Roller Derby Power Jam Explained

I was just explaining to Celia Graves why I won’t be scrimmaging tonight.  It’s so frustrating, encountering one injury after another.  I completely understand why some girls quit–why they decide they can’t hack it, or whatever.

Good thing for me is that I’m not some girls.  I don’t quit on the things I love.

While I don’t love getting hurt, I do love derby, and I *am* healing.  If I were really torn up and needed a doctor or surgery or whatever, I’d probably be off skates entirely, then God only knows how I’d feel about skating.  But being able to skate and strengthen my ligaments while they heal seems to be working for me–even if it is hard to be patient about it.

Last Monday I scrimmaged and only lasted a couple of jams before I twisted my leg/knee/ligament (whatever) and had to quit.  The day before, I’d landed on it hard and been fine.  (Coincidentally, yesterday I landed on it hard and it was fine.)  But scrimmages are a lot rougher–we definitely throw our bodies a lot harder than when we are just doing drills–and my knee/leg/whatever just isn’t totally ready for that yet.

So…tonight I watch.  I’d skate if we were doing drills, but I don’t think we are.  So I’m just going to take my laptop and work on Troll or Derby some more.  I’m so behind on that right now!  But trying to stay positive.

Last night I dreamed of playing freeze tag on skates.  We didn’t actually do that yesterday, but we were about to, when Joe got to practice.

We used to play freeze tag & dodgeball once in awhile on Sundays.  That was a lot of fun.

Skills and drills and races and all that are good, but once in awhile it’s nice just to be silly.  It keeps things light, makes everyone feel happier, forget how tired or sore or achy they are.

This Saturday in Indy there’s an open skate w/ the Circle City Socialites.  If I can, I might get up that way.  Nothing firm right now, but I thought it would be fun.  I’m sure I’ll be Christmas shopping over the weekend, so why not just head up that way?

Speaking of Christmas, if you want a bearings necklace for someone, I’m still selling those.  Just let me know.  Right now I’ve got some cool rough/weathered looking bearings that are trimmed w/ red paint.  Oh, how festive.  You don’t have to go through etsy if you just want to email me or whatevs.

Well, back to my mss.  I’m trying to write a novel about derby that doesn’t suck.  Hoo boy.  Wish me luck on that one.

Well, at least it’s better than the first one.  Music this time from Minus-One (The Kids Don’t Skate Here) and nice rage (between dusk and twilight).

We’re still not that entertaining, but we’re working on it.

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I actually won some races last night.  I’m not bragging about my take-offs or anything–I think I need to work a lot more on taking off on my toe stops–but it’s all in the start, in those things.  If you can beat them at the start, you can sprint to the first cone and then it’s pretty much over because they’ll lose speed behind you on the turn.

Skate L. Vice and Hildy and I were the pack for five races, and Skate L. figured out how to get next to me on the second cone by the 4th and 5th races, but then she nominated me to race w/ the fast girls (ugh) and I pretty much got creamed in that pack.

Oh, well!  At least it was cool that I got to skate with the jammers for a few laps, huh?

You never know, once my latest derby ailment is healed, I could be headed for Glory, after all.  (roffle)  I would settle just for earning a slot on the roster this spring.

And for right now, I would settle for being able to fully bend my right knee.

I like the races, but by the time we were 2/3 done with them, I was completely exhausted for the night.

We finished the evening with 15 min. of calisthentics, and I swear to God, I thought I was going to pee my tights during one of the exercises.  I wonder if Depends would consider marketing a line of disposable underwear for RollerMoms like me.  Three babies does not = a rugged bladder.  It’s more like a ragged bladder.

Today I’m tired but nowhere near as sore as I was two weeks ago when I came back from a mere two week break.  I’m healing faster by skating instead of sitting around.

Thank God for Food For Thought and Winrgy!  They are keeping me alive today.  Joost tells me they are changing the formula.  I hope it’s even more like Tang than it is now.  This stuff is the best.

So, I was just browsing flickr looking for photos from nationals, and I ran across a photo of two derby girls I like: Kamikaze Kim and Pia Mess.

Kim was the bench coach for TeamMilf, which was awesome, because I was too overwhelmed to pull it off (I don’t know why I thought I could both skate and call off the line-ups–I guess I didn’t really think I’d have to skate all that much!).  She was really, really cool and had a way of making me get back out there and skate even when I could not *breathe*.  She and Sadistic Sadie were great to skate/work with during that mini-bout.  I know it was only 30 min long but it meant a lot to me!

And then there is Pia, who has helped me with vitamins, fighting muscle fatigue, and has even offered to come to DCRG and lead a workshop if we would host her.  She has a great attitude and spirit!

And here they are, going one-on-one:

That’s not even from nationals, it’s just something I ran across.  This is from Battle Royale in Oct. 08, Bay Area DG vs. Duke City.

One of the things I love about roller derby in its current stage is the access newbs like me have to vets like them.  I mean, it’s truly amazing.  We are so lucky to have things like the net and RollerCon and stuff where we can meet people from all over, who have tons of experience, strength, and guidance to give.  I think it makes our sport move faster, develop quicker, you know?I could go on at length about the development of sport in the technology age, but I shall refrain, as I have werkz to do and all that rot. 

In case you got sleepy and missed the final, you can replay it here.

Here are some neat quotes I found on coaches today:

“A coach is someone who can give correction without causing resentment.”
~John Wooden

You are only as good as the coach thinks you are.
~Brian Williams

A life of frustration is inevitable for any coach whose main enjoyment is winning.
~Chuck Noll

The fewer rules a coach has, the fewer rules there are for players to break.
~John Madden

My job as a coach is to see more in others than they do themselves.
~Pat Summitt

I was just thinking of our coaches and thought I’d look and see if I could find anything inspirational. I do love me some quotes.

For those who might be wondering, I am still working on my knee. It *does* help it heal faster when I skate, as long as I don’t take a weird fall on it. It’s all in how it gets twisted.

There is a natural/wholistic doc in Louievilla I might go see if I’m not 100% by Mid-December. Until then, I’m not going to try scrimmaging again, as much as I’d like to. I’m feeling like I’m letting people down when I get hurt, so there’s really no point in getting out there to scrimmage until I know my knee won’t hurt like that anymore.

So, for now, lots of vitamins (thanks, Joost!), as much regular skating as I can work in, and as many of the drills as I can do without aggravating this darn knee!

What’s new with you?

We made the TV Monday.

I haven’t been skating much!  It seems like I’ve only had my skates on about once every two weeks, and it’s been awful.  My knee’s pretty  much better–good enough to skate on, as long as I don’t go flying from some big hit–so tonight I’m excited to go and get my butt kicked at Mojo’s endurance practices.  This day has been so busy, I hope I find time to eat before then.  Lately it seems like I can’t fit in everything I need to do, let alone everything I want to do.  But that somehow makes every chance I get to skate that much sweeter, you know?