8 wheels and a lot of heart.

I have been completely fallen in love with a new sport.

Six months ago, I spent a saturday evening digging out my old Bauer Turbo Skates, dusting them off, cleaning the wheels and bearings (a job i now know i did VERY wrong, but hey ho!) in anticipation of what was to come on the sunday afternoon. I was going for my first skating session with Leeds Roller Dolls.

This all seems so long ago now. I vividly remember the little whoop of joy i got as i put my quads on for the first time since i was about 19 and skated around the sports hall. However what i also remember is being massively intimidated by the large pack of tights and stripy sock adorned legs, little short-ed booties and LRD t-shirts with crazy names plastered on the back of them. Bruise 'em Banshee, SJ Slay, Rushin Doll, Chernobelle.... how was i ever going to fit into this world? I took deep breaths and listened to everything i was being taught. I had pads on for the first time in my skating life, and was being taught how to fall on them correctly. This was apparently the most important thing to learn. I remember thinking it was hilarious as all I had tried to do as a skater in my teens was NEVER to fall over! what is this crazy sport?! Having learned falling and basic stopping, I took to the track and was helped out by every single member to try and keep up with the weaving line drill they were doing. I was taking my first little baby steps to playing the game I saw next.

Roller Derby. It's the look of confusion on peoples faces I love the most. "What's Roller Derby?" I still haven't come up with a succinct answer for this. The answers usually range from "oh a crazy sport" (usually accompanied by an inane grin) or " a sport where packs of skaters skate around a track and try and score points while others try and bash you off the track" to a very standard "Roller derby is an all woman full contact sport played on quad skates" But quite often, my reply is ended with "ITS AWESOME!" If I could explain roller derby in any other way though I would carry around this video to explain things...



Doughnuts always save the day! So thats Roller Derby, and since that first session i have been hooked. I love everything about it. I don't actually remember loving a sport as much as this. When I was a swimmer I loved it, I loved training, I loved competing, but essentially I was just good at it and enjoyed being in water, but my lack of competitiveness often prevented me getting better, I just took it for granted that if i went to those 10 training sessions I would get better and my times would get quicker, which they did.... ish! But with Derby, I have found an inner fighting spirit and inner competitiveness I never knew I had. I wake up every training day now and can't wait to get on track, I constantly watch other players and try and work out how to be better.

The day I got my derby skates sealed my love affair for ever. They're not the best, but they're proper Derby skates, Reidell R3's. I love them. I took them out of the box, spun the wheels and giggled. They were perfect. I couldn't wait to put them on, I took them to practice that night and did a lot of falling (after all the Bauer's had had ankle support which i was now seriously lacking) but by the end of that session I was skating back with the best of it.

Leeds Roller Dolls is an awesome team. They have been running for over 3 years now (sorry dolls if I have got that wrong!) and it is completely self running. Its a club run by skaters for skaters. We have a board, committees and our own policies and business plans. We train 3 times a week and all training sessions are run by the more experienced Dolls and training plans are devised and strategically worked out by our own training committee. We have some awesome skaters in our league and when I watch our proper bouting A team play, I am always in awe of their fitness and skating agility.

I have attended 3 bouts now, and the last one Rack and Roll against Glasgow Roller Girls' Irn Bruisers was amazing. By the end of the bout i was in tears though shear pride for how hard and how well my team had skated and fought for their single point victory. They were amazing. All the dolls are amazing. The team spirit we have is something I have never really experienced before. EVERY doll is supported encouraged and made to feel important. Whether it is her first steps on skates or whether they have been selected for the UK all star team, all of us are part of one big league and I love them all. We are all constantly encouraged to be better players, and a few weeks ago, it was announced that we were going to launch a bouting 'B' team.

My little skating heart skipped a beat. A team I might be able to aim for. Since then, nothing else has occupied my head. I never thought this new sport i had found would mean so much to me. I want to be on that B team and I want to be a valuable team member. I've never wanted anything so much in sport in my life. So now I have something to aim for. We have a bout coming up in October where a potential B team will be put together, and I WANT to be on it. Its a hard push, but i'm going to do everything i possibly can to put myself in line for selection.

You'd think that once you master the skating element, Playing roller derby should be easy, but as GRG wrote on thier blog about the Rack and Roll bout, "It’s days like this that prove how far UK derby has come in the past few years. We’re not alt-punk indie chicks putting on a sideshow; every single girl on track today was an athlete." And an athlete is what I need to become. So I'm stepping up my fitness. I'm going to try and increase my CV fitness to help me with those times I get to jam, so i can get round and score more points, and I'm going to work on strengthening my core and lower body muscle groups to help me stay more balanced and skate better. Starting today. 30-45 minutes a day of CV and pilates/floor work is not a huge ask, So this is what I shall do.

I've come a long way from the terrified 15yearoldskates wearing person who turned up to a sports hall in Leeds in mid January. I now love my sport and love my team. Leeds Roller Dolls... you are amazing. Thank you with all my heart.


Eat Derby
Sleep Derby
Brush your God Damn Teeth Derby.

INTI,
Cookie Cutlass #903

nuts and bolts

Over the course of the last 12 months I have watched with intrigue. Every evening he arrives. A man, usually dressed in jeans and coloured t-shirt, pulls up in a white van on the small patch of tarmac across the grass from me. He parks neatly in front of the pastel coloured garages and opens up the 4th from right door slowly, like a child on a cautious adventure. He disappears inside and then come the great sound of the engine starting.

The man, (who I only know as Powell due to it being written on his white van in perfect black letters) owns a kit car. Its identical to the one my dad had when i was a awkward teenager living in Reading. Long silver nose, small rectangular windscreen with tiny wipers constantly caught in the upright position, two perpendicular squares of spongy leather forming two seats aside a small gearstick topped with a silver shifter, black solid roll bar behind the seats and a beautiful racing green body all around saving you from falling the 3 inches that you were held above the ground. No doors: they just take the fun out of it. Its so familiar, I know how hot the brushed silver dashboard feels when its been out in the sun, I know that awkward position you have to get in to just to get inside, but most of all i remember the total rush of excitement at sitting on that small square of leather when the engine was running, knowing how much fun the next little ride was going to be.

I'm not sure what model Powell's car is, could be a Caterham, could be a Locust, but I just know its fun. It doesn't have a roof, actually to be more precise it does, but you look like an idiot driving with it on; its essentially a leather rain mac stretched across your head. He does sometimes have the doors on his and i think my dad did quite a lot of the time too. What i remember most about the Locust (yes i do mean locust not Lotus) is that i learned so much about how cars work just from watching and helping my dad with his. Its a shame cars have become so modern as the things i learned about the engine in that car are beginning to become obsolete, but i guess this is what Powell loves his car too.

As I say, he arrives every night in his van and takes the car for a drive, but being on holiday at the moment I have discovered that he also works on it almost every day too. Today the car is up on jacks and he is repairing the rear suspension. Next to him is a gloriously grubby white box filled with tools and bolts and nuts and wire and parts that only he understands, but it makes the scene. Green bodywork, yellow jacks, grey wheels and grubby white box. He works so meticulously. Never worrying about the time it is taking. Today he has had a small audience of local children watching him, but far from being distracted or disrupted by them, he has politely answered questions and nonchalantly kicked back their football as it hits him for the 10th time.

Is this what happens when you find something you completely enjoy? I suppose it it similar to the simple peace and happiness i get from changing the wheels and bearings on my skates. Each piece is familiar, the tools work perfectly and you can see the process from start to finish before you even start.

Powell and his car make me happy.