Fresh Meat: The What I've Learnt So Far Edition

My last few Fresh Meat posts got caught up in the chaos of my birthday and the essay that got extended   which means I am a little behind with my diary.  Instead of trying to separate out the tons of stuff I have learnt over the last three weeks, extra practices and scrimmages, I decided to treat you all to a list of things I have learnt so far:

I am capable of more than I expected
If you had told me a few months back that I would be skating backwards, taking hits and even jumping, I would've laughed in your face.  Being chronically clumsy means I had no real skating expectations.  I thought I'd go for a few practices, take a fall and then chicken out.  Or even worse, not be able to stay upright at all!  Instead I am improving, gaining confidence and falling over (and over and over) and loving every second of it.  Exceeding your own expectations is a pretty great feeling!

Derby is a real sport and fitness is important
This might sound like an obvious point but I was so caught up in the names and the outfits and the skates and, and, and...that I didn't actually realise the levels of fitness required.  It was only on bootcamp day, when we did off-skate fitness, that I realised that I need to up my game!  Skating around the track 5 times is one thing but running around it?  Not even remotely the same!!

Derby girls are awesome girls
As someone who has never really been awesome at making friends, the social aspect of roller derby made me very nervous.  Would I fit in?  Would they like me?  Would I be picked last?  Lame I know but these were very real concerns the day I decided to attend my first practice.  I can honestly say that these worries were all in vain.  I have been made to feel so welcome by so many people and I've been lucky enough to do my fresh meat training with some of the most awesome girls.  There is nothing like falling over and bumping into people to get you bonding.

Anyway, what I am trying to get at with this post is that if you've been thinking about trying derby, go ahead!  Yes there are frustrations and a very real chance of injury but the people you meet and the lessons you learn make it all worth it!!

Fresh Meat: Week Ten

For those who don't know, roller derby is actually a contact sport.  You have to learn how to take hits and give them.  I don't mean punch in the face kind of hits but rather legal blocks and checks that both help to clear the way for your own jammer and prevent the other team's jammer from getting through.  It's part of the reason that you wear a helmet, tons of padding and spend so much time learning how to fall.  It's also part of the reason that I went on a very unlikely mouth guard shopping trip the other day.  Never in my wildest dreams did I consider the possibility that I would own a mouth guard.  Especially a pink one!!

Anyway, as you might have guessed, we started learning how to block and check on Thursday night.  This is where derby stance becomes super important because the lower your centre of gravity, the harder it is for someone to knock you over.  There is also no limit to how low to the ground you can skate.

We started by standing still and staying that way while being hip checked by some of the more experienced girls.  We also learnt the correct way to check someone else.  It's all about momentum and learning how to keep your elbows out of the equation.  I found it super hard to co-ordinate the blocking and the skating and the not tripping my partner so I can't even imagine trying to do this at any kind of speed!!  I guess that comes with practice!

Fresh Meat: Week Nine

This has been a busy week for roller derby.  For the first time since I have started, I have had 3 skate practices:  an extra lesson on Tuesday, normal training on Thursday and bootcamp on Friday.  Here are my day by day highlights:

Tuesday

Hooray for extra practices, especially after I mentioned that I felt like I was in need of some extra skate time.  We went through all our level one skills again which was a great refresher.  It's amazing how quickly you forget things when you are not doing them all the time (ahem, knee falls).  I almost got my crossovers right tonight which makes my heart happy!!  I have been practicing moving my one foot in front of the other and it looks like it's starting to pay off.  I also nailed transition skating.  This is where you skate forwards and, without stopping, turn yourself around until you are skating backwards.  It's such a great feeling when you finally manage to get a more complex skill right.  Needless to say, I headed home with a smile on my face.

Thursday

Every time I put on my skates, I am presently surprised to find my self just a little more stable, a little more capable and a little more confident.  Before I used to put on my skates and feel like I had to relearn what we covered previously before I could even focus on anything else.  Now, not so much!!  Even skating the opposite direction around the track is easier than before!!  Anyhoo, tonight we practiced pace lines and weaving.  When I weave through a pace line I am okay but when I weave through cones, I lose all momentum and come to a grinding halt!  We also did more working on whips and pushes.  I must be honest, I am a little intimidated by these.  I'm still trying to work out how much force to put behind my pushes and whips.  Also, I have weakling arms that need a bit more muscle!!

Friday

Wow! It's Sunday today and I am still recovering from bootcamp. My legs are dead but honestly, I learnt so much that it's totally worth every ache and pain I accumulated.  We started the evening with fitness which was nearly the end of me.  I can't believe that there is such a big difference between skating around the track 5 times and jogging around it.  Between the running and the lunging and the squatting and the burpees, I had to resurrect my asthma pump and inhale a bottle of water.  Once we were back on our skates Pippa, aka Madame Gutterfly, took us through footwork.  We practiced walking, backwards, forwards and sideways with skates on and then sideways and backwards.  It's not easy that's for sure!

We also practiced jumping, pack work and stopping and got some excellent tips on our derby stance and general skating form.  The biggest things for me though were the crossover tips (her tips totally changed my approach and I actually managed a crossover on a few occasions...yay) and the blocking.  Up until Friday we hadn't even started blocking yet.  I can remember the name of the movement she taught us first but she basically taught us blocking step by step which I found really useful.  And she didn't just teach us how to block but also how to keep ourselves upright.  I actually can't wait to put all this extra knowledge into practice!!  There was also some exciting news that came out of bootcamp but I'll fill you guys in when it's all official:)

Fresh Meat: Week Eight

This week's Fresh Meat post is a little late...sorry about that.  I haven't been a very motivated blogger this past week, hence the late Sunday evening catching up.  Anyhoo, this week we got our first taste of what skating in Durban's hot and steamy summer is going to be like.  There was a major cold front making it's way towards us so Thursday was exceptionally warm.  Needless to say, things were very sweaty...ugh.   I am going to have to invest in some comfy shorts in the next few weeks to ensure I don't pass out from heat exhaustion!

On to the skills!  We started off with warm up laps as per usual.  I am slowly starting to get the hang of skating in the opposite direction although I did find myself going right off the track a few times.  I am still battling with the crossovers but after practicing crossing over our feet while standing I almost nailed it on our next set of laps.  Definitely feeling like I need to be putting extra practice time in just wish I had more time to do it!!

Tonight was the first time we learnt how to do pushes and whips.  The push is pretty self explanatory.  You skate up behind your teammate and give them an extra boost by pushing them.  A whip is what the movie Whip It takes its name from and it involves transfering your speed to your teammate through a series of different movements.  Here are some examples:

Obviously it's really important to warn the person that you are going to push them or use a whip because otherwise there is a chance you'll both go flying and not in the way you intended!  I need to learn to lean forward more in this case because I nearly feel on my ass twice!!  I think they'll be a lot of fun once I get more used to the sudden burst of speed.

We finished off the night with a pace line.  I like these a lot.  It's fun to be able to practice weaving in and out of other people and to learn to regulate your speed when there is more at stake (aka crashing into the person in front of you and thereby setting off the domino effect).

I am looking forward to next week a lot.  We have our normal Thursday practice and a special Bootcamp on Friday night!! Yay!!

Fresh Meat: Week Seven

I am proud to announce that I can skate towards a cone, jump over it and land again without damaging myself!  Honestly, aside from the fact that I can now skate, I think this is my proudest derby moment to date.  When our coach said we were going to do jumps last night my heart sank a little.  I really felt like I had been sucking all evening.  During our warm-up laps I STILL couldn't get crossovers right.  Something about this skill completely freaks me out.  The first night we tried them I fell and fell and fell.  Now whenever I work up the nerve to try again, I chicken out halfway through.  It's more than a little frustrating.  If you're curious about what a crossover actually is, check out this video:

She actually gives some pretty decent advice, maybe I should try it?  Anyhoo, after laps we practiced skating on one foot.  I don't know what it is about my feet but they will not go in a straight line.  I feel so unstable when I lift my foot that I try and compensate immediately and throw off my centre of gravity.  This means that even though I can skate on one foot, I go off in all sorts of crazy directions.  Not good.  In light of this, you can imagine why my heart sank at the mention of jumping.  Bleh!  We started by jumping over a line on the track and it wasn't too bad.  When she asked who felt confident enough to jump a cone, my friend Liz suggested we just go for it to see what happens.  Best idea of the night!!  Managing that jump not once but several times (AND managing to fall correctly when I did eventually fall) totally made up for my earlier frustrations. 

Another cool thing about last night?  I can finally feel a change in my fitness levels.  The hour we practice always passes very fast but before I was completely wiped out at the end.  Now, I feel like I could go for longer and I feel more energetic than before.  So not only am I learning awesome new skills but it's paying off in other ways too.  Yay roller derby!!

Fresh Meat: Week Six

So, no Fresh Meat for me tonight.  It's my very awesome friend Shannon's birthday today (HAPPY BIRTHDAY FRIEND) so after varsity, I am heading straight to her birthday drinks.  To make up for the lack of Fresh Meat shenanigans, here is some more detail about the skills I need to master over the next little while.  Tonight's subject, recovery tactics:

Skater must perform the following falls safely, correctly and naturally.  Skaters must be able to slide into knee contact with the floor rather than crashing onto pads.  Slides should be performed from a brisk pace without using hands or flailing arms.  Recovery to a normal skating pace should be smooth and immediate unless noted otherwise.

Knee Taps (Left and Right)

• Performs each knee tap without coming to a complete stop.
• Taps a single knee without breaking normal skating stride.
• Recovers from knee tap without using hands to get up.
• Performs two consecutive knee taps in stride, with low recovery.

Double Knee Slides

• Knees do not make contact with the ground at exact same time.
• Returns to active skating within three seconds.
• Recovers without using hands to get up.
• Momentum used to initiate the slide is continued into the recovery to normal skating motion.

As I mentioned last week, we've already started with the double knee slides.  In fact, that was one of the skills I learnt during my first round of Fresh Meat.  All the other falls we learnt are no longer applicable though which is a pity, some of them were really fun.  Anyhoo, if you want to view the full list of skills, click here.

Fresh Meat: Week 5

Biggest lesson I learnt this week?  Skating the other direction is hard.  We started off practice by doing 10 warm up laps in one direction and then 10 in the other direction.  Going anti-clockwise is easy because my right leg is used to guiding me around corners but going clockwise is ridiculous.  First off, my left leg is totally uncoordinated and cannot function as a guide.  On top of that, my right leg wants to take over which meant I went off the track at every single corner.  Can we say frustration?  Even sticky skating feels unnatural skating clockwise.  Bleh.  I'm adding that to my list of things Monique needs to practice!!

After laps, I was just about ready to go home.  I know that I sound like a broken record but skating the opposite direction left me with jelly legs.  Did I mention it was hard?  Anyhoo, after a quick water break we moved on to skating around obstacles.  Our coach for the even placed some cones on the ground and we had to skate around them first using both feet to guide us and then sticky skating slalom style.  This was much easier than anticipated and a nice break after the laps.  In other words, we got a chance to catch our breath.

Last night also included more backwards skating practice.  I first started skating backwards by accident at the stadium one day and I haven't had any trouble with this skill since.  I do find it a little had to pick up speed but once I'm going, it's all good.  Got to remember to get my centre of gravity right though, I almost face-planted twice!!

Next up, knee slides.  This is a skill I learnt during my first Fresh Meat run through so it was just a matter of getting the movements right again.  I rather like this skill because sliding across the floor on both knees feels pretty damn cool.

We ended practice with planking, which is basically the worst exercise ever.  30 seconds normal plant, 30 seconds left side plank and 30 seconds right side plank.  By the time I got home I was super achy and super exhausted and all essay writing plans flew out the window in favour of my couch and coffee.   That may sound like a post of complaint but I assure you it's not.  While this may be hard (especially for a lazy bastard like me) it's still an enormous amount of fun.

Fresh Meat: Week Four

So this week's Fresh Meat post is a little late.  I have had one of those weeks all week and by the time I got home yesterday all I wanted to do was sit on the couch and watch The Walking Dead. I am trying to catch up on Season 3 before Season 4 starts and each episode leaves me just a little more addicted.  I love that show...but back to the topic at hand.  This week I took a Berocca before I left work to go to varsity which meant that by the time I got to derby, I had a lot more energy than I usually do.  For those of you who don't know, on a Thursday I go from work to my two hour lecture and then all the way back to Hillcrest for practice.  It's all worth it but it makes for a very long day.  Anyway, the extra energy helped a lot because I wasn't nearly as pooped by the end of practice as I usually am!

My skates when they were still shiny and new...

After doing several warm-up laps around the track we practiced some more t-stops and plow stops.  There is no better motivation to stop before the line that the threat of crunches or jumping jacks in skates to make you want to stop!  Unfortunately I was slightly over cautious which earned me the same punishment as failing stop...oh well...at least it was crunches.

Next it was backwards skating which is much easier than it sounds.  We paired up and took turns pushing each other backwards and trusting our partners to stop us before the line.  The hardest part was keeping in a straight line but luckily we found a line on the floor to follow.

Thursday night was also the first night we skated in a proper pack.  We broke up into two teams of nine or ten and then skated slowly around the track as close to our team mates as possible...basically like a big blob.  When our coach called out touch, we had to be close enough to reach out and touch two people without moving.  When she called out touch again, we had to have moved around enough so that we could touch two different people.  It's one way to get to know the other skaters and resulted in a fair amount of laughter.  I must admit that our amoeba did super well...we kept together, kept our derby stance and managed to work out a system to move each other around.  It was an excellent exercise in team work.

We ended of the evening with more stopping practice and the surprising news that we had basically been examined that evening and that we had checked the first box in our fresh meat training....yay!  Next week we are starting some new skills and I am probably more excited than necessary:)

Fresh Meat: Week Three

At gym this week, I somehow managed to offend a muscle at the back of my leg.  It wasn't bad, just stiff.  Then, on Thursday morning, I went to the post office to fetch my books for varsity and slipped on the stairs and managed to upset the muscle even more.  So much more, that I limped around the office for the rest of the day.  Long story short, I decided that skating (and falling) on Thursday night would've been a poor choice and instead came home to study.  Seeing that I don't really have an update to share, I thought I'd give you guys an idea of the some of the skills that we need to learn in order to be considered bout ready.  First up, Basic Skating Skills:

Skating Posture

• Bends at knees and hips with shoulders back.
• Demonstrates stability, with centre of gravity down and forward.
• Demonstrates ability to skate low with bent, flexible knees.

Stride

• Uses steady, confident, fluid strides. 
• Uses both feet to push forward on straightaways. 
• Shifts weight completely from foot to foot without stumbling.

Crossovers

• Performs smooth crossovers while skating straightaways and track turns. 
• Uses both feet to push during crossovers. 
• Performs reverse crossovers, crossing over the right foot to the outside of the track.

Speed and Endurance

• Skates at least 27 laps around regulation track within five minutes.
• Accelerates from a standstill to complete one lap within 13 seconds.

Stops

• Skater must come to a complete stop from a brisk pace within 4 seconds using proper form and without losing balance.

T-stop

• Balancing weight on one leg, other foot is turned at a 90 degree angle so the heel or arch of the turned foot is aligned with the heel of the other foot.
• Maintaining balance on one leg, applies smooth pressure with the turned foot using the two outside wheels, the two front wheels or all four wheels (does not use only the two inside wheels).

Plow Stop

• Turns one or both feet so toes are pointing in and heels are pointing out.
• Upon completion of stop, feet are in a position that would allow resumed skating (feet are not spread so wide apart that skater must adjust stance before resuming skating).

Other Skating Skills

• Performs one-foot glides with each foot for the length of the track turn and straightaway with good balance.
• In low stance with one foot completely off the floor, able to balance weight over the other foot for at least 5 seconds.
• Maintains speed sufficient to complete glide and does not flail limbs.
• Propels self while keeping all eight wheels on the floor.
• Moves easily and fluidly from one side of the track to the other.
• Performs smooth, quick lateral cuts, crossing the track at least four times on each straightaway and at least three times on each track turn.
• Backwards skating within track boundaries.
• Maintains moderate pace skating backward around the entire track.

This is just a small sample of what I need to perfect over the next three months.  You can view the full list of skills here if you are interested. 

Fresh Meat: Week One & Two

Roller Derby is not something I ever imagined myself doing.  In fact, until a friend joined Durban Roller Derby, I didn't even know it existed in Durban.  After some explaining (and the watching of Whip It) and a lot of persistence from said friend, I finally took myself to a practice.  I went through a 6 week Fresh Meat program but alas, I wasn't quite ready for the exam.  That, combined with changes to the WFTDA minimum skills requirements meant I got a chance to join the new improved 3 month program as a rookie. It was just as well because although I am slowly getting the hang of it, I am still really new to skating. Before July, the last time I had skates on my feet was sometime around my 10th birthday!!  Anyhoo, rambling aside, I thought that it'd be fun to track my progress here and prove that if I can do it, anyone can.

Week One

My lectures this semester have moved to a Thursday night, the same night as derby, so I was a little late for the very first practice. Luckily the part that I missed only involved finding your feet and warming up so I didn't miss too much. The main focus for the evening t-stops and sticky skating. While I have sticky skating (skating without lifting your feet) more or less down, I suck at t-stops. My right leg cooperates but my left leg will have none of it. To do a t-stop, you have to pick up your one foot and drag it sideways behind you to stop. When we skated at the stadium I was managing to get it right about 90% of the time but on the track, with a different surface, I felt like I was starting from scratch again. I definitely feel like a need to practice these a lot more. In fact, I feel like I need to practice everything a lot more instead of just sitting idle between Thursdays. For the first time, we skated a pace line which involves skating in a line round the track and maintaining the pace and distance of the skater in front. We had tried this at the stadium the Sunday before and, although the idea of skating close to someone else initially terrified me, it was fun. I didn't do too badly and managed to keep up without falling which was great. When we started doing squats and footwork, I realized that the truck on my one skate was loose and, in the process of taking them off and adjusting/tightening both skates, I missed the balance of practice.

Week Two

This week I managed to make it to practice more or less on time despite the fact that my lecture ran over time. We did some more sticky skating to warm up which is cool, I am really getting the hang of it. I can definitely feel that my fitness is not up to scratch though. The combination of derby stance (aka squatting) and using momentum to propel yourself is hard on your inner thighs and lower back. After a couple of trips round the track we did some foot work. This involves being able to take steps with your skates on. I can manage the sideways and forwards moving but trying to step backwards is not easy at all. It feels like you are guaranteed to fall!!  

After practicing some plow stops and t-stops, we started learning how to do crossovers. This involves you picking up one foot and placing it in front of the other when skating around corners. It is hard. I managed to get it right for about 5 seconds and then I started falling. And falling. And falling some more. Seriously, its was the most (and hardest) I've fallen since I started and I'm amazed that I didn't hurt myself badly. One thing it taught me was the importance of derby stance because I wasn't skating in the right position which meant I fell backwards instead of forwards EVERY TIME. Oh well, thats how you learn right? I definitely need to invest in some Arnica though...

So thats what I have been up to the last two weeks. In future, I will aim for a post a week and I'll try and get it out on a Friday. Have any of you guys tried roller derby? Let me know what your experience was like in the comments. 

P.S. If you are in the Durban area and want to get involved then this Thursday (15/08) is the last opportunity join this batch of Fresh Meat.  Check out the Durban Derby Facebook page for more details.