Issue 03
THE ROLLER DERBY
By Shawna KenneyPhotos By Dale Rio
Illustration By ThingMaking
Today, like a horror-movie zombie, Roller Derby is back from the dead, thriving in at least 16 American cities. Well-organized women’s leagues like the Los Angeles Derby Dolls have no shortage of players answering their recruitment flyer requiring prospects to:
- Be at least 21 years of age
- Be able to practice twice a week
- Not be a wussy!
Founded by Wendy “Thora Zeen” Templeton and Rebecca “Demolicious” Nimburg in October 2003, the Derby Dolls are a league of more than 60 women divided into four teams: Fight Crew, the Sirens, Tough Cookies, and Trust Fund Terrors. The four teams under the Derby Dolls’ umbrella all skate on a traditional “banked track,” a 100′ x 56′ oval-shaped, angled rink, put together in pieces and torn down after games by the teams themselves. Practices are held on a rooftop parking lot in Chinatown.
In each game, two teams face off against each other. The game consists of two halves, each half lasting a period of fifteen minutes. Each period is made up of jams. During each jam, four players from each team skate on the track. At the beginning of the jam, the skaters come together to form the pack. The pack consists of six defensive blockers (three from each team) with two jammers (one from each team) directly behind them. Jammers are the only skaters that can score points.
Play begins when one of the referees sounds a long whistle blast, signaling the pack to start moving. Once the last pack member travels 20 feet from the starting line, another long whistle blast signals the jammers to begin skating. This is when the official jam begins. Once the jam whistle is blown, the jammers must make their way through the pack and around the track to the back of the pack again (think low-crouched, elbows-flaring, lightning-speed images of yesteryear). The blockers from the opposing team will try to prevent them from making it around in time. From this point, each time the jammer passes a member of the opposing team they receive one point for their team.
A jam is over when the 60-second time limit elapses, or the lead jammer places both hands on her hips, thereby calling off the jam, or an official calls for a timeout due to an emergency or skater injury. Sirens jammer Melinda “Hellen Heels” Miles, 25, admits part of the appeal for her is the great workout, which has given her a “nice new tight ass!” She actually won the “Rubber Ass” award at the team’s first annual Derby Prom, due to her finesse in falling. “Sometimes I’ll lay awake in bed, my body throbbing, and I wonder how much I’m really fucking up my body for the long haul. Most of the time now, I really do look like a battered woman. In a sense I am, but I’m just getting abused by my friends,” she laughs. Like her numerous predecessors, she says, “I’m having the time of my life!”
The sport is not for everyone, however. “You must have a pussy, not be a pussy!” Miles states. “When I think back to my first practice, I hadn’t skated since I was about eight years old, and it did NOT come back easily! Really, I totally sucked-but I stuck with it, got over my embarrassment, and have improved so much from where I started.”
Thirty-year-old Cari “Puncherello” Knight, Captain of the Sirens team, found Roller Derby when searching Craig’s List for hiking partners; despite breaking her thumb the first day on the banked track, she hasn’t looked back since. “It is really empowering,” she says. “I was never good at sports, except for badminton. To start excelling was like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe I’m doing this.’ Plus, the people I skate with are awesome.”
Jenny “Candy Striker” Comperda, 26-year-old Jammer Assist, agrees. “I love the anxiety and the anticipation. I also love waking up the next day after practice and feeling this ache through my body. It’s a good ache - it means I’ve played hard.” She says that the most difficult aspect of the sport is bouncing back after injury. “You have to be crazy,” she adds. “I ask myself every day, ‘who the hell do I think I am?’” Derby Dolls players are required to wear kneepads, elbow pads, wrist guards, and helmets, while mouth guards and “crash pads” (for the butt) are highly recommended.
“We cut some of the crash pads so they don’t hang down below our skirts,” says Captain Puncherello. Apparently it’s more than violence titillating fans nationwide, and the Dolls’ merchandising, offering everything from tank tops to cookbooks, proves they’re well aware of that.
Tim Patten, owner of San Francisco’s Bay City Bombers, the oldest and perhaps most recognizable team in the country, agrees this is exactly the direction Roller Derby must take. “There’s been a struggle for decades to get rid of the women, to have a men’s-only league, and I’ve never been in favor of that. It needs sex, violence, and romance, on top of all the athleticism that is required. And it needs to go in an all-female direction. Anybody who knows anything about current-day America, women are on-the-roll in general, in jobs, in sports girls can have football teams now. That’s where America is at right now.” He points to professional wrestler Chyna’s success to illustrate. “She’s an incredible star in Japan, because Japanese women need to be set free - they need a hero, a leader, somebody who is going to be a role model.” Historically, Roller Derby has appealed to so many people, he feels, because the players “connected with the average American. Women needed a role model and men felt the male skaters were true athletes.” Since buying the Bombers franchise in 1988, Patten has hand-picked every skater for this very reason.
“It’s not just being an athlete, it’s also being able to speak, to work in the media. It’s being photogenic,” he states. The Bombers’ website prominently features bombshell Laura Weintraub. Voted “prettiest person in all of professional sports,” Weintraub also skates on Spike TV’s Rollerjam under the name “The Pussy Cat.” Famous sportswriter Frank DeFord’s book Five Strides on the Banked Track acknowledged it was no secret why Joanie Weston, former team captain and later Bomber franchise part-owner, was the biggest star back in the day. “She is not only the best skater, but she looks the part as well,” he wrote. “With her bleached blond pigtails flowing from beneath her shiny black pivot helmet, [she] appears like a brave Viking queen in full regalia.”
“You just can’t pick all the ugly dykes that come along,” explains Patten. “I don’t mean to be negative. They’re certainly out there skating, but you know, the biggest thing is a desire,” he adds. “The reality is, it’s a very frustrating industry. It’s just like American Idol. And guess what? Out of 100,000 people every year, there’s only one American Idol-sorry buddy! And unless you’re that one that has charisma, that has an emotional connection with human beings, that makes it across the airwaves, well. The number one thing I look for is a deep, deep desire, and ability to deal with frustration.”
For now, leagues like the Derby Dolls remain skater-owned-and-operated, holding fundraisers for their financial needs, and group parties for personalizing their uniforms. New York’s Gotham Girls, who have appeared on the Today Show and UPN 9, sell tickets and accept sponsorships and donations via their website, claiming they’re “always looking for badass bitches on wheels to join our ranks.”
Texas’s Lonestar Rollergirls just inked a deal for a reality show on A&E billed as “Roller Girls: They are waitresses and school teachers, biologists and attorneys. Many are married. Some have children. They are also ex-homecoming queens starved for glamour, and athletes looking for the adrenaline rush that comes from knocking someone over a railing. Some are rock’n'roll chicks just out for a good time, and they are all proud, strong women in Austin, Texas.” The show promises to follow “grueling practices and training sessions” and offer behind-the-scenes looks at triumphs, paybacks, broken bones, and rocky personal lives.
Other leagues may not be far behind. “Competing against leagues in different cities and doing exhibitions in other countries is one of my goals for our league,” says L.A.’s Thora Zeen. “Having all-girl roller derby games televised would be hot!”
Teammate Hellen Heels agrees. “I just hope it grows, with more skaters joining and more fans getting entertained, but doesn’t get too big where the punk rock element is lost. Really though, cheap beer, bands, and half-clad, all-bad girls tearing it up on a banked track - It doesn’t get any better than that, folks!”