It's Derby Time!

Roller derby, that is. Have you been to a roller derby match? You should go. At least once. I'm not sure if roller derby is considered more of a sport or entertainment. I'd say it's a bit of both. The women were certainly athletic, but with the provocative names, garish make-up and lots of fishnet stockings, I'd say there's a "spectacle" component as well.

The league here is called DC Rollergirls and their motto is "With Liberty and Justice to Brawl." We watched the Cherry Blossom Bombshells take on Scare Force One. Never having been to a roller derby it took a little bit to figure out the scoring. Luckily, tucked into our program was a scoring cheat sheet. A match is divided into jams which last up to two minutes. Five players from each team line up for each jam. Here they are lining up:

It's kind of complicated to tell you what happens after that. But, they skate around, blocking each other, bumping each other off the track, trying to pass, etc. Most of my pictures look like this:

And this:

With less than ten minutes to go, the Bombshells were way ahead and people started to leave. But during the last couple of jams before time ran out, Scare Force One poured it on and tied it up. The Bombshells ended up winning in double overtime. It was exciting even if you didn't know what was going on.

The best part was the crowd. Not a huge crowd, but so into it. If you have a roller derby team near you, check them out. Just once. For fun.