Roller Derby? Sign Me Up!
Howdy!, new blog post, new passion and a new name.
I want you to picture the following in your mind:
“Tough full contact sport, regular practices, huge bruises, encouragement, tournaments and an international federation, fans screaming their favourite players name, the passion of the fans rubs off on the players, and oh what a block! “
Sounds like rugby, or American football and its as tough if not tougher, the difference is these players do it all while wearing fishnets and roller skates.
The sport is called Roller Derby and is enjoying a blossoming revival as a legitimate sport away from its 1970s fake fights and scripted wins. The modern sport was reanimated in Texas in the early 00’s and today comes in 2 main flavours and has spread to nearly all the continents on the planet.
But what is Roller Derby I hear you cry (thats your cue…)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2W2b1WBmm4 <– this link explains it really well.
One of the fun things about this sport, from a spectators point of view is that all the skaters and refs have a Derby Name or a Skating Name. These can range from a personal meaning to the puntastic with names such as Gorgon Roller, Fran Grenade, Crash Matt, Cindi Launch’er and Iona Sextoi.
How did I get involved? well my girlfriend has taken this and is at present training hard to become a member of the bouting team and me? Well i am of the the Non Skating Officals or NSO’s as they are more commonly known. Another term for us is Stats geeks as we keep track of the score, the number and types of penalties that the girls accrue as well as timing their stays in the penalty box.
My Derby Name: Stat Damon and my number is 00k
Yes yes got to get the monkey reference in there somewhere.
