Bout day

Today I head to Peoria with a couple of the Quad-City Rollers for a bout. It's one of the few travel bouts we have this schedule, which makes me sad because travel bouts are the same level of fun without all the anxiety and work on our part.

We have a really good relationship with Peoria, and it's always a pleasure to watch them improve more and more. We get a chance to show them how much we've improved since the last time we played them, albeit shorthanded.

I think we're skating with nine skaters tonight to their 13, so it'll definitely be interesting to see the outcome. Plus of those 9 skaters we have one or two fresh meat players, so the edge of experience will likely go to Peoria's favor. Here's to our endurance and ability to gel together as a team.

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The Chicago Bruise Brothers make their official debut tonight against Green Bay's men's team, so I'm sorry I'm going to miss watching Justice Feelgood Marshall on the track live on DNN. Oh, the irony.

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Our sisters to the West, Old Capital City Roller Girls play Des Moines Derby Dames tonight in WFTDA action tonight. I'm looking forward to hearing the results from that game after getting the news that Showstopper will be pulling the plug on her career after a recent injury. Plus, Iowa City is such a swell league.

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Wednesday was the first time I ever got to use Gumball toestops. I recently spent several months with simply jam plugs in to force myself to learn to plow stop and hockey stop. After a round of jam reffing I decided that toe stops were in order to not get left in the dust from quick jammer starts. And finally after having gifted two other sets of toestops to skaters, I purchased another set (short stems) and put them in.

I'm still not overly comfortable running on them, but they're pretty amazing when suicide stops are necessary. :D Maybe one of these days I'll actually get comfortable enough to run with 'em.

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Our vets have been scrimmaging with the junior league in preparation for their big tournament in a few weeks. They'll play their first bout against another team in Des Moines, so some of them are a little nervous. The juniors had only scrimmaged with themselves up to this point.

And while we aren't allowed to hit them (don't touch the minors), they have full permission to use us for target practice, essentially making us heavy bags on wheels.

It's amazing to watch their little minds soak up all the derby, as they're constantly learning. Hopefully playing against adults will give them a huge learning curve when they play other juniors.

I have to get ready for the road trip. Ciao.