MRDA Champs

If you are keeping track at home, you will notice that I traveled to Baltimore three times in the span of a month (August into September) and in October I found myself rolling down 87 thrice for adventures in NYC/Long Island - the Gotham Boot Camp, CDTA vs NYSE, and on October 22 - Men's Roller Derby Association (MRDA) Championships. The event took place at Skate Safe America (also LIRR's venue) and was hosted by the New York Shock Exchange.

New York Shock Exchange

My second post ever on this blog was about men's roller derby. Since then I've come to appreciate it more and more. I definitely see some differences between the way men and women play, but I like watching both.

MRDA Champs featured six teams from around the United States:
Dallas Deception (Texas)
Magic City (somewhere in Florida)
St. Louis Gatekeeper (Missouri)
Puget Sound (Seattle area)
Pioneer Valley (Western Mass)
New York Shock Exchange.

woohoo, PVRD!

PVRD is my favorite MRDA team. Ever since I saw them last year, I've been all about the mustaches.  I also love the Shock Exchange, cause hell yeah New York! Plus they're all super awesome. Side note: CDTA is obviously my favorite not-yet-MRDA team.


The other four leagues I didn't know much about.  Dallas?  Texas has roller derby, that's cool.  St. Louis? The guys with beards. Also, where the heck is St. Louis? Puget Sound = Quadzilla.  Magic City? wow... those are some ridiculous names on that roster.

So that's what I was working with going into the tournament.

It was a solid event of all-day derby - there were 8 full length men's bout, plus one women's bout in the middle to break things up.  I hung out mostly with the dudes from CDTA and there was also a bunch of people from the Utica Quadfathers there and Central New York players there.

Capital District Trauma Authority
Roarshock, Jonny Malice, Massacre, Wellen Dowd, and Museknuckle

Being the top two ranked teams, St. Louis and NYSE had a first round by. NYSE ended up playing Magic City in the first game, and the score was a lot closer than I expected.

Grambo from CNY volunteering at
MRDA.

Magic City is ridiculous.  I mean that in a mostly good way, although at first I was not sure how I felt about them. Rumor had it that most of their skaters have a background in jam skating. They definitely had some fancy footwork. Overall, NYSE played a tighter game strategy-wise and were able to take the win. Check out the Derby News Network recap here. There's a comment which is a bit critical of NYSE's strategy that won them the game, but heck - that is the way derby is played these days. It's just playing smart based on the rules of the game.  Anyway, the first picture on that article where Magic City (green) is facing reverse direction pretty much sums up the whole game.  It was an exciting game to watch.

PVRD had a tough first game against Puget Sound, who are a powerhouse in the west. After losing to them, they played Dallas Deception, which was a little bit closer.

The best game of the day, in my opinion, was Magic City vs. St. Louis. Two teams I knew little about going into it, but I think this bout exemplified some of the best men's derby has to offer. The two teams were very well matched game and I decided I just really like to watch Magic City skate.
If you watch any videos of the bouts from MRDA Champs, I definitely recommend Magic City vs St. Louis.

These are just my basic impressions from Champs.  If you want some real stats based, unbiased recaps you should check out DNN here, here, here, here, and here.

Eastern Region Play-offs: Nightmare on 95 Day 1

I've got thoughts on three of Friday's bouts for you.

In the first game of the tournament, the Dutchland Derby Rollers took on our friends from Maine Roller Derby (we're playing their B team next week!). I think it was a surprise to a lot of people, but Team USA rostered skater, V-Diva, recently transferred to DDR from Lehigh Valley. Maine did well but Dutchland took the win- their next bout would've been against Gotham (#1 tournament seed) later in the day - except they chose to forfeit. Read about that over on derbynewsnetwork or pretty much any facebook wall of someone related to roller derby.

The London vs Carolina game was one I had been looking forward to. I saw London play Providence Roller Derby, and I thought they were pretty great! Last year at Regionals (back when it was "Regionals"), Carolina played Montreal, winning by only a couple points. In my mind, this was sort of an international rematch for Carolina.

Carolina literally facing of vs London

London ruled the game with smart trapping and super recycling from their blockers; and beautiful footwork by their jammers. Even with hard strikes to the hips driven by Carolina, the London jammers would rarely take a tumble, and more like do some sort of spin-around move and stay on their feet. I actually saw this move from a couple jammers this weekend, including Charm City's CC Bang Bang.
Carolina interesting strategy of starting facing the jammers. From the crowd, it seemed intimidating. I'm curious about this strategy - I'm sure we'll be hearing about it.
The final score was London 160 - Carolina 67.


Montreal vs. Steel City
So, first of all you had to wonder - is the whole league wearing unitards under their jerseys, like the coaches? Or are those just pants?
This was a low scoring game for the first 10 minutes, with a score of score 16 Steel - 6 Montreal. Steel inched up to about at 25 point lead, but in the final jams of the period, Montreal nearly shortened the gap to 49-41 - still a quite low scoring game.
Soon into the second period, we saw the first 1 point lead change.  Midway into period two, the Steel City jammer was unable to take advantage of a powerjam due to what appeared to be an equipment malfunction seconds into the jam. A minute passed as she attempted to adjust her kneepad (?) and shortly the Montreal jammer was back on the track.
Steel City's defense endeavored to be ruthless: with big girls Athena and Bonecrusher in the back of the pack, it was nearly impossible to get around them. I'd like to rephrase myself and say that they were big girls... with incredible endurance and jammer stopping hits. By the end of the period, Steel regained the lead and took the game 134 - 88.

Hellions of DNN tonight!

Tonight's bout in Canada - Hellions vs. Montreal's Les Filles du Roi will be broadcast live on Derby News Network. The game begins at 7pm est.
Miss it live? The bout may be archived - check back here for a link.

Eastern Regionals Recap

I was at Eastern Regionals pretty much all weekend.  I got there after the first two games on Friday and Saturday, but from then on it was non-stop roller derby.

My favorite teams of the weekend were Montreal, Steel City, and Charm City.  As I anticipated, Montreal seemed to be the sweetheart team of the weekend.  In their first game, they held their own against Boston, but it's not too much of a surprise that Boston took the win.  On Saturday, they lost by only 2 points to Carolina, which later that night one NSO described to me as a "comedy of errors."  Montreal ended up taking 7th place after a strong bout against Providence.

Steel City's Hurricane Heather jamming past out of play
blockers from Carolina.

The first game I caught on Friday was Steel City vs. Charm City, which was a terrific match.  Right off the bat they utilized "slow game" strategies, meaning once the jam whistle blew, nobody raced off the line, but instead held back - perhaps in an effort to intimidate the jammer.  Our league has done a little bit of this strategy, but Steel City has nailed it.  Throughout the weekend, their "steel curtain" was incredible.  Charm City, however, featured tough cookies such as Dolly Rocket and Joy Collision.  Dolly seemed almost villainous as she played with a serious scowl on her face and took out anyone in her way showing no mercy.  I won't completely buy into it though - I sat next to her grandparents during the first bout and when she came over to say hello to them I saw her genuinely smile.  Even though derby girls can be fierce on the track, off the track they're still human.

This game was a great way to warm us all up for the rest of the weekend - I think it was my favorite game of the tournament.  Even though I came into the weekend with my eye on Steel City (and kept it there the rest of the weekend - they ended up taking 5th place), I began rooting for Charm City as well.

Philly vs. Gotham.  Notice how some blockers started
closer to the jammer line.  Getting ready to execute the
"slow game" strategy.

This weekend I learned that during regional playoffs, the most important game isn't the last game for first or second place, but the one decides third and fourth.  Out of ten teams, only the top three teams advance to the Championships.  That meant the game to watch would be Charm City vs. Boston.  Last year, Boston, Philly, and Gotham were the top three.

The score was neck-and-neck for the first 45 minutes of the game, until Charm City started pulling ahead, kept their defense strong, and won the game by 34 points.  Wooo!  I don't believe Charm City has never gone to the Championships before, so there was much celebrating.  Advancing teams will be: Gotham, Philly, and Charm City.

Catch some good recaps on all the bouts from Derby News Network here: http://derbynewsnetwork.com/2010/09/eastern_region_playoffs_recaps

I learned some other interesting things and met some cool people this weekend, which I'll talk about in my next post.

East Coast Regionals this Weekend

I'm starting to read up on the teams for Eastern Regionals this weekend.  Derby in the Burbs, hosted by Suburbia Roller Derby this year, will take place on Friday, September 24 - Sunday, September 26.

One special thing about this year's event is that it's the first time a team outside the U.S. will be competing.  the New Skids on the Block, Montreal Roller Derby's travel team, will take on Boston on Friday afternoon for Game 4.  I've seen both teams play, but more recently Montreal at East Coast Extravaganza back in July.

Like I wrote about Minnesota, I'm gonna say that Montreal is going to be the exciting team to watch this weekend - and not just because they'll be hard to miss wearing neon.  Not only are they an all around fun group of girls, but their hitting power and blocking ability is also quite impressive.  Geaux Montreal!



Shockratease is coming down on Friday with me and she's excited to see Steel City (Pittsburgh).  I just watched a video of them on youtube.  They look like a fun and hardworking team!

Then of course there is Gotham, whose All Star team never disappoints.  DNN has some interesting commentary on their strategy, which I've never noticed before so I'll have to pay attention.  Also excited to meet some of the girls from Suburbia (although they're not playing).  Lets go New York Derby!

Don't forget that you can watch the whole tournament live for free on Derby News Network!

For more "informed" commentary, check out DNN's preview article or the preview from Roller Derby Inside Track.  Better to consider their thoughts over my speculation when it's time to fill out your bracket.

East Coast Extravaganza

This weekend I was in Philadelphia checking out East Coast Extravaganza (ECE).  This three-day tournament is sponsored by the Philly Roller Girls.  According to the website, there were 900+ skaters in 47 bouts.  The main attractions were the WFTDA sanctioned bouts, which were played by teams who are part of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association.  The Gotham Girls played on Boston; Maine (we played their B-team last month!) took on the Dominion Derby Girls from Virginia Beach; Providence, RI, played girls from Minnesota (arguably the best game of the weekend!), and sooo many more games.  Roller derby is a national sport, and this tournament is one way teams from across the country can get together and play each other to figure out their nation rankings.

There were also plenty of "challenge bouts" (basically pick-up games) that anyone could skate in if they registered as a skater.  Silly me didn't get my act together until the last minute, so I missed out on this!  Definitely next year!  What's fun about challenge bouts is that you can sign up to play on a team with some sort of theme, and you're pretty much matched with girls you've never skated with before, as you all sign up to skate for a team remotely.  There was a men's derby challenge bout which was great because there were lots of people at ECE who had never seen men's derby.  We are spoiled here in the north east!

So anyway, I went down to Philly with Eloda and Ida.  We spent Friday afternoon in Philly, saw Reading Terminal Market (same place as Reading Railroad from Monopoly!!) and took a double decker bus tour around town.  Then we headed over to the Sportsplex to check out the action.  We watched the Gotham Girls play Windy City (from Chicago).  Gotham is currently ranked #1 nationally  and Windy City is ranked #9.  It was a good bout.  Both teams played exceptionally, but Gotham is just outta control. They won the game 191 - 50.  Still, it was was so fun to watch - all of the girls had so much energy and were very limber.

I hope to blog about some other games and experiences from the rest of the weekend soon.  Can't wait until next year!

Couldn't make it to Philly this weekend?  Check out some of the bouts on Derby News Network: http://www.derbynewsnetwork.com/live/archive  They were broadcasting bouts all day on Saturday and Sunday.  Host a post-ECE derby watching party and perhaps play the DNN Drinking Game!  I definitely recommend Provide vs. Minnesota!  Such a close game.