After a long break from derby, I'm back, training to be a referee with the Forest City Rangers, the referees associated with London's own
Forest City Derby Girls. I'll also be blogging about my experiences in hopes that offer trainee refs and folks curious about working to earn their stripes might find it useful. Look for updates each Monday!
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| Copyright Area 705 Roller Derby |
As part of my training, I'm currently NSOing as often as I can. This past Saturday, the
Festival City Rollergirls'
Decapulettes hosted the
Area 705 Roller Derby's Smooth Operators. The match-up promised a great chance for the Decaps to show their fast-paced improvement and Area 705 to take on a more experienced team and earn both some bruises and some crucial playtime. Both teams had visiting players from other leagues (including
Toronto LOCO,
LOCO Kitchener and
LMRD) and referees from all over (
WEWRA,
FDCG, among others already mentioned) showing derby spirit and helping fill the rosters and positions
The Decaps maintained control throughout the game, with some excellent jamming and hard hits. But the Smooth Operators were no slouches and showed a great deal of potential with incredible sportsmanship. From the perspective of the penalty box, I saw quite a few players from both teams, but the Smooth Operators did their league proud with great attitudes.
My favourite players of the bout? The Decaps' nimble Cargoyle and the Smooth Operators' Rainbow Crash, who was all enthusiasm in Pinkie Pie socks.
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| Copyright Festival City Rollergirls |
My favourite sight at the bout were the "Go Decaps!" pennants on sale. Cheap and easy to make, pennants are a great way to sell some merch, distract children and get some team colours into the crowd. Kudos to whoever in Festival City decided to go for them. It's great to see leagues diversifying the content of their merch tables. A Decaps fan at Saturday's bout could buy shirts, buttons, pennants and hot sauce. Happily the hot sauce did not come to the after-party.
All in all, Saturday's bout was a great showing and a wonderful way for a derby fan to get back in the game.
Today's featured league hails not far from the town I did most of my growing up in. A relatively new full-contact league, PRD was founded in January 2011 in Peterborough, Ontario by Lucid Lou of TORD's Death Track Dolls and Falldown Firlotte. Currently sporting two teams, the Electric City Rollers and the Damage Dollz, this league is proof that derby is pretty much taking over the province of Ontario.
Getting interested in Peterborough Roller Derby at this stage is something of an adventure. They're a relatively young league, but an ambitious and busy one, already having bouted against the West End Waywards Rollerskating Association's Rollergettes, Durham Region Roller Derby's Atom Smashers and LOCO's own Violet Femmes. Upcoming bouts include a meet-up with the Capital City Roller Dolls' Dolly Rogers on July 7th and a bout against the Kingston Derby Girls on August 11th. Get your foot in PRD's door now to see an adolescent league grow up fast.
