Note: Squirrel Ex Machina is the bench coach of the Des Moines Derby Dames. She is the author of this piece.
Bout day. I wish that people could see all that goes on behind the scenes to make these things work. It really is amazing. With a bout at 7pm, volunteers, emcees and team members converge on our venue at 10 am to begin preparation. The track is measures out, taped, lights laid and secured. Hundreds of chairs are put out, organized and positioned. Sound checks, safety check, time checks. It’s like a beehive preparing for battle. Everyone has a job and everyone is heads down working to get things done.
I can feel it tonight. The energy is unmistakable. We’ve played Old Capitol once before (our first game) and we’ve been working our asses off for two months to step up our game. I don’t know if they realize that we’re gonna give them a run for their money.
Seven O’clock hits.
The crowd is pumped.
The teams are ready.
The smell of stale sweat and beer fill the air.
Game on bitches!
Between whistle blows and shouting teams, I’m running the bench better that ever. I know my team, I know their skills and I know when to put them out. Jam after jam the pressure builds but I’ve got this down. People don’t realize the stress of running a bench. Players don’t just magically appear on the track for each jam. No! Between each jam, I’ve got 30 seconds to assess the situation. 30 seconds to see who is in the penalty box, who needs a break, who the other team is putting out. 30 seconds to plan how we’re going to win every jam. Sometimes it’s focusing on defense and tossing out my biggest hardest hitters, sometimes is all about points and getting out my faster jammers with good control blockers. Those 30 seconds come and go and tonight I’ve got it down.
The game is tight we lead then they lead. At half time, they are ahead but we can catch up if we dig dig dig in the last half. “Everyone take a deep breath,” I tell my players in the locker room. “Imagine you’re on a beach.” Ok, it’s kinda hippie bullshit but we need to keep clear headed and goal focused. “Ok, let’s talk about the game.” The room explodes into conversation. Everything from track communication and wall building to strategy moving forward. We can win this one.
Almost.
We lost but man it felt like a win. My team was ON and we fought till the very end. Hard hits, some injuries but a whole lotta heart got us through this bout feeling like fucking rock stars.
We can only get better. We can only improve. Bring it Wisconsin, because you know we’re gonna when we see you on June 5th.
DES MOINES –Watching Malay Bouaphakeo, aka Show Stopper, the founder/player and coach of the Des Moines Derby Dames, conduct practice can be an exhausting experience in and of itself.
Bouaphakeo was a force of nature during D3’s Wednesday night practice at Skate North Incrediroll in Des Moines. Whether explaining the proper implementation of defensive maneuvers like the snowplow or when to do a two-wall or a three-wall, or serving as jammer or blocker during scrimmages, she maintained the same level of intensity mixed with iron will and determination.
“BUILD A WALL!” she yelled out at one point from the sidelines awaiting her turn in a scrimmage.
“GET UP HERE!” she called from the front of the pack to a teammate inside it.
“HERE SHE COMES!” she exclaimed to her scrimmage teammates as an opposing jammer creeps up.
This kind of drive and focus is par for the course for the 27-year-old Storm Lake native.
“She’s always been intense,” said D3 Blocker Monica Thompson, aka MOAB (Mother Of All Bombs). “She’s always been in our faces and pushing us hard because that’s how she works and that’s why we love her.”
Bouaphakeo will bring that intensity back to the oval on Saturday night as the D3 will take on the Old Capital City Roller Girls in a rematch of their teams first bout at the 7 Flags Event Center in Clive. Old Capital City won that bout by the score of 192-81 on April 3 in Iowa City
It was also the bout where Bouaphakeo suffered a partially torn ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) and a partially torn PCL(posterior cruciate ligament), an injury that has kept her out of the previous two bouts.
Details are sketchy among her D3 teammates as to what happened exactly, which can be expected given the fast pace of a derby bout. The injury occurred in the closing stages of the first bout with Old Capital City. Jennifer Dixon, aka Squirrel Ex Machina, D3’s bench coach, said the combination of Bouaphakeo taking a good hit from an Old Capital City player that she didn’t see coming, combined with her left knee pad being slightly out of alignment contributed to her injury.
Bouaphakeo said she herself does not even remember what happened except that she fell.
“I was in the pack and I was just blocking and I fell,” Bouaphakeo said. “I don’t know how I fell, really. I hurt it instantly and I couldn’t really move it. And I’m a pretty strong person and to actually start bawling in the middle of a game or with an injury- it’s a pretty tough thing. I’ve played sports my entire life. I’ve played Division I softball. I’ve never been injured in my life. It was a big deal for me. I mean I usually just get up.”
Evidence of her strong will was on display later that night. Dixon said after being taken to the hospital, refusing painkillers and being fitted with a knee brace, she returned for the after party. Still seeing their founder and captain on the ground was very dramatic for D3, although according to Jammer Lacy J. Brunnette, aka Cosmo Disco; it has been easier since Bouaphakeo has switched her to a coach while she has been off the oval.
As for Thompson feels partially responsible for the injury to Bouaphakeo.
“I feel like if anybody on our team gets injured, whether it’s my job to be there and protect them or not, I feel like I’m partially responsible,” Thompson said. “I’m a blocker. I am ‘The Mother Of All Bombs’ and I protect people. That’s what I do. That’s why I’m here. This is my family and it’s my job to protect them. If I’m not keeping them safe and happy so we can dance and sing afterwards then I have not done my job.”
Despite the injury, Bouaphakeo claims that this is the best year of her life thus far with the Dames coming into their own, her personal life and her career as a headhunter for Paragon IT. At the very least the last couple of years have been a whirlwind for her. After suffering a second degree sprain in her Medial Collateral Ligament in her right leg in June 2009 and stopped competing with the Mid Iowa Rollers. It was from there that the idea from the Des Moines Derby Dames began to take shape.
Initially the idea for a second derby team in Des Moines involved Bouaphakeo and two other people. The other two later bailed and she was the one woman left standing. Far from being disheartened, she intensified her focus on bringing her vision to life. Bouaphakeo described the preparation as similar to that of launching a small business including things like public relations, getting a plan together, going after sponsors and recruiting. “We stuck out neck out to far to say that we are going to start another derby team and just quit,” she said. “And I am not a quitter. I’m not going to not follow through.”
Perhaps Bouaphakeo’s first major coup on the recruiting front was Brunnette, which occurred through an online conversation. Brunnette said she was one of the first people who signed up for the Des Moines Derby Dames Twitter account. Soon she got a private message from Bouaphakeo asking her if she ever thought about trying roller derby. Brunnette said she began watching Derby videos on YouTube while at the same time talking with Bouaphakeo.
The D3 mastermind drove a good bargain, apparently. Within three hours of initial contact, Brunnette had a pair of roller skates ordered and went to a skate shop to pick up pads and other assorted equipment needed to play derby. She attended practices religiously during those days that she described the Dames as merely a “wing and a hope,” with lots of open skate nights and only five girls, none of whom were guaranteed to show up at a practice.
Yet she stayed with Bouaphakeo, who refers to Brunnette as her Renee Zellweger to her Tom Cruise, ala Jerry Maguire. The vision and love for derby obviously transmitted from the founder to the devoted recruit.
“It’s everything a girl wants. You have the femininity. You have the athleticism. You have the fans. You have the lights the music,” Brunnette said. “It’s the perfect sport and it’s a fringe sport so the people who do it are so fun because you’re all doing something special together. She didn’t really need to convince me much but she’s an interesting character.”
Yet those days of open skate nights and uncertainty were very short lived for the Dames. She began training the team in November 2009 on an ambitious schedule that defied the expectations of everyone, who claimed that it would be at least a year before the Dames first bout, including members of the Dames sister team, the Omaha Rollergirls. The Dames made their first bout on April 3 in Iowa City. The next week, on April 10 the team made its home debut at the Val Air Ballroom in Des Moines. Bouaphakeo described the opening bout, which was a sell-out, as being ironic with her not being able to skate. Yet at the same time she focused her energy on bout preparation during the day and coaching during the actual bout, which resulted in a 223-88 win over the Wisconsin River Valley Roller Girls.
“It was very difficult because I started the whole team,” she said. “This is my dream. This is my mission and that was exactly what I was hoping for our first bout and not being able to skate in what I created was very, very difficult but, you know, I do it for the girls. I do it for what we are trying to accomplish and it’s not the end of the world that I don’t skate. That means I take on another role. I coach and I lead the girls from the bench. So was it difficult not to play? Yeah, Absolutely. Was I happy just to be there? You bet, you know, because with all the hard work, I didn’t know what it was going to be, you know? I got to take it in a lot more.”
Bouaphakeo takes a great deal of pride in the rapid development of her team, taking a mere five months from the start of training to the first bout. She claimed that the Dames are in a spot where no first year derby team should ever be. But then she changed her mind. “They should be actually,” Bouaphakeo said. “”They should be that way because if you put enough time and enough effort to it and you train people properly, you can absolutely do it.”
Not only does she credit her teammates, the fans, the referees, the emcees, the volunteers and the sponsors for the success of the team, she also credits the Des Moines community at large. Bouaphakeo insists that Des Moines was made for roller derby, citing the fact that the largest city in Iowa is a young community that has a desire to see and try new things. Bouaphakeo claimed evidence of this can be found in D3 being able to secure sponsors even before the team hit the oval, which, she added, was also a testament to the soundness of the business plan.
Perhaps a bit of serendipity can be credited with the initial success of her vision. Bouaphakeo pointed out that she has always worn the number 10 throughout the course of her athletic career, from her days at Storm Lake High School to Drake University to the Dames. D3 had its first bout this year, 2010, and had its first bout on April 10. She claims she did not plan any of this on purpose.
Dixon said Bouaphakeo is looking forward to donning skates on Saturday. “She’s pretty damn excited,” Dixon said. “I think she’s a little nervous, but she wouldn’t admit that. I know the girls are excited because she’s a force when she gets out there on the track. She’s an awesome communicator. She knows the strategies. She’s a fabulous leader and so having her on the track is just a huge asset for everyone.”
But more than that, Dixon said, because after three bouts to experience Derby, she believes D3 has a far better grasp of the sport and has been able to piece it together so now they will not look like “a deer in headlights” as they did in the first game.
Brunnette said that while the intensity is definitely up for the rematch against Old Capital City, it is a good natured since many of the players on D3 are friends with them. She added that Bouaphakeo can be expected to skate with her usual intensity and fire on Saturday.
“She’s an Aries sign which means she has a lot of fire,” Brunnette said. “Obviously she wouldn’t come back if she didn’t think she could handle it and she is a very physically and mentally strong person. You know there’s always a risk with Derby but she’s well aware of those risks and she’s prepared.”
As for Thompson, who is fiercely devoted to Bouaphakeo, she too is anticipating the return of the Show Stopper to the oval.
“When she says ‘Come on! Get up here’ I can follow her and I would follow that woman into a burning building with a gasoline jacket because if she says I can do it, I can do it,” Thompson said. “There is no doubt in my mind that if she says ‘Come on, MOAB, let’s do this,’ we can get it done.”
Noel and I made I-35 from Highway 20 (which we hit coming out of Waterloo) in 50 minutes. Since this usually took me over an hour to make, and with about 1 hour and 20 minutes to cover about 60 miles, I began to get giddy. We were going to make the match on time.
The combination of that knowledge and the emergence of the evening sun out of the rainclouds that blanketed the north turned my attention to the bout itself.
What would it be like? A friend of mine who attended the Cedar Rapids Roller Girls bout told me that it was, in his words, kind of lame but added that a) he didn't have the greatest of seats and b) the beer was a bit pricey. I suppose the combination of those two things could make a lame night out of anything.
Still the question lingered, would it be lame?
In my previous post I mentioned that the incarnation of Roller Derby that the Dames play is different from previous editions. While the kitsch is in the names and the outfits, the actual competition is real. These women would be taking the floor without any idea of what was going to happen- for good or for ill. The ill showed up in the Dames' inaugural match as Dames founder, Show Stopper, was seriously injured in the bout against the Old Capital City Roller Girls of Iowa City. I cannot remember which foot was injured but it looked pretty serious.
Since the action was real, would it be timid, especially in light of such a serious injury?
Our high speed sprint down I-35 placed us in the parking lot of the Val-Air at 7:10 p.m. What Noel and I saw there surprised us. The parking lot was full. People were tailgating. Both of us agreed that this was cool. We also agreed we had to haul ass to get inside the building out of legitimate fear that it sold out. Fortunately, we got tickets.
Stepping inside, I saw the track boundary laid out in the center of the decent sized wooden dance floor. Unlike the roller derby I had been accustomed to seeing, this match would be done on a flat track.
The absence of a banked track had the possibility of slowing the overall speed of the game. On the other hand it paved the way for Suicide Seating. This wonderful bit of news was provided to Noel and I by Dames bench coach Squirrel Ex Machina- thus ending the debate about where we were going to sit.
The first team on the floor was the aforementioned River Valley Rollergirls from the Warsau-Schoefield, Wisconsin area. They were dressed in orange tops and came equipped with such wonderful names as Coochie Carnage, Gun Metal Grace, team leader Hether Skelter and the Eradiskater.
Then came the Dames, who were led out by the Isiserettes, a completely kick ass drum and dancing group that had so much soul, phat beats and energy that they could probably power a high octane rave all by themselves.
The incredibly impressive full color program contained what we would be in for.
There would be two 30 minute periods separated by a half time.
Both teams would field five girls. Two of them would serve as Jammers, recognizable by the star on their helmet. These two would be the only ones who can score points. The first jammer to break through the pack is awarded the status of lead jammer- the most powerful woman on the floor because she has the option to call off a jam at any point she so chooses before the two minute jam is over. The jammers can only score points on the second lap around the pack. Points are acquired when these jammers pass a member of the opposing team.
From my vantage point in the Suicide Seats, it looked like the Jammers started about 15 to 20 feet behind what is called the pack. At the lead of the pack are two girls, one from each team, known as Pivots, recognizable by the stripe on their helmets. These Pivots control the pace of the pack.
Behind the pivots were the blockers, three from each team. These women serve offensive and defensive purposes simultaneously. Offensively they have to navigate their jammer though the pack. Defensively they have to block the opposing teams jammer from breaking through.
A brief demonstration was exhibited for the audience prior to start of the match. This was done half-assed by both teams and understandably so. Both teams were ready. I was ready. Ready for whatever.
Besides the chaos of the first jam, which threw me for a loop at the simultaneous action of it all, the first person Noel and I noticed was a jammer that called herself Stella Italiana. The announcer mentioned that she had a background in speed skating. This experience manifested itself almost immediately. This Stella Italiana does not skate- she floats. Time after time throughout the course of the evening her navigation through the pack left Noel and I slack jawed At times she seemed to almost turn herself into a liquid substance to escape the waiting arms and bodies of the River Valley blockers only to emerge on the other side of the pack.
The second thing we noticed was the ease at which the Dames were racking up points and the difficulty that River Valley was having acquiring their own. Not only that, we noticed that many of the Rollergirls were being sent to the penalty box. Once there was as many as four. Throughout the night, especially in the early stages of the match, there were sights of upraised arms begging the officials for an explanation and one particular exasperated "What the fuck did I do?!" coming from Road Block of the Rollergirls.
Later at the after party we found out why. It had nothing to do with the quality of the players on the Rollergirls squad. They were simply out of their league- literally. The ladies explained to us after the game that they are what is called a "renegade" team. Renegade appears to be a form of Roller Derby that is far more physically aggressive and far less structured by rules than the World Flat Track Derby Association game that the Dames play under.
The physical nature of the match was made manifest almost immediately. On the first jam, Rollergirls leaderHether Skelter appeared to have bent her right pointer finger all to hell. Coochie Carnage, one of the frequent visitors to the penalty box was seen moving her jaw back and forth in obvious pain, trying as hard as she was to mask it. She stayed in the game.
As the game progressed the Rollergirls obviously began to feel more at home in the WFTDA format. points from jammers, such as the tenacious Sammi Tsunami, were becoming more frequent but by that time the Dames were far out of reach. Final Score 223-88.
Note: As I write this, it is 11:20 at night. There is more that I would like to say, but wouldn't do justice to those words and these women if I continued tonight. I'll try to wrap it up tomorrow. Sorry about that.
