Scene Report: A Player's Perspective by Deja Deadwards

Note: Deja Deadwards is a blocker with the Mid Iowa Rollers. She is the Author of this piece.

Author's Note: Tyler asked me to write a “player’s perspective” piece about last Saturday’s MIR vs CRRG bout. Unfortunately, due to the nerve-wracking nature of the game, I don’t really remember any specifics. I spent most of the game sitting on the bench gnawing at my mouthguard and screaming “GET HER! GET HER” at my teammates. The time I spent on the track was a blur of smashing and crashing with the other blockers. So, instead I thought I’d write a piece about the days leading up to the game.

Game day. After a busy week of derby practice and activities, I’m rested and ready for the confrontation with Cedar Rapids Rollergirls. The nerves which have been fluttering through me occasionally throughout the week have built into a solid mass of tension. However, now that I’ve got a few bouts under my belt (and know I won’t have to jam in this one!) it’s a manageable state of nervousness and not an all-out terror that makes me want to puke.

The preparation begins weeks ahead of time as practices begin to ramp up. Players use the internet to scour videos of the opposing team’s other games, watching for strategies and gauging the potential threat of each player. The vets regale the rookies with stories from previous years’ bouts. Going up against Cedar Rapids, we knew we would have to stop their blockers. I’d played with Ali Assassinateher and A Few Screws Lucy as my teammates at our March Mixer and as I re-watched the video from that game, I was amazed by their front wall – it’s a derby-textbook thing of beauty! They stopped the jammer every time without ever leaving the engagement zone.

All week long we practiced drills to break up walls and slow the pack. Practices right before a game are always tense and sometimes slide into the realm of counterproductive negativity, but I felt that we avoided that this week with three great practices which left me feeling completely wiped out. The team understood that it would take every one of us working together to pull this one off and everyone was determined to skate as hard as they could.

I slept late on Saturday, showered and packed my bags for the trip. I headed out to meet up with the rest of the team at the truck stop in Altoona at 1:00pm. Surprisingly, everyone arrived fairly close to the scheduled time and we got ourselves on the road. We arrived at the hotel around 3:30pm and checked into our block of rooms. We were told to be down at the US Cellular Center at 5:00pm to start warm-ups. Grimm and my friend Jenn (along for the derby ride) and I went out to try to find some lunch. Unfortunately, we seemed to be in the deserted section of downtown CR and wasted precious minutes driving around looking for anything open. Eventually we found a Maid-Rite and grabbed some quick sandwiches. We got back to the hotel just in time to find the rest of the team suited up and getting ready to head out. Grimm and I did a quick change (alas, no face paint for me at this game!) and rolled over to the venue.

We had about ten minutes to gear up and hit the track for warm-ups. We spent a few minutes taking easy laps and doing some rolling stretches before our coach, Big Truck, started shouting instructions. Sprint laps came first, followed by a death star drill where jammers Lolli, Fanny and cTAL had to work through a pack made up of the entire team. We did some stretching while Big Truck and Lolli talked through some strategies and tips to remember.

When our warm-up period was over, the Helldorados took the track and we scattered for individual last-minute preparations. I checked my toe-stops (which had lately developed an annoying habit of coming loose) and filled my water bottle. I grabbed a program from the merch table and went back to our bench to continue stretching and to size up the competition. The Helldorados looked comfortable on their home track, running through some knee falls and sprints. The nerves in my stomach started up again; these girls were strong and could skate hard. They were going to knock the crap out of me!

We moved back to the locker room where we again ran through some strategy and our bench coach, Knock Around Suzie, prepared the lineups. She told Sin De Rolla to be ready to go in as a back-up jammer, but Sin wasn’t sure she had the right wheels for the floor (a super-slick concrete). A chaotic rush then ensued to get Sin’s wheels swapped out to a stickier pair which would allow her to grip the floor better while speeding around the corners.

A second warm-up period was scheduled for both teams together as the doors opened and the crowd poured in. I’d never skated a warm-up with the other team before and was a little concerned how that would go. I thought the Helldorados might take this opportunity to try to psych us out, and I mentally steeled myself to take whatever they would dish out. Turns out, derby sisterhood extends to joint warm-ups and the girls were nothing but friendly. There were jokes, some opposite team whips and even a little dancing (who doesn’t love Sir Mix-a-Lot?)

As announcers Your Dad, Bam Bam and our own Chuck U. started the show off, I noticed the suicide seats were packed with derby girls from several other teams around the state. Seems like this should have made me more nervous – after all, these girls would know if I made a mistake, unlike most of the fans who don’t really understand all the nuances of the rules. But, seeing the girls laughing and cheering both teams on helped me to relax. It reminded me of all the reasons I love derby: that it gives women opportunities to shine that most of us don’t get in our regular lives; that it celebrates women’s strength and beauty (in all shapes/sizes); that it fires such a passion in us that we willingly sacrifice our free time, extra money and even our bodies to it. We’re derby girls first and foremost, no matter what teams we’re on.

I also remembered the reason why we were in Cedar Rapids that night: the crowd had come to see a great show, and every woman warming up on that track was prepared to give it to them. Cheers to the Rollergirls, the Rollers and the Mayhem for delivering a night to remember!

Scene Report: MIR vs. Mahaska Mayhem by Déjà Deadwards

Dark clouds rolled across the sky as I headed to Oskaloosa to watch the Mahaska Mayhem host the Mid Iowa Rollers in the Mayhem’s first home bout. The two teams had faced up in Des Moines in May and the Rollers had been impressed with the Mayhem’s skills. The Mayhem skated faster and hit harder than anyone had expected from a brand new team. Now the Rollers were anticipating a hard battle as they’d packed their roster with fresh meat.

The first half was chaotic, to say the least. The early jams had several incidents of track-cutting and major penalties (pushing, back-blocking) that weren’t called, leaving the Rollers frustrated and leading to timeouts between each jam while bench coaches and captains argued plays with the refs. In one of the early jams, the Mahaska blocking line took off at a sprint, quickly splitting the pack and leaving the Rollers baffled in the back. In a no-pack situation, no one is allowed to hit anyone, so both jammers soared through clean. The Mayhem realized their strategy wasn’t working and the blockers lapped the track to catch up to the Roller’s blocking line. There were also a few incidents of the ref’s whistle on a penalty call being misinterpreted as the “end of jam” whistle with skaters leaving the track thinking the jam was over while it was actually still in progress.

After the first several jams, everyone settled in a bit and the play got better. Big hits started to rev up the crowd as girls tumbled to the floor. At one point, the medics rushed out to check on Tulsa Tararyz (a Rollers rookie) after she went down with her knee twisted behind her. After a few anxious minutes, Tulsa got to her feet and the crowd cheered. Unfortunately, it meant she was sidelined with an ice pack for the rest of the game.

Another round of mass confusion occurred when Babyface Basher was taking a turn as Mid Iowa Rollers jammer. After a multi-player pileup, Basher jumped up and headed back into the pack. Roxy Knocks was sitting next to me and pointed out that Basher had lost her star helmet panty (which signified that she was the jammer). We quickly scanned the floor to see if it had fallen off, and that’s when I saw a flash of blue on Wildcat’s knee. During the floor mash-up, the panty had gotten stuck to Wildcat’s kneepad Velcro! Basher continued to weave through the Mayhem blockers who were unaware of her being the jammer. Soon both benches were screaming about the helmet panty, but the players on the track and the refs didn’t understand what was going on. Eventually one of the refs caught on that Basher was missing her panty and sent her to the box just as the two minutes ended. Someone finally pointed out to Wildcat that she had a helmet panty stuck to her knee and everyone had a good laugh at her surprise.

Regardless of some of the issues in the first half, the Roller’s experienced jammers, Mizz Lolli Pop Ya, cTAL faTAL and Vyolent GriMm, soared through several jams to bring the Rollers to a 98-46 lead going into halftime, along with solid jams by Babyface Basher and rookie Sugar Kaned.

As the players took a break to regroup, I took some time to think about roller derby and Oskaloosa’s role in it. When Mid Iowa Rollers started up four years ago, Spinning Wheels rink in Oskaloosa was one of their first practice facilities. The owner even painted a permanent track on the rink floor. I’m amazed by the fact that those first girls were dedicated enough to drive 90 minutes each way to practice for a sport which most of them had never even had the chance to see live; and that a rink owner believed in the sport’s future enough to make a permanent track. It’s great to see that this track is being put to use once more and that the Mahaska team is generating a lot of excitement and new roller derby fans in the area.

Back in the second half, the Mid Iowa Rollers continued to dominate with fast jamming skills, but the Mayhem never stopped producing crowd-wowing hits and fighting for a break. The Rollers held the Mayhem pointless through the first four jams (props to Huzzie Lecher and Sin De Rolla for some great blocking) before jammer Vyolent GriMm was sent to the penalty box, leaving the opportunity for a 10-point jam by BAB that set the crowd roaring. The Rollers put a quick stop to that momentum though, holding the Mayhem pointless through another four jams.
With less than six minutes on the clock, a mass pileup left Brickyard Gerard lying face-down on the floor tapping her helmet (the sign for injury). The medics ran onto the track again, and after several minutes Brickyard was able to get up and skate gingerly back to the bench. Anita Spankins and BAB continued to push through the last few jams, making up a few more points at the end to leave the final score 169 – 90 in favor of Mid Iowa Rollers.

All in all, it was a great night of derby! It was so exciting to see our rookie players Snot Face, Sugar Kaned, Civil Penalty and Dolly Mad-As-Sin throwing themselves into the mix and using the skills we’ve learned in practice. It’s also great to watch a new team being born. Since we practiced with the Mayhem early on (shout out to BAMF who I worked with on hitting drills!), I feel a kinship with these girls who started derby around the same time I did. I’m amazed with what they’ve managed to pull together in such a short time, and thrilled by the new energy they’re bringing to this sport.
I think the night is best summed up by rookie Dolly Mad-As-Sin, who skated over to me at half time and with a face lit up like a kid at Christmas, shouted “I LOVE THIS! The skating, the hitting… I LOVE THIS!!!”

You’re not the only one, Dolly…