Image courtesy of ARRG
The penultimate bout of the Auld Reekie Roller Girls Home Season is coming up.
The bout takes place at Meadowbank Sports Centre,London Road,Edinburgh on Saturday the 8th of March.Doors open at 2pm and entry is £7 on the day or £5(plus booking fee) in advance.
Auld Reekie Roller Girls present the second bout of this years Home Season,with a match between The Cherry Bombers and The Skatefast Club.
The bout takes place at Meadowbank Sports Centre,London Road,Edinburgh on Saturday the 16th of February.Doors open at 2pm and entry is £7 on the day,or £5(plus booking fee) in advance.
More details at the Facebook event page.
Cherry Bombers Best Blocker Maulibu Barbie watches out for the Leithals’ Sharlotte Fever, jamming.
Saturday 19th of January saw the first public bout in Scotland played under the new WFTDA rules. Most famously, these rules remove minor penalties in favour of a streamlined officiation process where only major penalties can be awarded; however, they also make a host of other changed, including starting both the pack and the jammers on the same single starting whistle.
Auld Reekie started their home season last year in the first third of the year as, amongst other things, a way to warm up after the Christmas/Hogmanay break, but the timing this year has been particularly advantageous, giving them also a chance to get more practice with the new rules before bouting against other leagues.
This first bout saw last home season winners, the nautical/steampunk themed Leithal Weapons, up against “zombie highschool” themed Cherry Bombers. Both teams were playing with a reduced roster, with the Bombers particularly affected, down to only 9 skaters, and one of their star jammers, Circuit Breaker, suffering from the flu. The skate-out can be found here.
From the start, the Leithal Weapons pulled out an initial advantage, ARRG star jammer Admiral Attackbar (11:11) and vice-captain Alma Geddon (42) both scoring in the initial jams, to bring the score after the first 4 minutes to a 13 to nil lead.
Nevertheless, 13 points is nothing at the start of a bout, and the Bombers looked like fighting right back when new skater Para’beat’em’all (62) took lead jammer in the very next jam… only to pick up a track cut major during her scoring pass just before trying to call the jam off! With the power-jam for Leithals new skater Sharlotte Fever (1924) to exploit, things went from bad to worse for the Bombers, a chain reaction of penalties resulting in, at one point, only Teenie Bash (208), ex of Fair City Rollers, on the track to oppose her.
Hampered by their reduced roster, the Bombers were unable to recover quickly from their penalty situation, with the penalty box refilling as overstretched blockers picked up more penalties before their comrades could escape to join them. The Leithals capitalised, pushing the score into triple figures with multiple power jams before Teenie Bash finally managed to score for the red team,
6 Cherry Bombers : 115 Leithal Weapons
still with around 12 minutes left in the period.
A power-jam for Circuit Breaker, brought a much needed boost in the underdogs’ score, almost tripling it to 16 before she called the jam. The Leithals struck back immediately, however, with Yin and Bang effortlessly taking lead jammer the very next jam, while Teenie Bash struggled for some time with an imposing front-wall masterminded by Leithals pivot Admiral Attackbar, although both jammers were held well on their scoring passes, Velosidy exerting herself particularly to hold back the opposing scorer. Still, Teenie managed to pick up a single scoring pass, to be followed by a second magnificent display from Circuit, taking lead jammer and sneaking in a single scoring pass ahead of an accelerating Alma Geddon in hot pursuit.
That was the final scoring pass for the red team this period, though, with the final 8 minutes dominated by the Leithal Weapons once more, thanks partly to a recurrence of the Bombers’ penalty issues from earlier on. Playing with such a reduced roster was telling on their skaters, allowing the Leithals to dominate the track.
By the end of the period, the score stood at an intimidating
24 Cherry Bombers : 216 Leithal Weapons
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Half-time saw the second appearance of Sing in the City at a bout, an Edinburgh-based modern choir and Auld Reekie’s regular half-time entertainment for this Home Season. Beginning with a medley including “Auld Reekie”, the reworked version of “Hey Mickey” that serves as Auld Reekie’s anthem, the choir moved on to Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida”, a safe choice for a modern choir’s first opening to an audience.
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Ciderella chases down Circuit Breaker in one of the several jammer-on-jammer duels in the bout.
Returning from half-time, the Cherry Bombers faced a difficult challenge to win with an almost 200 point deficit. In fact, an almost immediate power jam for the Leithals once more, Circuit Breaker (100) spending time in the penalty box, whilst Yin and Bang (39) racked up a few more points, immediately increased their deficit even more…
The increasingly exhausted Bombers only managing to pick up 10 points in by the end of the third 15 minutes, it was looking even better for the team in blue as they picked up 113 in the same time, bringing the score to
34 Cherry Bombers : 329 Leithal Weapons
A long official timeout sent additional members of both teams to the penalty box and, devastatingly for a team with an already tiny roster, sent Bombers team captain Velosidy off track as she fouled out at her 7th sin-bin trip.
With the Leithal Weapons also down on blockers, however, the very next jam saw Teenie Bash pick up a valuable 3-point pass, albeit the last scoring tha the Bombers would get for the next five minutes. Superior blocking from the Leithals continued to tell, pushing their score closer and closer to a 10:1 ratio, sitting at:
37 Cherry Bombers : 354 Leithal Weapons
with only 10 minutes on the clock.
Just when it looked like the Leithals would actually manage to win with a 10:1 score ratio, a slightly misjudged piece of skating by Alma Geddon, returning from stradding the line to in-bounds to pick up a track cut major, handed the power jam to the Bombers’ Teenie Bash, to the loud delight of all of the Cherry Bombers fans in the audience. After getting over her own elation, Teenie capitalised, pushing her team’s score up by 10 vital points. After a brief team-timeout, The Bombers maintained their momentum, Circuit Breaking taking lead jammer mere fractions of a second ahead of the Leithals’ Ciderella (3), and engaging in a protracted and close-fought defensive jamming duel before calling it off. With Teenie Bash back on track for the next jam, yet another Leithals track cut, this time by Yin and Bang, handed the her the second power jam of the last 5 minutes, and a 19 point power jam. Just 5 minutes had made Teenie the Cherry Bombers’ highest scoring player by a landslide, bringing in more than half of the teams’ score for the bout.
With a bout timing issue causing head ref Righteous Oxide to allow one final jam, it was Kaos Moss who took back control for the Leithal Weapons for a final frosting of points, leaving the final score at:
66 Cherry Bombers : 395 Leithal Weapons
The Skater awards were given to:
| Cherry Bombers | Leithal Weapons | |
| Best Blocker | Maulibu Barbie | Minnie Riot |
| Best Jammer | Teenie Bash | Sharlotte Fever |
| Most Valuable Player | Circuit Breaker | Ciderella |
The next bout in the Auld Reekie Roller Girls Home Season is February 16th, where the Cherry Bombers, hopefully back up to a full roster, will take on The Skatefast Club.
Image courtesy of Auld Reekie Roller Girls
Auld Reekie Roller Girls kick off the new year with their second Home Season, featuring a bout between the Cherry Bombers and, last seasons winners, the Leithal Weapons.
The action takes place at Meadowbank Sports Centre, London Road, Edinburgh,on Saturday the 19th of January.Doors open at 2pm.Entry is $7 on the day, £5(plus booking fee) for an advance single bout ticket, or there is also the option of a Season ticket, which will allow entry to all Home Season bouts for £15(plus booking fee)
Please note, Season tickets may only be purchased up to the first game.
More info at the Facebook event page.
Photography by Dave McAleavy.
Track Queens looked fantastic from the footage,how was it to actually be a part of?
An unforgettable weekend – BCRD did Europe proud in organising it, and it was great to see WFTDA representation there to support us too. What great Roller Derby from all of the teams who took part – some real nail-biting action in every single bout. It was as fun as it looked. More so because of all of the hilarious extra’s; the pony invasion, the Helsinki/ARRG ninja v pony fight at half time in the final – that was a grudge match that needed to be fought. In Helsinki this year, my new jumper got ripped off my back and the team needed some retribution, you know? I think we got it. I think they got the message. We’re watching you Turtles.
The first bout against Central City Roller Girls was quite literally heart stopping to watch and really could have went either way.Did you ever doubt ARRG could win one of the hardest fought opening bouts of the tournament?
I never doubted for a minute that we had the ability to win it, but I also thought it would be close fought and really could turn out either way. CCR came into the tournament having had some great wins. I always thought we were strong enough, we just needed to really keep the focus and pull it together. Playing against teams so well matched in skill level means no time for any sort of mental lapse. I’m so proud of the team for keeping it zipped up to the end – there were a few shaky moments, but we didn’t freak out! We’ve been really focussing on the mental angle, we do have a small team of excitable exploding ponies and it is important that everyone on our team is in the game mentally and playing the long game not panicking about every point change or bad jam, we sometimes get too excited or distracted. We’ve added in some pre bout and mid bout ‘activities’ to assist with keeping it together which I think is starting to work for us.
The LRG bout was interesting,as right from the outset it was obvious that it was not going to be a repeat of your previous encounter with them.Do you feel that the closer result this time around shows how far the team has progressed?
Well we wanted to demonstrate that we used the huge beasting last time to improve, which we definitely have I think. Our team has matured and grown really close over the course of this year after some upheaval, so yes I really hope it showed! We took some key lessons from the last game with Brawling and applied them to our training over the past 6 months – strength and stamina was one area; we’ve practically taken over TEBA (The Edinburgh Boxing Academy) lately, their Ultimate Fitness classes for boxing are absolutely mental and amazing. We also switched up our jammer rotation a bit and worked on tighter, faster pack reactions – and just trying to keep it on a level and together – last time we played Brawling they probably had a different game plan too though. It’s also amazing how they manage to keep playing at such a high standard even with some roster changes, we do aspire to that. We wish we could play them once a month. Hopefully we can take a trip down to do some friendly training with them soon.
The Stockholm bout was if anything, more exciting to watch than the first and easily one of the best bouts of the whole tournament,are you disappointed not to have taken the third place after such a close, hard-fought game?
It’s weird, of course we really wanted a medal, but I don’t think the team felt deflated about not getting 3rd place – probably because we felt we played a really good game and had a good tournament with us moving up a place to 4th overall. Stockholm have some fantastic skaters, they are really tough and strong, which always makes for a fun bout – I do find it frustrating to watch the footage when we lost the lead …but again, so much learning opportunity there! It was a close result at the end, and it’s given us confidence that we’re playing at a good level just now and we are all raring to go after the Xmas break and get focussed with pushing ourselves up to the next level. We have a list of things to work on again ready for the next batch of Thistles games.
Taking a broader,European view for a moment,the Track Queens tournament has shown that most of the competing teams are grouped very closely together in terms of ability and skill,how do see European Derby progressing from where it is now?
I think that the more European tournaments we have and the more teams that start travelling a bit further for bouts to get a different perspective on the way the game is being played elsewhere, the better the standard will become. There are so many more teams across Europe who also could have competed confidently at this level and probably would have surprised people too. I think the teams with the drive and commitment to keep pushing will ultimately push through and I’d love to see some massive strong European presence at the national level competitions soon. I think we’re lucky to have so many good leagues in such a relatively small geographical area. It’s exciting how many Euro leagues are becoming WFTDA members too just now. I also have to mention the fantastic level of officiating we saw at Track Queens too – I love seeing dedicated NSO’s/refs and in Europe it’s looking SO good.
Auld Reekie have had an interesting year,the first Home Season and the other big first,organising an ARRG boot camp,then some losses balanced out with very strong performances in two major tournaments,not to mention the ,’this is how we roll’ signature team move.What are your Auld Reekie highlights of the past year?
I honestly would ramble on for hours on this subject because all of the things you mentioned have been huge achievements, especially the rolling around in dirt 
It’s definitely been the year of the tournament, and a good fun filled one at that. But to keep it short – personally it’s been having Cider voted in as Thistles Vice Captain – she brings her unique style to the role and it fits just perfectly with us as a team – she never fails to make me laugh even when I’m stressed or tired and I’m enjoying the Captain role even more because of this. Also she looks so good with a Moustache. Things that make me smile a lot just now are the Thistles being just the best bunch of women a person could ever meet and the whole of ARRG pulling together to make our huge league ambitions into realities, I can’t actually put into words how this makes me feel, I seem to cry a lot more these days from happiness and pride in people than from anything else – ARRG has turned me into an emotional softy.
Looking forward to next year,can you tell us anything about ARRG’s plans for 2013?
I cannot breathe with the excitement of it – we’ll definitely be taking the Thistles to America!! More to be announced on that soon!!
So um, probablly a few fund raisers to do as well!!! We’d love to do another Boot Camp if we can find the time, because we had so much fun – maybe School of ARRG Knocks “even ARRG’er”?! We have a couple of exciting festival bouts planned for August – we may just get a re-match with Stockholm yeah! We have a whole batch of exciting new bouters showcasing their stuff at our home season kicking off on 19th January (cheap season tickets on sale now) and we have 3 whole fresh meat intakes planned, the first in February 2013 (email newskaters@arrg.co.uk to get your name down). For once, I can’t wait to get Xmas out of the way!
Finally,the new rule set, are you looking forward to getting to grips with it and do you think WFTDA have succeeded in streamlining the sport for fans and skaters alike?
Oh yes – I really like it. I always found minors really frustrating and think they interrupted the game /slowed it down excessively in relation to the impact they had. Time will tell how it changes the game I guess, we’ve already seen some changes emerging, being a WFTDA member league, we had a good head start to plan for this, as we get to vote on them and see draft versions of the new rules – we’ve been using an hour every week over the last few months for some preparatory exploration of how the changes ‘would’ feel, and we’ve had a mock bout with GRD to try it out already and help our Scottish WFTDA affiliated officials plan for it. We also planned our home season to be the time and place where we test the rule set out fully in public before we start our travel team bouts. In terms of the slow game/fast game, the faster game is always more fun to play 
Image courtesy of GRD
Glasgow Roller Derby proudly present their Home Season Final on Saturday the 24th of November at The Arc,Cowcaddens Road,Glasgow.
The season kicked off with a Bad Omens victory against the Death Stars,who lost again in the second bout against Hell’s Belles,the third bout saw the Belles matched against the Bad Omens,a bout which the Omens won by quite a margin.Will the Bad Omens win all their matches including the final?,or will the Hell’s Belles prevent a solid run of victories?
The only way to find out is to go on the day,tickets are £6 on the door or £5 in advance.More details on the Facebook event page
As if that wasn’t enough,GRD will host the Home Season afterparty at Garnethill Multicultural Community Centre,where they will hand out their annual awards and celebrate another year together,for the first time in the league’s history,one of the awards,GRD’S Favourite Skater,will be voted for by the public.You can vote for your favourite Glasgow skater here.Voting closes at midnight on Friday the 23rd of November.
Glasgow Roller Derby present the second bout in their 2012 Home Season on Saturday the 4th of August at The ARC Sportscentre,Cowcaddens Road,Glasgow.
This time around it’s the Hell’s Belles vs Death Stars.Tickets are available in advance at a cost of £5 or £6 on the day.
Afterwards there is not one,but two venues,first a food stop at Pinto’s and then drinking and dancing at the Garnethill Multicultural Centre.
Image courtesy of Glasgow Roller Derby
Glasgow Roller Derby kick off their 2012 Home Season on Saturday the 30th of June with a bout between last years winners,the Death Stars, up against the Bad Omens.
All four Home Season bouts will take place at The Arc and are priced at £5 each,with a season ticket costing a mere £15.Especially good value ,as not only do you get a bout free,but this first bout will also be a double-header,featuring a Mens Roller Derby clash between Sheffield’s mighty Inhuman League and Scotland’s very own Jakey Bites.
Photography by Sam Skipsey
Head over to Ante Ortus A Novus Lumen Ars for a bout report on the Auld Reekie Roller Girls Home Season final double header.
All the usual photos and video to peruse plus two reports,you can find the first,a bruising bout between Glasgow Roller Derby‘s Hells Belles and The Cherry Bombers, over here.
For coverage of the final bout,between The Skatefast Club and The Leithal Weapons click here.
Image courtesy of ARRG
On Saturday the 28th of April,Auld Reekie Roller Girls host the much anticipated final of their first Home Season in style with a double header.First up is a bout between Arrg’s Cherry Bombers and Glasgow Roller Derby’s Hells Belles.The main event is to decide which Home Team will be crowned champions and will see the Skatefast Club go up against the Leithal Weapons in what should be a really hard fought bout.
This takes place at Meadowbank Sports Centre,London Road,Edinburgh,entry is £7 on the day or £6 in advance.
Please note this is an evening event,doors open at 5pm with the first bout at 5:30pm.
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