ALOHA!! WELCOME TO ROLLER DERBY!!
I start up this blog every 3 months and run it in conjunction with Pacific Roller Derby's Fresh Meat training program for incoming roller derby hopefuls so that they can have a running log of the skills taught. Sometimes I include visual aides and links to helpful online resources that assist with learning skills. If you are with another league outside of PRD, you are of course welcome to this material. I am dubbed the "Safety Queen" because I try to emphasize best practices with training and gear, and that starts at the very beginning. Start with proper fitness and always consult your physician before starting a new training regimen if you have health conditions you are worried about.
You know your own body better than your derby trainer and I am not a certified personal trainer. I don't know your medical history and if you drop to the ground at a practice I will do okay because I'm good in crisis situations and had you sign a waiver that you hopefully put down a valid emergency contact name for, but beyond that, you will get no money if you sue me because I have none. I was a lifeguard for 10+ years, however, and I can do CPR and first aid purty dern good. That said, please try not to get hurt. It makes my heart hurt, and I die a little inside when it happens :)
I love you all and want you to enjoy this wonderful sport as much as I do, and so do all of the other skaters that skate for this league. They will all happily assist you with as much feedback as they can give you... with varying degrees of accuracy. Be sure to
LISTEN TO YOUR BODY. If a skill does not feel good or you feel really unsafe, you may not be ready or you may not be doing it right. GET MULTIPLE OPINIONS. Some girls have been playing for 8 years (me), some girls have been playing for 3 months even though they love the sport and they are super amazing and helpful. Some girls know a ton of stuff about gear and have a lot of it, and some people use gear until it dies a painful death (me). Every skater has a skill they are great at, and that skater has a skill they are terrible at, too! We are ALL working to improve on something and so it's super important to build each other up.
The competition starts later, and even then we still have beers together afterwards. It's not like other sports. Now is the time to support each other. We don't tear each other down. Reach out, get together, carpool, have lunch after, do group orders on your gear. These are your teammates!
Week 1:
Basic Stops: T-Stops, which look like an "L," really. Your stationary leg knee is slightly bent, your other leg picks up off the ground, then you apply all four wheels of that leg to the ground until the heel of that leg come to the heel of your standing stationary leg. Try it while holding onto a wall to start. Keep your eyes up. Keep your arms in. Plow Stops, or Snow Plows, starting with "Watermelons." Rolling forward, knees point out, toes point out, knees point in, toes point in.With this motion your inside edges should dig into the ground and your heels should feel like they are "kicking" out. Your butt sticks out with this. As tempting as it is, your elbows do NOT stick out with this.
Basic Falls: Single Knee Taps are kind of a fall, but really they are more of a balance check. Don't put your hands down on the ground if you can help it.We think of this fall as, "just kidding! I was thinking about falling, but I changed my mind!" In derby, if you can avoid falling, it's a great idea. If you are on the ground, you aren't helping your teammates and you are not helping score points. Therefore, you should spend as little time down there as you possibly can. The faster you get up, the better. Hence, a knee tap. Double Knee Taps, same concept. Tap one knee, then the other. In both cases you are gently touching the ground with your knee but not slamming into it because you don't want to dislocate your kneecap. Right? Right. We talked about Falling Small. Falling Small is falling as small as you possibly can in a teeny tiny ball to avoid being run over or avoiding any sort of collision or pileup on the track. Why would you want to trip all of your teammates? That's right. You wouldn't. RULE #1 IN ROLLER DERBY: DON'T BE A DOUCHEBAG.
Basic Jumps: We jumped over some cones. We talked about sitting in our invisible derby chairs, engaging our core muscle group to stay low and tight, and bringing our knees up to our chest as we jumped. We worked on keeping our arms in as we jumped. When anyone felt unstable, they got lower and leaned forward so that they could regain control of themselves. Everyone was able to jump over at least 2 of the cones, which was totally awesome for the first day of derby practice!
Basic Weaves: We weaved around cones. They were about 10 feet apart and we learned how to use our body and our knees to veer around an obstacle without using our arms as an aide. Everyone got better at keeping their eyes up and looking towards the next obstacle, like when driving a car; you never look straight down in front of your bumper when you're driving a car...you look ahead.
Week 2:
Repeat of week one drills, with a few additions. We will go in a similar fashion and I will be tacking on new drills each week as we progress. Week two included:
Basic Stride: Pushing straight off to the side, not behind you, helps you to gain speed and momentum as you skate forward. The longer your wheels are on the ground, the more traction they get, the more power you get, the more speed you get. This is why a good, strong, push makes all the difference! We practiced this
after we had tried crossovers, because I wanted you to get the feeling of the crossover first before you had any momentum. I only did that because some of you are very new on skates and don't know what to do with the speed. :) We practiced the basic push on both sides, both standing still holding onto the wall (to see how far out to the side we could stretch our extended leg while still keeping our wheels on the ground) as well as across the rink. Doing it both ways helps you understand how much more you can get out of it.
You must bend the leg you have your weight distributed over for your pushing leg to fully be able to extend. Derby skaters should rarely, if ever, be standing straight upright (doing so usually makes you an easy target for a hit, anyways).
Basic Crossover: We learned crossovers skating both derby and "non" derby direction, or counterclockwise and clockwise. In a crossover motion, the crossover leg is picking up out of the stride and crossing in front of the weight bearing leg. We squared our shoulders to the inside of the circle so that as we crossed over we made a neverending circle. I'm sure everyone got dizzy. With that motion, you then end up distributing all of your weight onto that leg, and the other leg will then do what is called an "underpush." We have not learned about the technicality of that portion of the crossover because sometimes it is difficult to digest in the first few weeks of derby, but don't worry... we will get there soon enough. For now, practice the motion that we learned of having one leg picking up and coming over the top.
Cone Weaves: Tighter, faster. Yeah, baby! Week two! We picked up the pace and got lower, weaved tighter, kept our knees together and our arms in protecting our boobs. This allowed for a faster response in our trucks as we zipped through cones that were 5-ft apart. Woohoo!
Intro To Paceline: We lined up arms length apart and played follow the leader every which way around the rink. If the person in front got too fast, we had to speak up and yell "slow down!" or "speed up" if it got bunchy. We had to use our T-stops to work on speed control. As each leader dropped to the back and a new leader started, I sometimes had them lead everyone with "fast feet" or little foot shuffles to get people to pay attention and work together. When you play derby you must learn how to be a part of a team and communicate as a team. Quiet people aren't effective. Gotta SPEAK UP! haha
