Retired roller girl critcises modern day roller derby

A retired roller derby skater has criticised the modern day game, saying the roller girls of today are “insulting.” Mary Youpelle, 91, who left school at 16 to become a professional roller derby player, has said today’s roller girls do not take the sport seriously. “They don’t put the effort into skating, they’re not proud of what they’re doing, they just think they’re having fun,” she said.

Mary joined a roller derby derby team in 1937 in St Louis and stopped in 1958 as a result of marriage and children.  During her time as a roller girl the sport drew huge crowds, “we were very close to getting in the Olympics,” she said. But Mary does not believe today’s game will reach that calibre as the girls see it as more of a hobby than a sport. “A lot of them are overweight, you can’t be an athlete and be overweight. I don’t give them credit at all,” she said.

Click below to listen to the interview with Mary about her views on today’s roller girls.  Apologies for the poor sound quality, but it is worth a listen to hear her opinion on the 21st Century game.

Mary’s comments are controversial for any roller derby fan or player, but what do you think? Answer the below poll and comment with your views on her remarks.

Injuries and safety in roller derby

With roller derby being a fast-paced contact sport in the same insurance bracket as rugby, injuries are not uncommon.  It is therefore essential for players to wear protective equipment to avoid causing harm to themselves or others. Emma Dyduch of Croydon Roller Derby describes the measures put in place to ensure the game is safe and talks about her most serious injury to date. 

Loretta ‘Little Iodine’ Behrens’ roller derby advice

You may have read the memoirs of the retired skater detailing her experiences of 1950s roller derby, but the outspoken 79-year-old has some strong opinions about the modern day game.

Loretta ended her career as a professional roller derby skater in 1959 after ten years of touring with teams across the US, appearing on television and attracting crowds of up to 35,000. Today, she follows 21st Century roller derby and says the sport is very different to the game she played. “In my day there were people that were blockers, jammers, pack skaters, everyone had the opportunity to be whatever they wanted,” she says.

The feisty ex-skater visits roller girls around the US, encouraging them and offering them advice about gameplay. The need for today’s roller girls to play both offence and defence is an important principle according to Loretta. “They are still playing put your head down push through the pack and score, there’s more to roller derby than just scoring points.”

With today’s final scores reaching the hundreds, there is no doubt the game has changed, as Loretta points out, “we had games where nobody even scored a point because we had good defensive play.” For the modern day game that seems unimaginable, but the New Yorker recognises the differences between the early days and now, “what I keep telling everybody is that you’ll never be a roller derby girl of my past, those days are over.”

Despite the move from banked to flat track, Loretta can still offer some advice to the roller girls of the future, “what you need to do is watch how the girls in the pack block.  One of the things I always told everybody is that jammers are the most boring people out there because they just skate.  The roller girls these days don’t even block they just put their head down,” she says. As any roller girl would know, spatial awareness is essential, and Loretta agrees, “you need two sets of eyes, one in front and one in the rear.  If somebody falls in front of you and you’re looking behind them, you’ll go flying right over them.”

Loretta admits that after the Texas Roller Girls’ 2001 revival of roller derby, she didn’t have a high opinion of the game they were playing as she thought the girls were not committed to the sport, “it’s a women’s world today and a lot of new people want to become athletes and unfortunately my opinion of the roller girls when they first started was that it was not athletic. They seemed to want to go out, have fun, have a party, drink and whatever.  Now they’re getting more serious.”

Derby Girl: Loretta For Loretta, the sport that changed her life will always stay with her and she hopes to pass on her knowledge and advice to future generations in order for the sport to be a major success. She is confident modern day roller derby will take off after witnessing an audience of 2,000 spectators turn up at a game in Atlanta, “I thought that was wonderful because they are creating fans there as more and more people are understanding  what the sport is.”

To read Loretta’s full story and a history of the sport, check out this month’s Lead Jammer magazine and follow @LeadJammerMag on Twitter.

Roller derby ‘isn’t a sport’

According to a recent article posted by The Morning Bulletin, roller derby is not a sport. Yes, you read that right. Despite the fact Team England have recently returned from achieving third place in what was the first ever Roller Derby World Cup, held in Toronto, Adrian Taylor has slammed roller derby saying “it  looks like an excuse for violence and brutality with a dubious element of perversion thrown in for salacious pleasure.”

He identifies football, rugby, tennis and athletics as ‘sports’, adding that the need for “skills, finesse, strategy and a high degree of strength and fitness” in these activities characterises them as ‘sport’.

It is no secret that roller derby is an entertainment sport; both for players and spectators. But is this element of fun detracting from the seriousness of what is a brutal and challenging game, requiring strength, agility, speed, strategy and fitness?

There is growing debate as to whether names like Kamikaze Kitten and Vagablonde are holding the sport back.  With its fast growing popularity, should roller derby consider a re-vamp? Or are whacky names and fishnets all part of the magic of this truly fascinating sport?

What is roller derby? Rules and gameplay

Basic gameplay
Roller Derby is a contact sport played mainly by women and can be described as a high speed race on skates. There are two teams of five players; a jammer and four blockers. The eight blockers skate around the looped track in a tight formation called a pack. It is the task of the jammer to break through the pack, scoring a point for each opposing player they pass during the two-minute jam. The blockers can hip shove and shoulder barge to hinder the other team’s chances of scoring, whilst trying to help their jammer through. The first player through the pack is the lead jammer, meaning she can call off the two-minute jam at any time. A player may choose to do this if she has fallen behind the pack and wants to prevent the other jammer from scoring. A game, or bout, comprises of two 30-minute halves.
           

Jammer
The jammer is the point-scoring player and is identified by a star on her helmet. The jammer must be very fit and have the ability to speed skate in order to lap opposing players and score points for her team. She must also have her eyes on the other jammer so if she is lead jammer she knows when to call the jam off.

Pivot
The pivot sets the pace of the pack and is identified by a stripe on her helmet. The jammer can pass the star to the pivot during gameplay by taking off the star helmet cover and giving it to the pivot. This means that the pivot is now the jammer and can score points for the team.

Penalties
To ensure the game is safe and fair, there are a number of illegal moves which result in players being sent to the sin bin for two minutes. Major penalties mean players are sent to the sin bin straight away, whilst four minor penalties equate to a major. A player with seven major penalties is ejected from the game. Penalties include elbows to the face, blocking with the back and tripping players over. It is a great advantage to a team when the opposing jammer is sent off because it means the player can lap the pack without fear of the other team scoring. This is called a power jam and can result in high scoring jams.

Roller derby used to be played on a banked track, but many 21st Century leagues now play on a flat track with the WFTDA acting as a governing body of rules for the sport. There are still some banked track leagues in existence but flat track roller derby is more commonplace as it is considered easier to set up.