pancakes and cake. Then we watched Whip It! and then a mix of clips on YouTube. Lots of reverend banter and quite a late night.

Saturday

I headed over to The Edge sports centre in Leeds to photograph the Hot Wheel double header.

The first was their B team playing Spa Town. The teams were evenly matched, the lead changing throughout the bout. At half time Hot Wheel B lead 104 to Spa Town 100. The second period was neck and neck right through to the end. The bout finished 210 Spa Town against 190 Hot Wheel B.

The second bout was Hot Wheel A team versus Rainy City Roller Girls. I feel that the warm up drills that a team performs give a good indication of the bout to follow. Rainy City split the team with vests and practised some very sharp walls. Hot Wheel too did some great blocking. This was going to be close. Talking to others there was a feeling that perhaps Rainy City were going to win comfortably. I’d never seen them play, so I had Hot Wheel for the win.

In the first period Hot Wheel took an early lead. Mia, skating for Hot Wheel was proving to be a really effective jammer. Towards the end of the period Ducky took a blow to the face. A nose bleed caused the jam to be called off, though after attention from the medical team she was back on track. At half time Hot Wheel led 102 to 56. I had opportunity to chat with Mia briefly. She said that she had been nervous about jamming before the bout. In the second period she did more of the same, despite also taking a blow to the face.

Rainy City pulled back and the bout ended in their favour, 191 to 152. Oddly there were only best [player type] certificates given out for one of the teams in the first bout. Hot Wheel though did have goodie bags for all of the players.

Sunday

It was with some trepidation that I went to practice. I’ve been staying off skates for fear of worsening my injury. Readers may recall that in December I declared that I would retire from bouting. Since then many seemingly insignificant conversations have happened. I’ve seen a musculo-skeletal specialist and now better understand the injury (herniated disc) and it’s likely recovery time (18 months). I’ve spoken to other skaters who have suffered the same injury and are now back on track. I found out that a skater that I consider to be pretty damn awesome only recently changed up from the same (very ordinary) skates that I use. More than any of these I’ve continued to be involved in the sport/community and find that I love it.

So I need to find a balance between injury and enjoyment. I plan to take it really easy at practice, so that my skate skills can improve. I also want to investigate refereeing, thus improving my knowledge of the game. Finally I’ll be working on physical fitness – strengthening my back and upper body to hopefully help prevent such an injury in future. Then, in perhaps twelve months time, I’ll be in a place where I can bout again. But the important thing for me is that there is no pressure to bout until I’m comfortable with it.

I found practice so much fun. My existing skate skills hadn’t upped and left me, we had a new bod skating and the team looked after me and didn’t hit me (too hard)!

Still buzzing from an excellent weekend :-)

Last Saturday I had a lovely afternoon/evening with roller derby friends.

Manchester Roller Derby had arranged a scrimmage with a mixture of players from various local teams, including MRD, Skateful Dead, Old Knights and another team I think, though quite who escapes me. I said that I would NSO.

On the Friday evening my sciatic injury was killing me and I really didn’t fancy doing anything over the weekend. I messaged Carly and asking if I could get out of doing it. Then later, in a different conversation Tony O said that he was unable to make it. He was also going to NSO, but is always generous enough to give me a lift. I scrapped my request to skip out of going and set about trying to find a lift. The best I could find was with Lawrence and Carly. Lawrence was playing in the scrimmage and so they were going out for drinks afterwards. I wasn’t sure about that – again because my leg gets painful after a while and lying down is the only way to relieve that pain.

They picked me up a bit after three and we drove over to Manchester. We talked about roller derby all the way there and it was great. Lawrence plays for The Skateful Dead and Carly referees for us. It was so good to talk through my injury worries and how I could remain part of the team without playing.

The scrimmage was good. Lots of big blockers, some skinny jammers (how Jim Jams didn’t get snapped into little pieces I don’t know) and plenty of big hits. I was the token bloke in the team of seven NSOs and six(?) referees. I did penalty box timing again.

After the scrim it was a short drive to The Courtyard in Manchester. Near Oxford Road, it’s a student place with cheap food and drink – £2.50 for a pint of Black Sheep! It was crowded so we decided to eat elsewhere and ended up in Revolution. Lawrence treat me to the meal – thank you very much. After the drive home I think it was around half eleven.

A massive thank you to Carly and Lawrence, not only for the lift and food but for helping me get my head straight about roller derby. My focus now is to get into refereeing (an idea suggested by Pulp Bitchin who plays for Wakey Wheeled Cats).

(An addendum. I couldn’t make it to training and the team meeting on Sunday, but had a lovely message from Gillie saying that the team was keen for me to carry on with them and that I could perhaps do bench during scrimmages. Also that just doing non-contact stuff during practice is fine.)

On Sunday I went to a fun skate. I took my beloved in-line skates as I’ve not used them for ages. For the whole of the session I was in pain. I could hardly do anything that I used to be able to do. After two hours I headed back home. As I hobbled over the bridge from the station there was an old man coming the other way with a walking stick. He was grey, in hair and complexion, in his sixties I suppose, and yet he looked more sprightly than me. I was so depressed.

This lead to days (and nights) of mental turmoil.

The Skateful Dead

An effective derby team is at least 14 players that are committed to the team. If I thought that I could give this then I would just be taking a break. I have come to realise that contact sports and the injuries that they bring are beyond what I consider acceptable. If I ever make a full recovery then I will fear injury in future. Practice is fun, but it’s with friends and there is an understanding that we shouldn’t injure one another (it doesn’t always work!). But when bouting it’s all out hitting. Some of the players are big, I’m not.

Rock Stars

Roller derby players have something of a rock-star status. However, the rock-star status only works when you’re a player. If you’re a hobbling cripple you lose that status.

Community

The derby community is the most inclusive community that I have come across. I enjoy being part of it. Hopefully this will continue, perhaps through photography and NSO duties.

Wheels on my feet!

I fell in love with skating almost ten years ago. Roller derby has taught me new skills and made me realise that I still have a great deal to learn. But in under a year of playing I’ve been transformed from being able to skate in the park for six hours every weekend and run 5km a few times a week to being unable to do either of these, being in pain nearly all of the time and relying on painkillers every day to control that pain. I don’t want this.

So it is with some sadness that I have decided that I am going to quit playing roller derby.

I wish The Skateful Dead every success. I’m proud that I’ve represented the team in some small way. If I can help in future then I will of course – as noted above, I’m quite handy with a camera.

Thank you for fun times!

A report from The Skateful Dead practice of 22 December, which I thought I’d published, but it’s been sat in draft since then. Oops!

We tried a new drill for the first time. Skating at a fair speed around the track the lead two would derby stop to inside and outside and then recycle as fast as possible to the back of the line. Then we did 27 in 5 which was good; I kept low and went fast :-)

Then we moved on to hitting practice, so I stopped – yeah, sciatic still not right. It looked like fun though. We borrowed some pads from Whitcliffe so people didn’t get completely battered. After some variation of left/right hitting we all lined up and everyone had a go had hitting Tony. It was his last practice session today as he’s moving on to play for Manchester Roller Derby. Thank you Tony for all the effort that you’ve put into Skateful Dead :-)

Then it was scrim time. As I wasn’t playing I got to “bench” for team black. It was five-a-side, so no rest between jams. It’s occasionally good to watch from the bench as you get a different perspective. The focus moves on what you’re doing/meant to be doing to seeing how the teams perform as a group. There was some really good play from both teams. Our walls can be really effective when they work; there was one jam where our wall held Ash for quite some time. I noticed Matt jamming and nicely slicing through our wall on one occasion. Tony O also did a monster hit on Ash and knocked him over.

We also had Carly and Rollverine from the Banditas skating with us today. It’s great when we have Banditas join us as they are so good.

I couldn’t make it to practice this weekend. However, Sunday afternoon found me at North Bridge Leisure Centre “NSOing”.

An Non Skating Official is one of the team involved with the administration of a roller derby bout. They perform a range of tasks, score keeping, penalty tracking and timing. I’ve never done it before, but when the Banditas but out a call on Facebook I jumped at the chance. Some have said that it can be boring, though I didn’t find it so. In any case I feel that it’s important to step up and do this kind of thing, I believe it’s part of belonging to the derby community.

This was a scrimmage was between Halifax Banditas and Rainy City Rollergirls. The Head NSO was Kim who plays for Wakey Wheeled Cats. She organised us all, provided sweets and gave clear guidance on what we needed to do. I was one of the three penalty box timers; timing a blocker pair.

A roller derby bout is 60 minutes, consisting of two 30 minute periods. Each of these is a series of “jams” that are no longer than 2 minutes each. If a player get penalised they spend a minute in the box. So that is what I was timing. It’s not quite so straight forward though. Jams can be shorter than 2 minutes and when they end then the penalty timers stop until the next jam starts. In addition the skater remains seated until they have 10 seconds remaining, at which point they stand. There is only space for two blockers from each team in the box, so if a third commits a foul it gets more complicated. Anyway, it went pretty well and I came away with a list of improvements for my penalty timer app.

How quickly did I learn the importance of calling colour and number when giving instructions? Two players with #147 in the box at the same time. Oops! No harm done.

After the first two periods the teams drew black/white discs and two new teams evolved each made up of a mixture of Banditas and Rainy City girls. (I was glad to be living by my “always carry a camera” rule as at this point I got asked to take photos of the mixed teams.) They then played a third period. This was followed by some hectic removing of the track and tidying the hall before a bit of a buffet in the bar.

A very enjoyable afternoon thank you!

Hull Angels Roller Dames vs Sheffield Steel Rollergirls Crucibelles

This weekend started with a train ride over to Hull to take photos at this (closed) bout. Danni Mac, who plays for HARD, put out a call for photographers on Facebook a bit ago. I jumped at the chance, having missed an opportunity in November.

I arrived at Ennerdale Leisure Centre early and grabbed an very reasonably priced chip butty and a cup of tea. Then down to the sports hall. It was Sodium lighting, like we have in the main hall at Whitcliffe Mount. I know that it’s impossible to get the white balance correct under such lighting. Shoot RAW, you’ll be fine! #crossesfingers

There was a photographer there with the Crucibelles. We had a quick chat about the light and where we were allowed to stand inside the track. We got told that too.

The atmosphere was lovely. Lots of laughter between players from both teams. It quickly became apparent that Iron Giant is one of those people that spreads happiness. In reviewing the photos I see it too, so many times.

When the jam starts she puts on her game face. She both jammed and blocked and succeeded at both. Of note was some excellent blocking against She Rarr.  It seems I may have a bit of a derby crush :-)

During half time the players sang as they skated round. (I don’t recall the song, but it was very good.) I can’t imagine blokes doing that, but it would be cool IMHO.

I’d not had chance to speak to D-Mac before or during the game, but caught up with her afterwards. I also got a lift back to the station (thanks, Danni, perfect timing for the train). She’s lovely too. We chatted about guest skaters (oops, heavy topic), injuries and other derby stuff.

For those interested in the stats I took 876 photos and used just 67. For each of those I fixed white balance in UFRaw before exporting to JPEG. The views on Flickr has exceeded anything I’ve ever seen; 16,865 since I posted them at around 1pm.

View the photo set on Flickr.

Home

Sunday is Skateful Dead training day. Not so much to report from this.

Tony O and I arrived early. It had been suggested by the captain that we might want to feedback on last week’s bout. This didn’t really happen as planned. We had a quick chat after warm up and agreed that the team needs to work on stamina and improve fitness outside of training. Endurance drill followed. Then we practised some of the stuff that had done previously – jammer against two blockers, then full wall. Some bridging.

We scrimmaged, though numbers were low, so it was three blockers and a jammer per team. This is when I got injured. I was jamming and the opposing blocker was facing me, so I went for a hit. Unfortunately we collided shoulder to shoulder and I seem to have come off worst. I’m hoping that it won’t be so bad in the morning. #sigh

Right, off to bed to rest up, late start in the morning :-)

Skateful Dead vs Super Smash Brollers

Yesterday I was with The Skateful Dead as our official photographer. We were down in Nottingham to play the Super Smash Brollers. The Brollers won 226 to 181.

The bout was, as I’m sure TV commentators would say, one of two halves. Buckingham Malice drew first blood with a 9 point jam. The team looked great. The walls were effective (all that practice was paying off) and our jammer was getting lead. I could hear the team shouting opposing jammer lane numbers and it was working! By the fifth jam we had 29 against 9 for SSB.

Brollers were suffering penalties, and this rewarded us with a handful of power jams. There was an official time out 20 minutes in to the first period. I took the opportunity to tweet the score of 87 for Skateful with the Brollers on 27. We extended that over the next ten minutes whilst holding the Brollers. The first period ended with a power jam for the Brollers taking their score to 58 against our 148.

(A note to those that don’t watch roller derby. A 90 point lead might sound good, but we didn’t consider it “comfortable”. A power jam (a jam in which there is only one jammer on track for some of the time) can net a team 20 or 30 points.)

In the second period the Brollers came out fighting. The played Jammy Dodger in probably every other jam. The tables turned. We got penalty after penalty, handing the Brollers power jam after power jam. It seemed, to me, that our jammers were exhausted. We’d scored 148 points in the first period and only managed 33 in the second. Brollers scored 58 in the first and 168 in the second. We have plenty to take away from the bout and it was played in good spirit. Thank you Brollers!

Nottingham Roller Girls vs Hereford Rollers Girls

Following on from the men’s bout we had Nottingham Roller Girls versus Hereford Roller Girls. I still had my “official photographer” badge, so I stayed in the middle of the track and carried on shooting. (Childish it may be, but I do like a badge :-))

Thinking about it, my mind must have been in a completely different state watching the women play. I wasn’t attempting to live tweet the bout and I don’t know the final outcome. Nottingham won by about ten points I think. During the bout however I was utterly focused on taking photos. When Skateful were playing I was more engaged in the game, willing the team on to win.

People often say that the women’s game is different to the men’s. Clichéd, but I agree, though I’m just not quite sure how. There seemed to be much less shouting in the women’s bout, but perhaps I just wasn’t tuned into it? I think that generally the female players are more nimble then the men. I feel that the jammers get to a wall, momentarily get held up and then skip around/through and are one their way. They are cleaner players – from memory I’d say that there was only one power jam in the bout. There were some good hits, and I captured one excellent sacrifice of a blocker in an attempt to take out a jammer.

I also noticed a formation of three wall that we’ve not practised – like a cyclops but in a two/one formation. (It obviously can’t be called a cyclops!)

Some (mildly) interesting notes regarding the photography. I took 825 photos during the day. Many of these are sequences. With these it is usually only a single image that makes it to Flickr. The one where the player doesn’t have his/her eyes closed, the referee/NSO didn’t get in the way and the image is in focus. So I discard many of the images.

When selecting images I try to avoid (too many) duplicates of the same person. Jammers get their photo taken all the time! I also try to make sure that I’ve got at least one photo of all of the players, though it’s not always possible.

I worked through those of the men’s bout on Sunday morning and the women’s late evening. I have ended up, quite by accident, with 54 photos in the first set and 56 in the second. (Two of the men left before the awards, so that would have made it 56.)

Finally, a special mention for our very own Carly Jane. It was her début appearance as a derby referee this weekend. Not an easy start as she faced a tough call in our bout. During the second period, when we were losing, our jammer cut track. She called the penalty. This is absolutely the right thing to do of course, but it still can’t have felt comfortable. Well done Carly!

I was at practice again last night, making it three days in a row. Just five of us blokes, plus Gillie, Carly and Imogen. No, we didn’t scrimmage!

We practised bridging, wall reformation, more bridging and more wall reformation. As I’m not playing on Saturday it made sense (to me) to jam as much as possible. We want a wall that is effective, where the blockers to work fluidly  together. The more we practice the better we’ll get.

I used to be a bit of a jammer wall flower, but I’ve found recently that it’s quite addictive. Last night, whenever I could, I grabbed the jammer panty :-)

Roller derby is really hard work. Sweat builds up in your helmet and runs down your face and neck. Many of the guys wear bandanas to absorb it. By the end of the session everything you’re wearing is soaked. During the session you hardly notice though – your mind is engaged in the game. (I’m also quietly pleased with my work rate. I was by far the oldest person there last night, but I pretty much kept up with the youngsters :-))

Now I have a break from derby for a week and a bit. Saturday is our bout against Super Smash Brollers in Nottingham. We’re skipping practice on Sunday, so the next time I’ll be on track is 8 December.

Go Dead!