Dolly Rockit Rollers

Eeeeeeeeee!  Yes, I’m quite excited, and the reason for it is a silhouetted skater on a black and green background.  Not only because I’m quite fond of green, but the picture (as seen on this homepage) represents DRR’s acceptance into the WFTDA Apprentice League!

For those of you who may be a little unsure of what this is, or what it means, or what it REALLY means to us, please read on …

I’ll start with the googleable basics.  WFTDA.  It’s not just a bunch of letters left over in scrabble.  That would just be daft.  (or DAFTW … sorry, really poor joke).  It’s the Womens Flat Track Derby Association, the governing body for our sport worldwide.  They set the rules, monitor the league tables, set up the major tournaments and generally oversee everything.  Now, we’ve been members of UKRDA for over a year, and proudly so – our membership with the WFTDA Apprentice Leagues will run nicely alongside.

Apprentice member leagues get loads of really cool benefits – support from full WFTDA leagues, with one sponsoring you on your journey, assistance with all the workings of your league, input into decisions WFTDA makes and loads, loads more!

Pretty awesome, right?

Even more awesome is this amazing news, right now.  Just when we needed it.  After quite a turbulent time for the Dollies, this is the news we really needed!  It’s not a secret that our league has had a lot to work with over the past few months.  We’ve had a few skaters move away and join other teams.  A quick glance at the team selected to play the Tattoo Freeze tournament at the beginning of the year shows only 10 skaters who are now on the current A-team roster.  That means 10 brand new A-team skaters.  That’s half a roster.  That’s a lot of change.  And following on from this change, we’ve had some pretty tough rematches to deal with – after finishing 2011 on an 8 win streak (hell yeah!) we’ve played a lot of teams this year who were hungry to take back a win!  So 2012 has been a hard year for us.

To come away from these tough games, quite a few losses, the losses of skaters, and having to re-establish a team has meant the league has been working overtime on the motivation department, and this news, this acceptance even in hardship, this lovely skater on the black and green background is a symbol of the strength of DRR – our skaters, our referees, our NSOs, our volunteers and our supporters.

So, there’s the reason for the joy and excitement.  It’s a brand new challenge, with a new team, new league members and lots and lots of amazing derby times for us to round off this year and into 2013.  We’ll be working harder and harder still to prove that we are the league you all know and love – celebrating our wins, fighting every game, bringing the sparkle into bouts, and of course, kicking the arse out of afterparties!  Because we know, all of us, that we can and will have a new symbol of strength to show on our uniforms.  And that girl will be proudly silhouetted on a black and pink background.  Regardless of how much pink and red really clash.

So now here I am, sat at my desk, notice firmly handed in, new job imminent, with a tiny teeny bit of not exactly ‘free time’ to spare, and I am going to write about one of the most fundamentally important parts of our league and that’s LOVE. *makes puke noise in her head* No Really I mean it.

Those of you who know our league will probably be aware that we are in the process of going through a lot of changes right now. Not bad changes, it’s evolution, natural progression if you like, but it leaves people feeling a little shaken, lost, separated, a bit confused and lately I have seen a lot of sad faces, and as you will all know this is not a face that is indicative of a Dolly Rockit Roller.

I was thinking about this a lot and I am sure that any busy league, like us, gets so lost in the planning, organising, nuts and bolts of running a league, that you actually forget to spend any real quality time with your skaters. I mean how long do you get to actually talk to someone in a session? You don’t. How about after parties? Well we all know how after parties end up – they DON’T count! With so many other things going on, it’s pretty hard to maintain relationships with people outside of your safe little league cluster, but what about the skaters that are in it? I bet you, like me, have a few key people that you talk to/text/email/facebook daily, but then there are others that you see all the time and when do you get to actually talk to them?

This really became apparent to me when we visited Brighton to play the Brighton Rockers. The league had felt a little bit scattered, it showed, we looked a little bit scattered on the track, and yes we lost. We lost by a lot. But then the rest of the weekend was one of the biggest wins we have had since last years rounders in the park. We all pottered about round Brighton together, our big fat incestuous family. Meeting up at various places then dispersing, new people would arrive, we’d potter off somewhere else.

I can’t remember what we talked about really, but it wasn’t Roller Derby. Maybe it was because we were taken out of our natural environment, it gave us different things to talk about, maybe it was because we just realised that we hadn’t been able to chat complete and utter drivvel with one another for months on end, I’m not sure. But what I am sure about is that everything seemed a lot more positive and together on our return.

After our tournament with Helsinki, our rounders was sadly cancelled due to the weather. Then… as if by magic… the sun came out! Another afternoon was spent with more different people, their families, their pets. It was nice.

Our photoshoot last Saturday finished at 6:30ish and I think we all left at about 9pm; we seem to be getting back into the swing of non Roller Derby conversational technique now, but f*ck it’s been difficult. You know the other day I drove around the corner with one of our skaters and thought, oh my god, that’s the first time I have actually had a conversation with them in months. That’s just not cool.

When Slam & I set up the league, I think it’s safe to say that although we had a lot of organising to do, we also spent a lot more time with people, getting to know people a bit better, and we had to, because we had to find out what skills and qualities they had and how they could help us with the mammoth task ahead. We are now 2.5 years in, with almost 100 skaters and sometimes it’s so easy to lose sight of the very reason we did this in the first place – the skaters.

I guess what I am trying to say is, that these little things, events, adventures – whatever you want to call them, that may seem really quite small or unnecessary or trivial are actually the very foundations of what your league was built on. Normality. Fun. These are not just skaters, they are your friends, your business partners, your husbands and wives, brothers and sisters. You are one huge incestuous family and you will gain new family members just as you will lose family members and that’s fine, just as long as you remember to spend some quality family time with them and share around the love

At least I was not the only piece of fresh meat there and straight away there was a camaraderie that I still have now. Other girls that were there for the same reason as me. With the fear in their eyes and the determination in their hearts we turned up to the newbie intake for Leicester’s only flat track roller derby team Dolly Rockit Rollers.

All I remember is people talking but not understanding what they were saying as the nerves were making me want to faint. I just couldn’t take it in and the stuff I had tried to learn just disappeared in a mist of stress. We were lead into groups one to get on skates and one to do ‘Shoe Derby’. The idea of getting into skates was amazing but my own issues were stopping me and I was glad that I wasn’t in the first group on skates.

Whips, falls, checks, blocker, jammer, pivot….. it was like another language but it was from that point on that I was hooked. I gave it my all in Shoe Derby and then when it came to getting me into some skates I just took a leap of faith and went for it. My heart beat faster, my head ached, I started to sweat but I put the skates on my feet. I could not stand and I was clinging to the wall for dear life and my heart sank as I said to myself there was no way in hell that I can do this sport. Its when the negative thoughts took control and my body reacted to this declaration. Telling myself that I could never do anything like this and this is when my skate devil first appeared.

I have suffered with this feeling of never being good at anything and its made me so doubtful it what I can do I don’t know how I have survived. Until recently I didn’t even know that there was something wrong with me and that I wasn’t just a failure. I have recently been diagnosed with Clinical Depression and looking back on my life I can see now that I have always had depression but I never knew what it was. I was lucky that I found a good doctor that diagnosed this. My skate devil had a name and it was depression.

From the first skate session when I cling to the wall trying to skate round a track like Bambi on ice to this very day 1 year later when I can not believe where I am now. Such an improvement and the realisation that I have learnt to skate.

There have been times that I have made excuses not to go to a session or that when I skating of not putting in the effort as I was scared that I would fail, with Roller Derby I swore to myself that my skate devil would stop me. Its hard to explain depression as it differs from person to person all I can tell you is what it has been to me.

Doctor after doctor told me there was nothing wrong and the feelings I was having were just hormones and that there was nothing really wrong with me. I could not understand why no one believed me as some days would go by when I felt so low that I didn’t want to be here anymore to days when I just existed and carried on like a robot. Then I was lucky enough that I spoke to someone who listened and didn’t look at me like I was making it up.

My own issues were finally being laid out and I was starting to see where this devil kept rearing its ugly head at different times in my life. As hard as it was to do I can now look that devil in the face and fight back. Its hard, believe me each day is still a struggle but each day is a new day and that’s what I have to focus on going forward knowing that my devil is there and always will be but that I can and will get on with my life. I can push back at that devil and as much as it has cost me in the past I won’t let it cost me my future not just in my personal life but in Roller Derby.

I still have so much to learn and them DAMN crossovers are a big hurdle but I will keep at it. Not only have I shown myself what I can do but other people around me have seen a difference. I have been so lucky that the support I have from my Dollies has helped me keep my head above the water. Its just awesome to know that I am not the only one to have so much self doubt about doing something that I love. My fight will continue.

No matter how many times I have fallen I still get back up, no matter how hard I get hit I hit back, HARDER. I will continue to skate, continue to fight on to be the best roller girl I can be. And I will continue to skate with the devil on my back.

When I finally did make the A team, I didn’t really get track time. It wears on you big time. Especially when your gran has come to watch for the first time asking you why you’re not playing.

Needless to say I was fed up and decided I’d just be on B team. It was going to be difficult not seeing my name on the A team rosters, but I knew where I stood in B team and it was the perfect opportunity to work on my skating.

I loved playing with the Raggy Dollz and still do to this day. We’re like a little family and they all make me so proud every practice. We support each other, work hard, and have fun. As individuals we are wonderful, as a team we are unstoppable. I love that about the Raggies.

So, if you’re not making the team and you think you’re trying hard, try harder. You can never work hard enough. I asked my coaches what I needed to work on, I practiced it in training when I could and used it in my Raggy Dollz bouts. If you don’t have a B team, intraleagues and general scrims are good for this too.

Most importantly, I stopped dwelling on not making teams and instead thought about what I could do so they’d have to choose me. If I had a bad jam I’d get off track and look towards the next jam. If you’re not getting any track time, politely tell your line up and every time you do go on, prove why you are there and why you made the team.

Believe it or not, negativity can really affect your play. Stay positive, every jam is a new one, you’ll hit your target, you’ll stop that jammer, you’ll score those points, you’ll make that team.

I hope this helps you and anyone else who is struggling with the same problem. You will make it.

After persistent requests from my boys we decided to go and see our first ever Roller Derby bout, ‘Club Tropicarnage!’ I had attended a couple of what I thought were ‘skate lessons’ with the Dolly Rockit Rollers but I hadn’t really got any idea what Roller Derby was about, I’m probably one of the very few who haven’t even seen the film ‘Whip It.’ My boys were captivated by this poster, 2 heavily padded skaters dressed in bikinis and one of them holding the eyeball of the other skater who was behind her. Should I really be taking my kids to see such things?!

As the event was local to where we lived I thought that if it didn’t live up to our expectations at least we hadn’t traveled far, and the kids got in free so that’s a bonus. Surely it couldn’t be that bad if they were encouraging kids to attend…

We received a warm welcome in the ‘tropical entrance’ the girls were dressed for the occasion and I recognised a couple of faces from ‘skate lessons.’ I was surprised to see how the hall was transformed into a sunny tropical paradise with inflatables and all. We were used to seeing the place looking very plain at our Saturday night recreational skate. This was starting to look like something different with some very lively girls in fancy gear even crazy bananas strutting their stuff.

The stalls around the room were selling some really cool stuff, so in fact even if the game wasn’t up to much at least I’d managed a bit of retail therapy. The compere I’d also seen at ‘skate lesson’ was full of life and kept us all entertained.

The skaters began to came on track looking awe inspiring dressed in some heavy protection and appearing exceedingly tall, I’d met 2 skaters in the corridor just minutes before and they were towering above me.

And so the game began… as did my fascination with roller derby. I must say that for the majority of the two bouts I didn’t understand what the hell was happening but somehow this didn’t seem to matter, just watching the expertise and power of the skaters was enough to give me the biggest buzz and thrill of excitement.

I remember at half time as the skaters were leaving the track I spoke to Kaztration, I couldn’t contain myself, I had to tell her how fantastic it all was and how brilliant she and all the other skaters were, her response has stuck in my mind ever since ‘If you’ve got fire in your belly then you’ll do it too!’

So that was it; hook, line and skater.

Photo credit: Paul Needham

If you did, congratulations. You are already a bigger fan than my family and the majority of my (non-derby) friendship circles, who have never seen a bout, least of all a bout with me participating.

Let me grant my family a short reprieve – they do live in a different country to me, so watching a home game would be quite tricky, and I’ve not played an away game in Ireland (yet!), and sadly they, like a lot of European fans, had trouble streaming the World Cup feed in December. For this they are forgiven. However, as stated, it is only a short reprieve. Ask any of my family what it is I actually ‘do’, and the response will be some variety of “skating?”, “some kind of team sport?” or “some feminist thing?”.

Not one of them knows what roller derby is, or what happens in a bout. This isn’t because they are unable to comprehend the complex workings of a multi-layered sport (despite the majority of them being blonde, or Irish, or both) – if you asked my mum to break down the strategies and gameplays around football (soccer), rugby, hurling, cricket or even poker, she could tell not only that, but every major player in each game. So why the apathy around roller derby?

I’m sure if I’d been talented enough in a different field, my parents would make darn sure the whole world knew. “Our Gem” they’d say, “you know she swims/runs/jumps for Ireland”. Somehow, “skates” doesn’t seem to fit into that sentence in their vocabulary. Even if I had been dynamite on track, I’m sure they’d be just as unassuming about the sport.

This grates with me. For two major reasons. The first one is because I have never, ever, been really, really good at anything, to the standard of competing at a high level. I’ve tried a number of hobbies, careers, pastimes, and although I’ve enjoyed them, and sometimes been quite good at them, nothing I’ve ever done has been worthy of making the news. I started roller derby a couple of years ago, when all around me thought it would be a ‘fad’. I pushed myself to learn the skills, the game, the strategies, and to make the bouting teams, and was astonished and over the moon to make the Ireland team.

A national team, representing on an international stage. Yet even this accolade brought barely a response from close friends, other than them knowing I was taking a trip to Canada, to do something ‘Irish’ and ‘skatey’. I had the feeling that they were apprehensive about continuing the conversation any further, lest I turned into some form of scout for a new cult, or continued to talk non-stop for 3 hours on the problems of finding hotpants that fit. I also had the feeling that were this a ‘mainstream’ sport, they might have been a little more interested. And hopefully a little more impressed.

Which leads me on to the second reason. I’m a born performer. I play to an audience, and I’m really at home on a stage, whether it’s acting Shakespeare on an elaborately set stage, playing rock tunes in a band at a local pub, or being ‘Holly’ on track in a live bout. It’s hard to play to an audience that’s not there. The thespian (or ‘diva’) side of me wants screaming fans, complete with placards and wearing teeshirts with my name – oops, I mean my team’s name – emblazoned across the front. I want to hear my non-derby friends to be discussing my latest bout in the pub, not some local second division football (soccer) team’s trillionth defeat this year. I want my mum to be equally horrified at my derby attire, as she is at my demeanour on track.

And the only way this is going to happen is to get people like you who already know about roller derby to influence people who don’t know about roller derby, to get to know roller derby! The more people who watch roller derby, and talk about roller derby, and tweet/update/email/write about roller derby, the more coverage it gets, the bigger it grows, the more people can share in the spectacle, the sport and the splendour, and you can boast about how you knew this wondrous activity in its more humble earlier setting.

I’m not guaranteeing it will become a televised sport, I’m not saying the skaters will be hounded by paparazzi, and unfortunately I doubt that participants (skaters, referees, NSOs, and other connected persons) will be paid for their time. But I am guaranteeing that your local league will love you for it. The more people they can get to watch a game, the more they can grow their league, and vis-à-vis the more games they can put on for you. So it’s a win-win situation, you get more of the derby you love from your local team. And I get more fans.

And I love fans. Especially those wearing Dolly Rockit Rollers’ merch.

1. Roller skating
2. Motorbikes
3. Drag racing
4. Guy Martin
5. Live music
6. Clever tricks
7. Art
8. Stalls
9. Cupcakes
10. Loads going on

Imagine them all in one place, imagine never having seen some of these things and then being able to share them with your family, and realise you had a few new favourite things to boot. This was Rollerburn in November 2011.

This was my first taste of roller derby, Dolly Rockit Rollers vs Lincolnshire Bombers. Action packed, amazing outfits, a blur of activity but having no idea what’s going on!!

Frantic murmurs in the audience from a few that had seen it before and had some grasp of the game, desperately trying to translate the action for the rest of us mortals. These girls oozed style, their own style, and didn’t care what else was going on, focused on the game, the win and racing their socks off.

I’ve never seen anyone work so hard for a sport in my life, inviting you to be part of the game, cheering, posing for photos then racing their arses off side skidding across the track into the crowd. My son still talks about the day a roller girl landed in his lap!

It’s not a sit around waiting for something to happen game it’s full on every second counts watching the scores climb on the score board and the change overs in the penalty box. Don’t think it’s all about the girls though as the refs give as good a show racing round the inside and outside alongside the jammers in their zebra stripes, with their smart moves and special arm signals.

Once you’ve seen it you’ll want more, and although it’s a fairly new sport to the country, once you get a few links on Facebook you’ll see there’s pretty much something on every weekend.

If that’s not enough to persuade you then just wait til you see the names, every roller girl has her own unique name, clever little word plays that really get you thinking. So ‘like’ the Dolly Rockits facebook page and wait to see when the next bout is, grab a few tickets and share them with friends you won’t be disappointed.

Photo credit: Jason Ruffell

Intrigued, slightly frightened and a little bit delighted by the idea of a contact game on skates, I used the powers of Google to see if there was any such thing in the UK. Turns out there was – and thankfully, it was much better than the CSI episode! After watching a few Youtube videos & reading a little about the game, I was definitely bout-curious. However, at that point in time, I didn’t have the resources (time, money – you get the idea) to go travelling far and wide in search of a team to train with. To add to this, shortly thereafter, I broke my wrist, which was definitely a deal-breaker – now was not right time to pursue this crazy roller derby stuff.

Fast forward a few years and I’m finally in the fortunate position of having a little more stability, good health combined with a little more free time. I’ve fallen in love with quad skating around my neighbourhood, plus (joy of joys!), there is now a derby team pretty much on my doorstep: step forward, the Dolly Rockit Rollers. What’s more, they have a reputation for being really rather good…

While pondering the fact that I couldn’t really afford to break anything else (either personally or professionally), I noticed that roller derby teams also tended to request volunteer referees, as well as skaters. It had never occurred to me that you could train to officiate roller derby, as opposed to playing! Reading up on reffing opened up an interesting possibility – I could train up in all of the skills, pick a derby name, get up close & personal with the track action… and hopefully keep all of my limbs intact. Awesome!

I decided to go and check out the Dollies in action and see if donning a set of zebra stripes was all it was cracked up to be. Sure enough, watching Scottish ref Urine Trouble gracefully calling penalties and flying around the infield during Beats International really sold it for me. She made it look so effortless.

The next day, I was lining up with the other newbie skaters at Dolly training HQ. I don’t think anybody ever knows what to expect at first, but if I’m honest, I was just excited to be there and learn some new skate skills, rather than just pootling ‘round the park or the streets. I was pleased to discover that some of my other pastimes had paved the way a little, and I picked up some of the skills more quickly than I’d dared hope. Alas, while some parts felt familiar, other skills that I’d not encountered before were less successful and, yes, slightly scary, especially skating in close proximity to other people and the whole hitting thing. No sense in getting too comfortable!

Reffing has been just as much a crash course as the skating side of things. Learning and understanding the rules is one thing, watching all 43+ pages occurring at once, multiple times over, at high speed… is quite another! Plus, if you’re an outside pack ref (OPR), you need to skate hard and fast, and brake even harder, all the while keeping your eyes on the pack for penalties. As a relatively new skater, this is an intimidating prospect. There’s a lot to learn and you can only pick up so much at once. For the first few sessions shadowing Kosh with the inside pack refs, I was content to achieve the small goal of staying upright & keeping my eyes on the pack. Never mind calling any penalties.

With a bit of luck, I got the hang of the hand signals early on, but determining if a penalty should be a major or a minor is a minefield I am still trying to work my way around. I’ve resorted to drawing pictures in the margins & colour-coding my copy of the rules – something that the rest of the newbie skaters probably don’t have to worry about just yet (certainly not to the same degree!)

By the time you get around to actually calling a penalty, it feels like a small victory for zebra-kind. Even if the skater doesn’t hear you, but that’s a story for another time…

Photo credit: Paul Needham