LA Roller Derby Comes to Australia
Roller Derby Gets Extreme in Sydney Australia
It’s not just Roller Derby, apparently. It’s the world’s first Roller Derby Extreme (RDX) and it’s bringing banked track roller derby back to Australia after 30 years.
It was my first ever roller derby event and it only took me five minutes to become mesmerized. The venue was fully set up for entertainment sport, and I felt like being on set of a super charged boxing match with a touch of night club atmosphere. The MC of the night was Dumptruck, well known roller derby commentator shipped in all the way from the United States to add to the authenticity of the event.
Roller derby isn’t a major sport in Australia yet but with the new rules and track introduced by Roller Derby Extreme, I can see its appeal and potential.
Australia Combat Skating on the Banked Track
It’s not just about pushing people over; the sport is all in the tactics, or as Dumptruck puts it, it’s like “full contact chess.” The track itself is custom made for this tour out of 12 tonnes of reinforced steel. It is no wonder the word ‘extreme’ was used many times throughout the night.
I was witnessing the clash between banked track queens, the LA Derby Dolls, and the New York Gotham Girls, the current world champions of the flat track. The competition was fierce. There were fists, shoulders and legs everywhere and I found myself cheering at every jam break and winching at every fall. It was exciting.
LA Roller Derby has the all the Names
Mind you, I was quite happy being in the audience. There were skaters with names like Fisti Cuff, Suzy Hotrod, Bombshell Betty and Laguna Beyatch, I wouldn’t want to mess with anyone on that track. The teams also picked four Australian skaters to participate on this tour, and I was proud to say that Australians can skate.
LA Roller Derby Coming to Melbourne and Brisbane, Australia, too
Roller Derby fans can still catch the shows in Melbourne (23 Nov) and Brisbane (25 Nov).
Visit Ticketek for details: premier.ticketek.com.au
Story by Amy Huang
Based in Sydney, Australia, Amy Huang is a writer stuck in the corporate world. A Business Analyst by profession, she works her life around travelling and has managed to squeeze in postgraduate studies in writing somewhere in between. Amy met her husband in 2006 while working on a community development project in Peru, and the travel-holic pair celebrated their love by getting married in Vanuatu in 2010. Amy keeps a blog on various travel topics at www.travelstring.com that might even include la roller derby in Australia.
I have to admit I have checked out the Derby Dolls and have had a blast and remember all the times I visited with my drunken father at the old Olympic Auditorium in Los Angeles, over thirty years ago.
I enjoyed it. However didn’t expect it to be scary! Just kidding, there were elements of violence though…