Sean and the roller derby - how it all started
A few years ago I caught some rollerderby on a Sky or cable channel, and didn't really know what was going on. Sometime after that I knew a couple of friends were members of leagues. Then last year it all came together a) with the release of the film "Whip It!" (coming of age story set against the backdrop of women's rollerderby) and b) finally getting to see a bout in London, and thinking "this is really cool, perhaps I can help out somehow".
So in May I went to watch a London Rollergirls practice. Handily one of their practice venues is just round the corner from where I live. I talked to Dangerous Danger, a female referee (most refs are men, but quite a few are women), and she told me that they were looking for NSOs - Non-Skating Officials. These people do jobs that make the games run smoothly - e.g. keeping score, timing penalties, communicating between referees, and timing jams and periods. So I volunteered to do that, and started hanging out at practices.
The next bout was not open to the public, apart from season ticket holders. I had the job of line-up tracking - writing down the players who were participating in that particular jam. Jams are 2 minute sessions where two teams of 5 skate against each other - the "jammer" from each team tries to lap everybody else to score points. But the squad of skaters is more like 14 people, so people aren't usually playing in every jam. Often a good jammer will skate every other jam.
Anyway, I obviously didn't do too much of a bad job, and the next bout was a public one. This time I was score tracking. There are generally 7(!) referees - two of these follow the jammer (point scoring skater) from each team, give her penalties and report her score each time she laps the rest of the pack. I was paired with one of these jam refs and every time his jammer scored points, he would signal the score to me, and I'd record it on my clipboard and pass the score on to the scoreboard keeper. At half-time the two jam refs switch teams to keep things fairer, so I switched teams too and recorded the score for the other team.
The other five refs are divided into inside and outside pack refs - they watch everyone but the jammers. Two of them skate inside the track and watch the front and back of the pack of 8 non-jammer skaters who are called "blockers". The blockers are trying to stop the opposing jammer from passing them, and helping their own jammer to pass the other team. The other three referees watch the pack from the outside of the track, taking it in turns to watch for half a lap.
There was a hiatus in summer, then in the autumn things started again. This time there were regular monthly bouts, there were four teams instead of three, there were two matches per occasion, and the bouts were held at Earl's Court - the previous Tottenham leisure centre location only had a capacity of 500 and was selling out quickly every time.
The first of the three autumn bouts I was score tracking again. Then the second bout clashed with a Saturday night gig my band had promised to do, so I couldn't help out. But the third bout I had a different job again. I was penalty box timing for the jammers.
In roller derby you get minor penalties for some things, and major penalties for worse transgressions. If you collect four minor penalties or one major penalty you have to skate around to the penalty box and sit out for one minute. The staff at the penalty box time each skater and let them know when their time's up and they can rejoin play. For a blocker it's fairly straightforward - they get a minute (or two if they've been extra bad). However, there are other rules designed to make sure you don't have too much time with no jammers on the track, because no team can score without its jammer. So I was following those rules, timing jammers and telling them if they could leave early because the other jammer had just turned up.
That was quite a hectic one - although I'd timed skaters at practice, I hadn't concentrated on just jammers before, and especially in a live bout situation. Still, I'll improve with experience.
My most recent bout was a few days later, and involved yet another job. A team from the LRG recreational (teaching) league were playing a full bout against the rookie players from the year before, who had got places on the main teams but were still fairly new. This time I was jam timing.
This involves a) keeping a 30 minute clock for the two periods, and pausing it for official timeouts, b) liasing with the scoreboard operator to check that the clock they are showing the crowd corresponds to the official time, c) starting each two minute jam with a whistle, to get the pack rolling, d) starting the jammers off with a second whistle (they start after the main pack has crossed the "pivot" line), e) timing the two minute jams and calling the jam off with a whistle after two minuts if the lead jammer hadn't already called it off. (The jammer who laps the pack first with no penalties has the option of terminating the jam early if it's strategically useful to do so). Oh and f) timing 30 seconds between jams while new skaters from each team came onto the track for the next jam, and g) timing 1 minute for time-outs called by the teams.
So quite a lot of stuff to do! However, it was really fun, and the ex-rookies won by about 20 points.
Next bout will be in February and I've made sure the next ones won't clash with any band gigs!
I'm really enjoying this, they're a great bunch of people, and the whole thing has a grass-roots DIY ethic which is really good. Every skater is on a committee of some sort and helps out with various things during a bout, whether it's selling doughnuts, or T-shirts, or being on the door, or being the "wet spot" person who wipes up if a member of the crowd spills something.
Stay tuned for my excursions into actually trying out skating....
So in May I went to watch a London Rollergirls practice. Handily one of their practice venues is just round the corner from where I live. I talked to Dangerous Danger, a female referee (most refs are men, but quite a few are women), and she told me that they were looking for NSOs - Non-Skating Officials. These people do jobs that make the games run smoothly - e.g. keeping score, timing penalties, communicating between referees, and timing jams and periods. So I volunteered to do that, and started hanging out at practices.
The next bout was not open to the public, apart from season ticket holders. I had the job of line-up tracking - writing down the players who were participating in that particular jam. Jams are 2 minute sessions where two teams of 5 skate against each other - the "jammer" from each team tries to lap everybody else to score points. But the squad of skaters is more like 14 people, so people aren't usually playing in every jam. Often a good jammer will skate every other jam.
Anyway, I obviously didn't do too much of a bad job, and the next bout was a public one. This time I was score tracking. There are generally 7(!) referees - two of these follow the jammer (point scoring skater) from each team, give her penalties and report her score each time she laps the rest of the pack. I was paired with one of these jam refs and every time his jammer scored points, he would signal the score to me, and I'd record it on my clipboard and pass the score on to the scoreboard keeper. At half-time the two jam refs switch teams to keep things fairer, so I switched teams too and recorded the score for the other team.
The other five refs are divided into inside and outside pack refs - they watch everyone but the jammers. Two of them skate inside the track and watch the front and back of the pack of 8 non-jammer skaters who are called "blockers". The blockers are trying to stop the opposing jammer from passing them, and helping their own jammer to pass the other team. The other three referees watch the pack from the outside of the track, taking it in turns to watch for half a lap.
There was a hiatus in summer, then in the autumn things started again. This time there were regular monthly bouts, there were four teams instead of three, there were two matches per occasion, and the bouts were held at Earl's Court - the previous Tottenham leisure centre location only had a capacity of 500 and was selling out quickly every time.
The first of the three autumn bouts I was score tracking again. Then the second bout clashed with a Saturday night gig my band had promised to do, so I couldn't help out. But the third bout I had a different job again. I was penalty box timing for the jammers.
In roller derby you get minor penalties for some things, and major penalties for worse transgressions. If you collect four minor penalties or one major penalty you have to skate around to the penalty box and sit out for one minute. The staff at the penalty box time each skater and let them know when their time's up and they can rejoin play. For a blocker it's fairly straightforward - they get a minute (or two if they've been extra bad). However, there are other rules designed to make sure you don't have too much time with no jammers on the track, because no team can score without its jammer. So I was following those rules, timing jammers and telling them if they could leave early because the other jammer had just turned up.
That was quite a hectic one - although I'd timed skaters at practice, I hadn't concentrated on just jammers before, and especially in a live bout situation. Still, I'll improve with experience.
My most recent bout was a few days later, and involved yet another job. A team from the LRG recreational (teaching) league were playing a full bout against the rookie players from the year before, who had got places on the main teams but were still fairly new. This time I was jam timing.
This involves a) keeping a 30 minute clock for the two periods, and pausing it for official timeouts, b) liasing with the scoreboard operator to check that the clock they are showing the crowd corresponds to the official time, c) starting each two minute jam with a whistle, to get the pack rolling, d) starting the jammers off with a second whistle (they start after the main pack has crossed the "pivot" line), e) timing the two minute jams and calling the jam off with a whistle after two minuts if the lead jammer hadn't already called it off. (The jammer who laps the pack first with no penalties has the option of terminating the jam early if it's strategically useful to do so). Oh and f) timing 30 seconds between jams while new skaters from each team came onto the track for the next jam, and g) timing 1 minute for time-outs called by the teams.
So quite a lot of stuff to do! However, it was really fun, and the ex-rookies won by about 20 points.
Next bout will be in February and I've made sure the next ones won't clash with any band gigs!
I'm really enjoying this, they're a great bunch of people, and the whole thing has a grass-roots DIY ethic which is really good. Every skater is on a committee of some sort and helps out with various things during a bout, whether it's selling doughnuts, or T-shirts, or being on the door, or being the "wet spot" person who wipes up if a member of the crowd spills something.
Stay tuned for my excursions into actually trying out skating....