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By Skaters, For Skaters by Eileen Nicol

Picture this: ten powerful women on four-wheeled roller skates, five to a team, racing around an oval track, many with face paint, tattoos, lipstick, fishnet stockings and short skirts; all sporting mouth guards, pads, helmets and a fierce determination to outmaneuver, outskate and outmuscle the opposing skaters. Add in a pulsating soundtrack and screaming fans and you get an inkling of the energy and drama of a roller derby bout.

Spectacle has deep roots in the decidedly contact sport of roller derby. In 1935, Leo Seltzer, a depression-era promoter of monthlong dance marathons, was looking for the next big thing, and came up with an event that simulated a cross-country skating race. His first “Transcontinental Roller Derby” was staged in front of 20,000 spectators at the Chicago Coliseum, where over the course of 30 days, 25 one-man and one-woman teams raced 11 ½ hours a day around an oval track to cover 3,000 miles in 57,000 laps.

Seltzer took his show on the road, and folklore has it that the real sport of roller derby developed after a New York sportswriter, impressed by a collision of skaters in a “speed tangle,” suggested Seltzer change the event to maximize the elbowing, “whipping” and slamming of other skaters into the outer rail. Seltzer bowed to the crowd’s enthusiasm for direct contact between skaters, and he changed roller derby into a contact sport in which two, instead of dozens, of teams vie to score as they fly around the track.

The popularity of women on the original “transcontinental” teams paved the way for all-women leagues in the 1950s, and in 2004 roller derby saw a resurgence as a women’s sport with a punk edge and revolutionarily non-commercial ethic. That year, Seattle’s Rat City Rollergirls league was established as a limited liability company, or LLC, owned by its members, making it the first all-female flat track roller derby league in the Northwest.

Now there are 78 flat track roller derby leagues in the U.S., five of which are in Washington. In addition to the Rat City Rollergirls, our state has the Jet City Rollergirls (established in Everett as a 501(3)C nonprofit in 2006), the Oly Rollers (Olympia, 2006) and the Slaughter County Roller Vixens (Bremerton, 2007).

All of the leagues are affiliated with the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA) which standardized rules and regulations for the sport in 2006 and now governs all parameters of the game, including track design specs and player requirements.

Rat City Rollergirls is composed of four teams (the Sockit Wenches, Throttle Rockets, Derby Liberation Front and Grave Danger), and in their local season the teams compete against each other. An all-star traveling team is selected from the four teams to compete against other regional leagues and, ultimately, in the national championship tournament. In 2009, the Oly Rollers from Olympia won the national championship, which was played in Philadelphia.

The Rat City Rollergirls are generally happy for their neighbors down the I-5 corridor. “We’re all very proud that someone from our area won the national competition,” says skater “Anya Heels,” a member of RCRG’s all-star travel team who in real life goes by the name Jaime Salazar. But she quickly points out, “We’re looking forward to the competition with them. I want us to get back to number one in the nation.”

WHAT'S IT ALL ABOUT?

The fishnet stockings, short skirts and elaborate makeup, all burlesque nods to the 1950s skater style, contribute to a carnival atmosphere that draws many skaters and spectators to the sport. “People that attend our bouts range from general sports fanatics to people who just love the campy feel,” says Salazar. Rat City bouts are inexpensive (general admission for adults is $14 and kids under 16 are $8) and are billed as family friendly.

A joyful raunchiness may earn some bouts a PG-13 rating, but let’s face it — kids understand the fun of running around and knocking each other down. There is even a Seattle Derby Brat league with divisions for ages 6–10 and 11–18.

Despite the emphasis on campy burlesque and spectacle, flat track roller derby is an athletic sport that is played by hard and fast rules. There are many layers and strategies to the game, but here are the basics: A “bout” consists of two periods, each lasting 30 minutes. Within the 30-minute period, five skaters from each team take the track for as many two-minute “jams” as time allows.

Three of the five skaters on each team are “blockers,” the fourth is a “pivot” (she sets the pace) and the fifth is the “jammer,” who is identified by the star on her helmet. The goal is to rack up points by getting the “jammer” to break ahead of the pack. Once she is ahead of the opposing jammer, she can begin scoring, one point for every opposing blocker she passes during the jam. Final bout scores are often in triple digits. Salazar describes the play as “nail-biting, action-packed, fast-paced, rough-and- tumble, and full-contact.”

At the beginning of each jam, the blockers from both teams line up 20 feet ahead of the jammers. When the whistle blows, the jammers take off to skate as fast and aggressively as possible, inbounds and without fouling, to break through the pack of blockers and continue around the track. Skaters in the pack can use body checks (the legal contact zone is between the shoulders and mid-thigh) and “whip assists” (when a teammate grabs her jammer by the hand or arm and “whips” her forward to help her propel herself through the pack) to foil their opponents, but other forms of blocking, such as tripping, kicking, and blocking with feet or legs are violations.

As one skater describes it, the jammer has “four people trying to kill her and four people trying to help her.”

WHAT’S IN A NAME?

Derby girls each develop an alter ego, complete with alias, which they register with a national data base. “We call each other by our skate names, even when we’re in social situations outside of derby,” explains Salazar.

Even volunteers get into the act. Randy Pan the Goat Boy has been announcing for RCRG since their first season.

But while the names are comical and even corny, the chance to reinvent oneself is compelling. It’s hard to say who loves the campiness of derby more, the skaters or their fans. Taking on a new persona— of someone who can hit people and get praised for it — can be a hugely liberating experience for women.

“I love that I can go out there and get my aggressions out without having to go to the gym or go to therapy,” Salazar says. “I’ve learned that my aggressive side is a lot stronger than I’ve ever given it credit for. I’m excited to be able to let that part out of me. And I get celebrated for it!”

Comparisons to entertainment sports like WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment)-style wrestling are tempting, but today’s derby athletes insist that the competition is not staged and that they have the bruises to prove it. The action is fast and furious and the spills are very real, but this is a legitimate sport with rules, referees and required protective gear. Penalties for breaking the rules range from time-outs in the penalty box to expulsion from a bout. Wrist and mouth guards, knee pads and helmets are mandatory, as is health insurance. While there are team skaters in their 40s, the average age of a Rat City Rollergirl is early 30s. Injury and the desire to have a life outside derby are two factors that keep that average on the low side.

“The shelf life of a roller girl is about three years,” admits Salazar, who recently underwent surgery to release the compartments of the muscles in her calves and hopes to get a few more years’ skating out of it. Broken bones and bruises come with the territory and gain a girl some skate cred — and perhaps even a photo on a not-for-the-squeamish page on the Rollergirls’ Web site.

Coaching is one way for former skaters to stay involved, and “Carmen Getsome” (aka Lacey Evans), a 27-year-old exercise specialist who played college soccer, foresees herself eventually in that role. “You know the day (the derby kids) are eligible to play in our league, they’re gonna take over and us old folks won’t have a chance. They’re so stellar — if you throw skates on at 8 or 9, it makes a big difference.”

DERBY IS DIY

A do-it-yourself ethic permeates derby, from the skaters and volunteers to the WFTDA, which hired its first employees in 2009. WFTDA’s guiding principle is “by the skaters, for the skaters.” Its Web site (www.wftda.com) touts the low start-up costs for starting a league, noting that “you don’t need to own or lease a space to house flat tracks. Simply find an unencumbered surface to skate on and you can set up a flat track with rope lights, rope, duct tape or even just cones.”

The Rat City Rollergirls started at Southgate Skating Rink in White Center —“Rat City” is a nickname for White Center — and they later moved to an old airplane hangar at Magnuson Park in Seattle. In 2009, they upped their game and began holding their league bouts in Key Arena.

It is a women-owned sport,” explains Evans. “We create it — it’s not only us participating, it’s us doing it — everything about it. We’re 100 percent responsible for the production as much as we are responsible for the athleticism.”

“This has really been the first arena for me to pick up roles of leadership and run with them,” says Evans. Last year she took on the contracts for trading cards the league produced. “I had to figure out all the legal mumbo jumbo and then get it approved by our lawyer. Derby has allowed me to kind of grow up and do things I never, ever would have gotten to do,” she says.

“It’s like having a second job,” says Salazar. Between committee work and practice, all-star skaters like Carmen Getsome and Anya Heels devote four to six nights a week to the Rollergirls. No one gets paid; in fact, they pay dues to cover the cost of practice space. Ticket sales and fundraisers support travel expenses for the all-stars and other production costs.
But derby girls do get a little help from their friends. “Without our volunteers, there’s no way we could ever make this happen,” says Salazar, praising the volunteer medical staff, referees, announcers and scorekeepers needed for bouts. Spouses of derby girls are also known as derby widows. Or they join in the fun. Most spouses or partners come to all the bouts and help with the setup and teardown.

The Rollergirls also give back to the community, choosing an additional outside beneficiary for all of their own fundraisers, even doing roadside cleanup in their birthplace of White Center.

“YOU CAN TRY STUFF”

Although Salazar has a speed skating background and Evans played soccer, many women like Mae Lay (aka Chelsea Shepherd) had never participated in organized sports before they found derby.

“I was kind of a loner,” admits Shepherd. She had started roller-skating around Green Lake in her twenties, eschewing inline skates for quads that she bought over the Internet. Then, coincidental with an “awful breakup,” she discovered PFM (or Potential Fresh Meat), an independent, volunteer-run club dedicated to roller derby education and practice, and she was hooked.

“It was just an amazing, supportive environment,” says Shepherd. “Roller derby saved me. I do feel like I kind of found myself.” Stoked by her newfound confidence, she and another skater resuscitated an attempt to start a banked track league here in Seattle, and she says she is surprised every day. “We have been through all of this business stuff that we’ve never done before and all of a sudden it’s working.”

Now, Shepherd is a cofounder of Seattle’s new banked track league Tilted Thunder, which has 80 members and is on its way to raising an estimated $40,000 to build and house a banked track. The Rat City girls have been generous, says Shepherd. “Everyone has offered us all of the advice they can give. And we’ve taken it — that’s why we’re doing well so far. Everybody’s response has been the more derby, the better.”

Ultimately, for many skaters, derby is where you try stuff — secure in the knowledge that there’s a sweet, deep safety net of support. As Shepherd points out, “When you actually play — this is a standard experience — you go out there and beat the crap out of each other and then you go out and have a beer and everybody’s all happy hunky-dory.”

Eileen Nicol is a frequent contributor to Seattle Woman.

RAT CITY ROLLER-GIRLS 2010 SEASON AT KEY ARENA

Sunday, January 31
Doors open at 2:30
Opening ceremonies start at 3:30 p.m.
All four teams will participate in this exhibition bout. Each team will play for a designated nonprofit charity and lineups will be determined at the bout.

Saturday, March 6
Doors open at 4:30 p.m.
Opening Ceremonies at 5:30 p.m.
Derby Liberation Front vs. Throttle Rockets
Sockit Wenches vs. Grave Danger

Saturday, April 10
Doors open at 4:30 p.m.
Opening Ceremonies at 5:30 p.m.
Derby Liberation Front vs. Grave Danger
Sockit Wenches vs. Throttle Rockets

Saturday, May 1
Doors open at 4:30 p.m.
Opening Ceremonies at 5:30 p.m.
Grave Danger vs. Throttle Rockets
Sockit Wenches vs. Derby Liberation Front

Saturday, June 5
Doors open at 4:30 p.m.
Grudge Match and Championship Bout
Bout lineups will be determined by standings.

©Copyright 2010, Caliope Publishing Company