This Is How I Roll: Kat Vecchio and Joe "Maulin' Brando" Mihalchick on the rise of men's roller derby

Last weekend, I was lucky enough to attend a screening of This Is How I Roll, a documentary about the growing presence of men's roller derby teams. Not satisfied with acting as coaches and referees -- or standing on the sidelines rooting for their derby girlfriends -- a small group of guys started talking about forming their own team and, eventually, their own roller derby league. It sounds like it should have been no big deal. After all, roller derby is a sport, and why should guys have a problem getting into sports? As it turns out, men trying to break into a sport dominated -- and revived -- by women was not as easy as it sounds.

After the jump, hear from the filmmakers of This Is How I Roll, producer and director Kat Vecchio and Joe Mihalchick, producer and men's derby skater Maulin' Brando with the New York Shock Exchange.

Jamie Frevele: Was the sexism against men's roller derby immediate, or was it gradual?

Kat Vecchio: Some of the very first men’s bouts involved pickup teams, and were treated as kind of one-off events. The first public game the Pioneer Valley men played was against a group of referees. So as Joe mentioned at the Q&A [at the screening in Huntington, New York on August 26] there was this initial reaction that can kind of be summed up as “Oh, isn’t that cute. Good for you guys!” When it became clear that there was a real drive among these skaters to start forming real teams, then you started to get a sense that not everyone would be welcoming.

Jamie: When did men first start forming their own teams?

Kat: Pioneer Valley Roller Derby in Massachusetts was founded in 2005, and they were unusual in that they decided from the get-go to have a women’s and a men’s team. It would be 2006 before the men would get to play in their first public game, an exhibition scrimmage against The Charm City Roller Girls co-ed referee staff. By 2007, the Harm City Homicide, out of Baltimore, and the New York Shock Exchange had formed. These three teams, all based on the east coast, were the first men’s teams of modern flat track roller derby.

Jamie: Were teams generally only comprised of refs and coaches for women's derby teams?

Kat: I think some of the early men’s teams had a high number of refs, managers and boyfriends associated with the women’s teams on their rosters because they were the easiest to recruit. They already knew about the sport, had an understanding of the rules, and in the case of the referees, they already knew how to skate! As the teams started to play public bouts and hold events they were able to cast a wider net for recruitment.

Here is a clip from the film featuring an exhibition bout in North Carolina, which took place at a women's tournament:

Jamie: Describe the backgrounds (age, day jobs, etc.) of some of the men's derby players. Are there any notable differences between the men and the women?

Kat: While it varies from city to city, and now country to country, roller derby has always attracted a pretty diverse group of people. I think the median age for the teams (both men and women) that I am familiar with tends to be late 20s to early 30s. However there are many skaters who are younger or older, one of the skaters featured in This Is How I Roll was in his 50s and became a grandfather during the time we were filming.

The professions for both the men and women run the gamut as well. While we don’t get into skaters personal lives in the film, the skaters featured have pretty diverse careers. There was a science teacher, a photographer, a beer vendor at a famous baseball stadium, an actor, a computer programmer, a mixed media sculptor, a call center operator, and a wine cellar manager.

Jamie: When we spoke before the screening, we discussed how some didn't want to call this "sexism." What did they call it if it wasn't sexism?

Kat: Some people felt the very idea of men experiencing sexism was impossible. The argument was that men have so much power in our society, that it was not possible for them to be disenfranchised based on their gender. Then there were those people who argued that placing any limitations based on gender was inherently sexism, that it didn’t matter which group has more power in our society. We chose not to assert an argument one way or the other in the film, but to instead try to allow the story to unfold in a way that would get viewers asking questions, and hopefully challenge people to think about these things through a new and different lens.

Jamie: How much has the men's derby league grown since the end of the film's production?

Joe Mihalchick: The growth of men's derby has been exponential. When we finished production in mid-2011, the Men's Roller Derby Association contained 11 leagues from across the United States, a huge leap from the previous fall with only four teams, when it was called the Men's Derby Coalition. As of August 2012, the MRDA contains 25 leagues. There are close to 50 men's derby teams in the U.S. alone now, with numerous in Canada, England, France, South America, and Australia. June 2012 saw the first Men's European Roller Derby Championships. I would guess that very soon MRDA will become an international organization.

Jamie: Was there ever any discussion about including transgender skaters?

Kat: During filming, we were certainly aware that the inclusion of transgender skaters in roller derby was becoming a national conversation for the roller derby community, but we felt that we needed to keep the film focused on following this particular story. It can be tempting to try to make a documentary cover too much ground, and at the end of the day, you only have so much time. We were fitting three years into 72 minutes. I think it would have been a disservice to transgender skaters to not make their story front and center, and I really hope someone makes that film soon.

Jamie: You mentioned that there were lots of issues, concerns, and considerations when it came to filming male skaters versus female skaters. Can you go into that in more detail?

Kat: Once you focus a lens on something, you have put a frame around it and present it to a viewer. By doing that you have the power to change how people view that image. Whether we realize it or not, we have all been taught how we are supposed to read images, especially when it comes to images of women. What I found was that if was very easy to film the male skaters in a way that made them look powerful. Shooting at low angles made them look large, more substantial, and tough. However, we are conditioned to digest images of women a little differently, and shooting them from the same low angle sometimes felt almost voyeuristic. To really convey how tough they were you needed to shoot more straight on, really capture the action in the blocking and intensity in their faces.

Jamie: Obviously there was a lot of opposition to men's derby. How easy (or difficult) was it to get those opinions on camera? Have any of them changed their minds since the end of production?

Kat: Yes, as one woman says in the film (the head referee for the Men’s Roller Derby Association), once people really saw the men’s teams pay their dues, saw that they were serious and willing to contribute to the sport as a whole, then there started to be a lot more acceptance. Many people have changed their minds as they have seen how it developed. I think a lot of the initial dislike for men’s derby came from people who were really uneasy about what it could mean for the sport.

This modern revival of roller derby is very new, and a lot of people had worked very hard to build it into a national, and now international sport for women. They were understandably cautious about what it would mean to add male teams to the mix. Female athletes have not had an easy road, and I think a level of protectiveness around a sport that was actually female-centered, is understandable. There were a lot of people, both male and female, who would speak in private about their dislike of the men skating, but would not do so on camera. I have a great deal of respect for the people who agreed to appear in the film. It is not an easy thing to go on public record with your opinions.

Jamie: How do you hope to appeal to an audience who might not be familiar with men's derby, let alone women's derby?

Kat: Some of the most enthusiastic reactions we have received have come from people who have never seen roller derby. I think audiences turn to documentaries like this to get a glimpse into a world they are not familiar with. The film is funny, and the characters are engaging, and you get a great behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to play roller derby.

Jamie: Do you think that the lessons of gender equality in roller derby are relevant to pretty much anything that might be seen as divided between the sexes?

Kat: I think that the issues in the film are certainly relevant outside the context of just roller derby. Should gender really be a factor in who gets to be an athlete, who gets to play a sport? Is a sport more or less legitimate because women or men play it? If female athletes traditionally have fewer opportunities in sports, is it fair to exclude men from a female-dominated sport?

Jamie: There's a very hopeful moment at the end of the movie with Bloody Mary throwing her hat into the ring for the men's league, after a lot of "soul-searching," it seems. Do you think men will ever catch up to women in roller derby and there might be real equality one day?

Kat: I’m not sure. The men’s teams are certainly continuing to grow and the sport as a whole is thriving, and I think both of those things are really exciting. Some people speculate that there are already so many opportunities for an audience to watch men slam into each other, that men’s roller derby will never have the same popularity as the women’s game. But, there were also people who thought that men’s derby would never have any audience, and that has certainly proven to be incorrect. Ultimately the men’s teams have been around for less time than many of the established women’s teams so it is difficult to compare them side-by-side. I think what is really important is that the sport as a whole is continuing to grow and develop.

Joe: To me, this is a great way to examine our preconceived notions of what it means to be an athlete, to examine our expectations of who owns a sport while working within a very specific cross section. The best documentaries are the ones that work within a world that you might not be familiar with, but allows you to see universal ideas within a very specific group. I hope we can do this with This Is How I Roll.

Thanks to Kat and Joe for their time! For more information about This Is How I Roll, visit their official web site or like them on Facebook. Here are the opening titles:

• [User 100]

  Jamie: How much has the men’s derby league grown since the end of the film’s production?

  Joe Mihalchick: The growth of men’s derby has been exponential. [...] There are close to 50 men’s derby teams in the U.S. alone now, with numerous in Canada, England, France, South America, and Australia. June 2012 saw the first Men’s European Roller Derby Championships. I would guess that very soon MRDA will become an international organization.

  So when was the last time some women tried to break into a men-dominated sport, and had “exponential” growth, and going international in a year or so?
  Sound like the poor roller derby guys experience quite some “discrimination” if they could overcome it that quickly…

  • [DJ Stella]

    Please don’t take the comment out of context. A year or so will still be 8 years after the first men’s team formed. Roller derby is unique as everyone started at square one (versus an established sports decades in the making.) So your example is faulty at best. Furthermore, sexism is sexism. Your stab at discrimination in quotes belittles what people have gone through just to play.

      I know internet message boards are the best of the best for ignorant comments but maybe at least try and be clever about it?

  • [Daniel Newman]

    women’s derby went from one league to over 400 in 7 years (and has far outstripped that number, which was from three years ago).  men’s derby went from 1 to 50+ in about the same amount of time.  exponential describes the growth over time, not the relative popularity.  ”going international” just means some dudes in canada and the UK (and a couple of other places) decided they want to play too…it doesn’t necessarily mean they’re drawing large crowds or that they have overcome anything.

• [R J]

  A twenty second search of teh interwebs will produce multiple articles and videos of men in the 1950′s, 60′s and 70′s skating professionally for roller derby teams.  

  Viewed in historical context the premise roller derby is women’s sport is incorrect.
  Just because the current reincarnation was spearheaded by women does not change the sports history. 

  Does the documentary examine the long history of men in roller derby?  If so how does the title “A story of men who want to hit like girls?”  apply.  If not, why not?

  • [DJ Stella]

    This film explores the position of men in modern flat track roller derby. While I don’t speak for the filmmakers, I think the tag line is a little tongue in cheek as in modern roller derby men and women tend to hit differently (men using shoulders, women favoring hips).

    It doesn’t cover derby historically, I imagine, as this isn’t a film about 75+ years of roller derby, it’s about the place of men in this modern revival.

    Thanks for bothering with a google search, you’d be surprised how many people won’t even go that far!

    • [R J]

      I grew up in the 60′s and 70′s watching the T-Birds, Ralphie Valladares was the man back then (no wordplay intended but duly noted), by the 80′s I had graduated to punk shows at the Olympic.  Did the search to validate my memory that men were common in roller derby, not some anomaly here in the LA area.

      Interesting about checking styles, as an ice hockey defense-man I have always favored a good hip check to send my opponents sprawling.

      The film should of acknowledged the history of men’s role in the sport (IMO flat vs. banked is a false dichotomy),  I would be disappointed if the men skating today were completely oblivious to the history of the sport.  To paraphrase Newton, you are jamming on the shoulders of giants. (and T-Birds and Bombers and Rollers…)

      • [JoeMihalchick]

        RJ, the film does address the historical context of roller derby being conceived as a co-ed sport in the 1930′s. We do speak to the issues you address, though the film does focus on the current flat-track revival that began in 2001, driven by female skaters and male skaters who came along later and tried to find their place within that. But, historical context isn’t ignored.

        As for the slogan, sure, it’s a tongue in cheek play on words. You meet make skaters in the film who talk about female athletes as their idols and how they wish they could play like them. We think it’s an interesting film; I hope you get the chance to see it.

        Joe Mihalchick
        Producer, This Is How I Roll

        • [Raphael Nora Rose]

          I live in Portland Oregon, and we do not (or did not the last time I looked) have a male team. I personally would be more inclined to go if I could see both men and women play (though I will show my age and say I REALLY miss the banked tracks). 

          Does your film address the WWE ‘completely real’ aspects of the sport? I haven’t seen it since its revival, but the televised meets I saw as a kid were obviously staged to some degree. Or is the new incarnation truly sportsmanlike?

        • [Stephen Schickedanz]

          Raphael, a simple Google search shows a MRDA team: http://www.stumptownderby.com/

      • [S. Dangerfield]

        I’m a former Bay City Bomber & L.A. T-Bird.

        I skate nowadays for the New York Shock Exchange because it allows me to skate as often as possible against the best collection of talent in the world, on a weekly basis.

        I can tell you for certain we are well aware of the history of roller skating. We maintain a number of the older traditions, for example we honor that no skater should wear #1, which has been kept as a memorial to a tragedy in 1937.

        But we are also looking to forge our own identity for the flat track game, and spread the game of roller derby to all people. 

        • [Mitchell Powers]

          I grew up watching the T-Birds in southern Mississippi on local TV.  When did you skate for them?  RJ, I feel you on the Derby/Punk connection.

      • [My Ocean]

        The Old Schoolers have their legacy already. This is about a new generation and new style of derby. Old School tainted itself with scripted outcomes. Modern derby is tainting itself with complex rules and not skating as a form of strategy. To put both styles of derby into one box does a disservice to both.

  • [This Is How I Roll]

    “Viewed in historical context the premise roller derby is women’s sport is incorrect. Just because the current reincarnation was spearheaded by women does not change the sports history. ”

    You’re right, but what we found is that many people (mostly fans, skaters tend to educate themselves on the history of the sport) are too young to have grown up watching the sport on TV, and they really have no cultural memory of the sport prior to its current incarnation.  While they knew roller derby had been played in earlier decades, they only remembered the women’s teams.  When speaking with people about the film the vast majority of them were surprised to learn that men had in fact played in the past.  It is with this mind set (even if it is incorrect) that many people are viewing the current version of roller derby and its players.

    We do touch on this in the film.   We interview a current male skater who talks about his memories watching the sport as a kid, and his sadness that that history is getting lost.  He also talks about the original inclusive nature of the sport.  However, we do not delve into the full history of the sport, instead we chose to focus the story on the current revival and the events that were unfolding as they related to men beginning to form teams.  

    Kat Vecchio
    Director – This Is How I Roll

  • [BustaArmov]

     Old roller derby has zero to do with modern roller derby. There is zero continuity between the two, and few people from that bygone era of “worked games” with predetermined outcomes and fudging of what rules there were. There is absolutely zero historical context from that era that matters other than inspiration. The remnants of those old games made themselves unwelcome for the most part in the modern movement, opposing it with a “They’re stealing our game!” sentiment.

    Also, roller derby in the 20th century was at no time a “sport”. All of the so called “leagues” were single owner organizations split into multiple teams. The teams were never independent, played teams from other organizations only for exhibition and were carefully scripted. Box scores were sent to papers to publish, and roller derby was popular enough to publish them, but in those days they had no idea that something like “sports entertainment” existed. If it looked like a sport, they thought it was. They didn’t know about “the home team always wins” or scores kept deliberately close to keep the audience. The games were more of a framework for “heat” than anything else. The original Roller Derby wasn’t scripted, but it was more like an improve play.

    From it’s inception between playright Damon Runyon (“Guys and Dolls”) and Leo Seltzer, Roller Derby was entertainment and nothing more. Winning a “championship” with 4 captive leagues was meaningless, especially when it was predetermined. The competing promotion, “Roller Games”, was the entertainment part of Roller Derby without any pretense of legitimacy. It was scripted, and patterned after Pro Wrestling, which was all the rage in the 1950s, and also didn’t admit to being faked until Vince McMahon took over in the 90s.

    So if you want history, that’s your history of 20th century roller derby. Jerry Seltzer let Roller Derby die. Other promotions came and went. The skaters couldn’t see skating roller derby on a flat track, and they didn’t want to skate unless they had an audience anyway, and they really disliked the idea of skating for free. No one from 20th century roller derby wanted a sport that anyone could pick up and skate anywhere: the money was in the monopoly.

    I’ve always thought that modern roller derby should have renamed its sport something else. It’s the first time any form of roller derby was started “from the sandlot” so to speak, not some entertainment conceived by a promoter. Modern roller derby is played because the skaters want to skate: it happens on basketball and tennis courts with no audience but other skaters if that, people cross organizational lines to skate in pickup teams all the time, and some even cross between flat and banked track.

    For modern roller derby, the clock really starts in 2001. And regardless of the men and women alternating periods, it was always the men who played last to win or lose. The idea of men and women playing separate games was never explored in 20th century roller derby. The idea of them sharing the track simultaneously was never explored. Turning roller derby into a true inter-city sport with independently owned teams was never explored. Rules that could be played by without adhering to an unwritten “code” was never explored.

    Modern roller derby has its own past, its own resume and a completely different priority. This is the history the modern men’s derby movement has latched on to. What came before 2001 is not modern roller derby’s history, it’s just something that inspired it as the most general concept. Whereas, men’s derby uses the rules that were the result of years of evolution that came from the challenges of “interleague” competition that women’s roller derby created.

• [camnotthebutler]

  As the husband of a derby chick I can tell you that the big problem she has with male roller derby is simply one of  don’t invade the only female sport that is tough, fast, exciting and for women.

  The men’s versions of aussie rules football, soccer, gridiron, rugby in all it’s forms, murderball, playground British bulldog, gallic football, track cycling and so on all dominate the attention compared to what the women’s versions do.

  So f#ck off and let the chicks have their game that draws paying crowds, gets airplay online and now on our local communiuty tv station, gets local press even.

  I agree with Danger, it may dilute the appeal to women, to my two daughters, and ruin the unique sensation that roller derby is.

  It sometimes feels like the push for male roller derby is just boys stamping the foot in the school playground because it can’t all go their way, all the time, in every way.

  Cam

  • [Ladyfingers]

    It sometimes feels like the push for male roller derby is just boys stamping the foot in the school playground because it can’t all go their way, all the time, in every way.

    I’m sure the men who want to play Roller Derby thank you for sharing your baseless projections about their motives.

    • [camnotthebutler]

      I am basing my thoughts on discussions with refs in our local leauge, great blokes who do a fantastic job and who love what they do. Some of them want the extra step of men’s roller derby matches, they feel left out and want their turn.

      Male bouts happened on the odd occasion, usually mixed matches so far. For all that I understand why they want to bout, I think bringing in regular male matches with male teams and male league rosters will harm roller derby for the women.

      Essentially modern roller derby is for the chicks, and I would like to see it stay that way.

      • [Ladyfingers]

        I’m sure you mean well, but I can’t help thinking that a protective man implying that Roller Derby is a paddling pool that needs splashers chased away does nothing to reify the toughness it seems to trade on. 

        • [camnotthebutler]

          Not chased away, just they should do the right thing, support the women rolling, get involved as refs and NSOs.

          As to toughness, my partner is 5 ft 3.5 inches, weighs maybe 54 kgs and bouts against some pretty big chicks comparatively. But there is now way she should bout against some 6ft 1 inch 86kg bloke like me. It’s physics in the end, relative averages and mass vs inertia. One of our refs is an ex gridiron player and must weigh at least 120kgs, and is taller than me. The coolest thing about watching derby is the fast smart and whippy jammers, so it actually suits women as a sport.

          I am not protecting her, I support her rolling, but I am involved in a online discussion on a blog she doesn’t ever look at.

      • [cdh1971]

        Hmm, I think I get your point, sorry for my previous reply. 

        Your wife, from your description sounds pretty open minded and cool. 

        In my neck of the, well, in my area, Eugene/Portland Oregon & Seattle, the male Refs _mostly_ are pretty hot, and are friendly, mostly.

        I’m, sure they’re of even better quality where you are (Great Britain right?)I urge you to Go For It!!!

  • [Hans Oberamergau]

    Exactly.  I’m in Baltimore and we’ve got some kick-ass women out there.  This is great, and fascinating, and not the image of women one is generally presented with.  

    As pointed out, it’s immediately apparent how cleanly male versions of a sport occult the female version.  Would this be different in this case, where the initial impetus was women driven?  I dunno.  Is is worth the risk of shitting on this just so men can have yet another full-contact sport? I think not.

    Feels to me like an abuse of privilege.  I’m a white guy and if I wanted to I could stroll into one of the predominantly-black clubs in town.  (Don’t know where you’re from, but here such things exist and I don’t believe I’d be especially welcome.)  I could go for a voyeuristic evening of checking out another culture.  Maybe go with some friends and make a night of it.  Rah, rah, down with racism, all that.  

    But maybe everybody deserves an event when they don’t need to worry about the onslaught of the dominant paradigm they’ve been swimming in all day.  Maybe I should recognize that part of the hostility I’d be encountering would be due to my willful dilution and un-safening of someone else’s space, all for a lark.

    The male roller derby thing has echoes of this for me.  Come on, guys.  Don’t piss all over this (in a marking territory way) just because you’re used to being privileged enough to take anything.  Allow someone else some space.

    • [Daniel Newman]

      you should watch the film.

    • [cdh1971]

      Hans, you and Cam are absolutely right. 

    • [DJ Stella]

      Maybe women don’t need to be coddled and everyone should be free to make their own choices.

      Insinuating you’re stepping aside to ‘protect’ women’s derby, you’re instituting the same sense of patriarchy because us women-folk need protecting because ‘wah’ boys want to play this flipping awesome sport as well.

      Watch the film.

      • [cdh1971]

        DJ…

        You & Hans…
        You’re Right…You’re Right…

        Nathan’s Right Too…

        Tra La La…

        (First pic is an artist’s interpretation of Vonnegut’s Tralfamadore Zoo.)

    • [My Ocean]

      It’s a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t situation. Men have a wider array of full-contact sports to play at any and every level than women generally do. But to say “I won’t play derby for the laydeeeez” can backfire, as seen in the comments here.

      I have to admit, most of the fans I’ve talked to of modern derby are interested in seeing the women skate more than men. I don’t know if there’s a chance that if derby got wider coverage on tv or some such thing, that men would eclipse women based on that casual observation. I myself find men’s-only derby boring to watch, but coed/mixed teams are a lot more interesting to see the different styles of play all at once. 

  • [Nathan Hornby]

    “It sometimes feels like the push for male roller derby is just boys stamping the foot in the school playground because it can’t all go their way, all the time, in every way.”

    Like how women that want to play football are just stamping their foot because the boys won’t let them play?

    Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate why women would want to keep the sports for themselves, but come on.

    • [Antinous / Moderator]

      Google ‘false equivalency’. Get back to us after you’ve done some reading.

      • [Nathan Hornby]

        I appreciate that women are subjected to far more discrimination than men, but my point was that neither party are playing silly buggers, as the quoted text insinuates. I know what a false equivelency is, but given the point I was making I think it was apt.

        they’re engaging in the sport because they’re interested in it. I don’t think it’s some kind of male led conspiracy to control all sport.

        • [My Ocean]

          No, it’s not a conspiracy, but there are quite a few women derby skaters who feel, “You guys have the corner market on EVERY OTHER full-contact sport out there. How about you stick with those and let us have this one sport, will ya?”

          I can empathize with that sentiment sometimes.

        • [Nathan Hornby]

          But how does it impact their enjoyment for others to enjoy it? Can’t we all just get along?

• [Visceral Vixen]

  I thought a kind of male roller derby had existed for years, just with the title: “Ice Hockey”. ;) 

  But in all seriousness, I would like to watch this documentary because I’m wondering with the superior male body-strength does it make the sport more brutal and dangerous? Or are there different rules?  

  • [Blinkers]

     ”I thought a kind of male roller derby had existed for years, just with the title: “Ice Hockey”

    That’s like saying baseball and cricket are the same sport.

  • [DJ Stella]

    The rules are exactly the same as WFTDA rules. It’s actually addressed in the film about people talking about different sizes and different rules (about why dudes should have a bigger track, etc.)

    What people don’t seem to realize is the flat track has the same dimensions as a banked track just 2-D. Therefore, if men and women could play on that track for 60 years why should this modern game need 2 different tracks?

    I wouldn’t say men’s derby is anymore brutal/dangerous, but in some cases the spectacle of a hit can be ratcheted up just because the bigger the body mass, the harder they fall!

    • [My Ocean]

      I don’t really believe the myth about WFTDA-sized tracks being the same size as a banked track, just flat. Mainly because there wasn’t a standardized banked track to measure from to begin with, and each banked track had varying degrees of bank to it. The reason the WFTDA track are the measurements it is is so that it will fit into a skating rink or basketball court while accommodating a small audience, not for the general size and ability of the skaters.

      Also, modern banked leagues generally are using the measurements of Kitten Traxx, which took an old LA T-birds track and lengthened it by ten feet in the straightaways. Makes it big enough for both the ladies and the dudes. I myself am female and find the standard WFTDA track to be too small length-wise these days, especially compared to the modern banked track.

      • [DJ Stella]

        I can’t speak to which banked track they used, but Texas threw it into a program (CAD I believe) that people use for just that purpose.  So yes, the measurements are the same, maybe to what the majority of banked tracks were/or to the one they’d eventual buy?

        It has nothing do with fitting into rinks/courts as rinks are all sizes (we had 4 alone in our state that didn’t come close to fitting a track, postage stamp sized!)

        • [My Ocean]

          I can tell you this: suggest making the WFTDA track longer, and see the push-back you get over space issues. I mean, I kinda get it, but if the level of play is going to continue to improve, some of the most fundamental aspects of the game may need to be reevaluated.

• [KingTacoF2.8]

  I was a male derby skater in Philadelphia from 2006 until about 2009 when I retired with a shoulder injury that needed surgery. I can state for myself that the impetus was nothing more than “That looks awesome! I want to try it!”. Who has the time to learn to skate and learn to play just to invade something we thought our genitals excluded us from? In fact, I’d say that coming from being refs and score keepers, I’d say we were feminists. We were volunteers helping women play a sport. Why shouldn’t we be allowed to play too? Why would be knowingly become second class citizens in the derby community (believe me, we are) if we’re a bunch of misogynists? Why spend years helping the women build their sport so that we play for 10 minutes as their halftime show?

• [callumd]

  The position that men shouldn’t play roller-derby in their own league to protect the womenfolk, to let them have a little something of their own, is patronising and somewhat derogatory.  Only the weak, the somehow inferior always need protection.  There’s nothing wrong with providing protection to those who seek it; it’s the assumption that it’s needed based on the possession of a particular set of genitalia that is insulting.

  I follow London Rollergirls and London Rockin’ Rollers, and try to get to as many of their matches as possible. Same goes for Arsenal Ladies. Watching them doesn’t change my appreciation of men’s football so why should the reverse change anything in rollerderby?

  But what do I know, I’m just another punter.

• [Daniel Newman]

  I’d also like to point out that while on average men may be larger than women, in derby that is not always the case.  Men’s body types vary just as widely as women’s.  All body types can find a place in roller derby, which is part of what makes it so inclusive.  As a smaller man, sports have overall not been easy for me to be competitive in, but I have found ways to use my size to my advantage in roller derby.  Believe it or not, a 5′ 3.5″ woman can most definitely bout against a 6′ 1″ dude if she knows what she’s doing.

• [Resound]

  I think the issue here isn’t whether or nor women can compete with men on the track but whether they can compete with men in terms of media attention, airtime and ultimately funding and credibility. Once the MRDA gets anywhere even remotely the sort of numbers the WFTDA (and by remotely near I mean probably not particularly near at all) I’d not be at all surprised to find that they’ll be considered to be the default league and women in derby will be treated like women in any other sport, that is as a second fiddle barely worth mentioning, never mind broadcasting, funding or holding any cultural currency.

  This isn’t about the men and women on the track, it’s about how sport is treated as a men’s domain and as soon as derby gets drawn into that sphere, women’s derby will be marginalised just like every other women’s sport, regardless of the quality of the actual games.