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No.

No?

Why?

I don’t take orders from anyone!

I think the drunk priest was the highlight for me as I skipped through it 😉

Watched this last night, a bit hipster-ish for me, but they’re having a laugh so good luck to them.

(and it’s roller derby, not roller ball, James Caan’s not anywhere to be seen and there’s no motorbikes)

Roller Derby has a very active UK community – a few ladies I know are involved and many teams are over subscribed.

That Nun scared the sh1t out of me!

Better than football

4 periods per game. Sounds messy…

DrP

Go and watch “Whip It”*

*Don’t actually do this unless you like teenage comedies/cliched coming of age films.

My mate does roller derby (plays for the Windsor Rollergirls) – I used to do the bout programmes for them. There’s also the men’s UK Roller Derby Association too (MURDA).

Mine’s a jammer. You lot can have the blockers 😉

Pillow fights.. that’s where it gets weird.

There seems to be a rather high ratio of weird blokes (the sort that aren’t trusted with children or pets) and predatory ‘ladies in comfortable shoes’ 😉

Why is it weird? They look like they’re having fun.

Not really weird, it’s even been on Blue Peter

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT2RWKYVB-4[/video]

Seems to be mainly an excuse for blokes to watch young girls falling over flashing their underwear.

Although I suppose the same can be said about female beach volleyball.

Other than that, it all looked a bit shambolic, and more like a game thought up during a drunken night out than anything resembling a respectable ‘sport’.

They look like they’re having fun.

Never said they werent having fun.

However,

I do think its a bit odd when you have a Nun in PVC giving blessings, a somewhat blasted looking Preacher, a couple of good ole boys clearly leching & teenage girls pillow-fighting dressed up as wholesome Family entertainment..

From what I’ve seen of the sport in the UK, the rules are slightly different… no punching for a start, and the penalty for rule breaking is time in the sinbin rather than a pillow fight. Fewer lecherous old men in the audience.
The ladies that play all seem to be really good at baking cakes too!

Watched the video. The second comment below it was:

how is this not an Olympic sport?

😆

That is a very different version of Roller Derby to that played in the UK and most of the world.

The guardian vid is looking at Banked Track roller derby – which dates back to the 30s. Originally Bank Track derby went the way of American Wrestling: contact, but playing up to the cameras, with ‘professional’ players. It finally disappeared from USA TV in the 90s, before being resurrected as an amateur sport in the early 2000s in Austin. But the early amateur group of girls couldnt afford to build a banked track, so they chalked the outline of the track on the floor and skated on that: Flat Track Roller Derby was born.

Flat track has taken off around the world, the rules are different, its taken much more seriously than seen in that vid (the LoneStar skaters play to rules very similar to early flat track rules – pillow fights, spank alley etc) Modern flat track – penalties are more like ice hockey, get called for a penalty you spend time in the penalty box, so your team skate short. Fighting will get you expelled from the game in Flat Track.

In the UK its gone from no leagues in 2005 to a least 1 league in virtually every major City in the UK
Can see a map of leagues in Europe here: http://euroderby.org/map.php

I’m a ref with the Rainy City Roller Girls, my wife is on one of the teams within the league – the A team is ranked within the top 10 teams in Europe. The oldest league in the UK, London Brawling, is ranked 15th in the World. At the first World Cup, held in Canada last December, Team England finished 3rd, behind Team Canada and Team USA.

If you want to see what Roller Derby is all about, then watch this: http://wftda.tv/archives/2012-east-region-playoffs/bout-10-philly-london/

This is London Brawling competing in the playoffs for a place in the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association Championships, which pits the top 15 teams in the world against each other.

The playoffs happen next weekend, and will be streamed on WFTDA.tv

If you havent heard of Roller Derby before, at the rate it has grown in the UK over the last 4 years, you soon will!