Nov 14, 2014 | Bout News
Silence of the Jams: The Preview
After the preseason mini-tournament last month, The Minnesota RollerGirls kick off Season Eleven in earnest this Saturday at the fabulous Roy Wilkins Auditorium in St. Paul, MN. As the excitement builds for a close-fought, exciting winter of roller derby action, MNRG has named their next bout after one of the most thrilling films ever made. It’s the Silence of the Jams.
First principles, Clarice. Simplicity.
Four Teams: The Garda Belts, Atomic Bombshells, Dagger Dolls, and Rockits. Jammers and blockers, rookies and veterans, all working together toward one goal. They skate for hours on end at practice. They train on blocking and dodging and sprinting and stopping. But what is the first principle thing they do? What needs do they serve by skating?
They Covet
And how do we begin to covet? Do we seek out things to covet?
No. We begin by coveting the Golden Skate
Ah yes, of course. The team that proves itself the best over the course of the season gets to take home that storied prize. The Garda Belts won it last year, but the Atomic Bombshells proved themselves the team to beat at the preseason tournament. Their team is full of veterans, skaters who have been blocking together and improving together for years. They’ve got fast, nimble jammers like Freeze Baby, Fannie Tanner, and Crowella de Vil. They showed that they can keep fighting all the way down to the wire. But the Gardas won’t give up the title easily, especially with legendary jammer Suzie Smashbox returned in full form. She’s even picked up some new tricks – did you see that spectacular apex jump from the last bout?
It will be left-turns with us too. Quid pro quo
Of course, lets not forget that the “last-place” team in the preseason tournament, The Dagger Dolls, brought the Bombshells to within an inch of their life last month, even leading going into the last jam. They’ll be facing off against the Rockits on Saturday. Expect a jammer shootout between two jammers new to MNRG – Jacked Pipes of the Dagger Dolls and Obscene Sheen of the Rockits both made a big scoring impact for their teams last month. Both teams have done an admirable job over the summer of integrating new talent into the team.
You know what you look like to me, with your Zuca bag and your fancy skates?
In fact, the whole league looks impressive. There’s always a risk that skaters will plateau or decline in their “summer off”, but last month we saw the hard hits and exacting technique that shows that skaters have been putting in the hours at practice to come back even stronger. Even the skaters who had “un-retired” after years off, like Mae Gusta and Suzie Smashbox, looked even faster and strong than when they’d left. That’s the sign of a league that knows how to keep pushing itself further.
A census taker once tried to test me
Of course, what these skaters want more than anything is to skate out from the dark and hear the Screaming of the Fans. If you haven’t got your tickets already, then now is the time. It’ll be killer.