Sat, May 17, 2008
Karyn
"Hoot'n Annie"
Shearer, right,
of the Saddletramps, tries to pass Iron Curtain's Angela "Dot Stoevsky" Bejarano during a last scrimmage before teams take to the ring this weekend for the "Dust Devil" flat-track tournament.
Rich-Joseph Facun / Arizona Daily Star
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Women who elbow in National gathering here spotlights sport's comeback
arizona daily star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 02.23.2006
Scantily clad, colorfully tattooed, pierced and highly mobile girls zip by on roller skates, while a bizarre stream-of-consciousness narration fills the ears.
Then a rock band starts up.
Call it sensory overload: It's Tucson Roller Derby, which will host the first-ever flat-track national championship this weekend, called the "Dust Devil."
From Friday through Sunday about 260 derby players from 20 leagues across the country will come to Tucson for the tourna-ment, crowning a women's flat-track roller derby national champion.
"It's literally the dream come true," said Melissa "Melicious" Joulwan of the Texas Rollergirls in Austin.
Members of the Texas group have been referred to as the "Godmothers of Roller Derby" since the city gave the sport its modern revival about six years ago.
Eventually, the Austin scene spawned two types of roller derby leagues: the banked track, which uses a railed-ring to skate on, and the flat track, which uses almost any surface and no barriers and is played here in the Tucson Roller Derby.
Beginnings in Tucson
"At first, people thought it was a fly-by-night thing," said Tucson "roller girl" Barb Trujillo, 37.
The non-profit Tucson Roller Derby was started with about 13 women in late 2003 by Kim Kysar, 36, who was familiar with the Austin leagues. But she was further inspired when a friend began a derby up north.
"You know, Phoenix could never outdo Tucson," she said.
The Tucson league now has about 60 players and volunteered to host the Dust Devil after a meeting in Chicago with representatives from 20 other American flat-track leagues, which now total about 30 nationwide.
"You put on your skates, and you feel like a superhero," said Phoenix native Natily "Ginger Snap" Blair, 29, of New York City's Gotham Girls.
Appearance is noticeable
Many roller girls bear a distinctive look, sporting knee-high socks, tattoos, short skirts or shorts and pigtails.
"You can usually spot a derby girl," said Tucson roller girl Zoe "Whiskey Mick" O'Reilly, 26.
The nicknames are equally noticeable.
Participants create aliases as an alter ego on the track. Names vary depending on what team they're playing for.
For instance, O'Reilly has also previously gone by the name "Whamma Pavlova" when she played for the Russian-themed Tucson team Iron Curtain and will be known as "Zoe Bowie" when she plays for the Tucson team in this weekend's competition: the Saddletramps.
Roller girls say their on-track persona lets them express themselves in ways they don't normally get to in other settings, whether it's at school, teaching a class, parenting, bartending or doing computer work. It's a celebration of both who they are and of who they aren't.
"I'm a lot nicer to people at work now that I get to hit girls," O'Reilly said.
The alternative look of roller girls is almost an unofficial uniform.
Men who participate in sports put on a uniform and do things they normally wouldn't do, like pat each other on the behind, said Sabrina "Knuckle Sandovitch" Fladness, 25.
Instills confidence
Roller derby is cathartic for some. For Joulwan, roller derby has given her more confidence.
"I'm not a skinny girl," she said, but in roller derby that extra bulk can be an advantage when body-checking a foe.
Being a roller girl is empowering for Tucson's Karyn "Hoot'n Annie" Shearer, 22, who spoke of a girl power different from what the Spice Girls touted years ago.
"We're not pushovers, but we're sexy at the same time," she said.
Roller girls acknowledge and embrace the spectacle, which is something between punk rock and speed-skating, but also stress the reality of the sport.
"We're not strippers on wheels," Joulwan said.
"Our skirts are no shorter than Anna Kournikova's," Blair said, referring to the pro tennis player.
Nothing in roller derby is choreographed: It's full contact. Just ask Tucson's Ashleigh "Randi Canyon" Bennett, 19, who will play this weekend with a broken collarbone suffered during a scrimmage.
Hope for TV presence
Roller derby girls say they want to get the sport on television eventually, preferably for sports station ESPN rather than A&E.
The Arts and Entertainment Network is currently showing a reality show about Texas roller girls. "Rollergirls" is based on the second league that formed in Austin, that of the banked-track-style Texas Roller Derby Lonestar Rollergirls.
Joulwan said producers first approached her flat-track league for the reality show in 2004.
She seriously considered it but passed on the idea, seeking exposure for the sport rather than the women in it.
Such opportunities are likely to continue for roller girls as the sport's popularity grows. It is also one of the reasons the Women's Flat Track Derby Association was formed in 2004 — to provide a united front for the city leagues and keep out entrepreneurs who might exploit the scene.
Roller derby's roots are in a do-it-yourself punk style, something members hope to preserve.
Joulwan said skateboarding and snowboarding are examples of sports that have maintained their essence.
Most roller girls play for the love of the sport, and that camaraderie will bring the 20 derby teams together this weekend.
"It's a good combination of sex and violence," Shearer said.
● Contact reporter Kevin W. Smith at 807-7761 or ksmith@azstarnet.com.
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