June Featured Skater: Madam Bomb

Name: Madam Bomb

Number: 94

Travel Team: Allstars & Brawlers

Home Team: Bombshell Bettys

Years skating: 14

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She always rocks an amazing boutfit that is matched only by her fierce playing style! Get to know June’s skater of the month: Madam Bomb!

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You were nominated by Sin City Rebel, who wants to know two questions that may or may not be connected. First, how do you get ready for a bout, and how do you always keep your hair looking so magnificent all of the time?

A lot of my bout preparation, especially if it’s a home (different if it’s home or away), but if it’s home, I’m thinking a lot about the theme and my boutfit. That really gets me amped up. I get to run the door, so I get to say hi to everybody coming to watch us—that gets me excited for being out there. Beyond that, just on a personal level, there’s a lot of times where I have my eyes closed and I’m just breathing, and I like to remind myself this is a cool-ass thing that we get to do. I play derby—you know, not everybody can say that. There’s really so few people that can say that, and it’s just so cool to be part of that community, so I just breathe it in, say: I get to play derby, and I get to do it with the people that—you know, it’s the one day when we’re all on the same team (unless we’re doing home teams!) we’re all on the same team. So everything that makes Bush a heavy hitter, and you [smalls] annoying because you can get at my ribs in a way that absolutely no one else can, or Bear and blocking—I mean I could name something for everybody—and Sin’s calm.

So just being able to be a part of their team, too. We’re all the same. So just thinking of that, breathing it in, and just thinking this is just the coolest thing that I get to do, like wow. That’s how I get ready!

Sounds like a good mindset! And do you want to share any of your hair secrets with us?

Oh, hair secrets! I mean, there’s certain products, but a little known fact: in Grease, there’s the “Beauty School Dropout” song. I technically am a beauty school dropout because I too, as a junior, went to cosmetology vocation my junior year, and then I dropped out in my senior year, but always had a love of hair. I get a little help from what I do to my hair, but that, to me, is fun, you know? It’s like wearing wigs or wearing hair pieces and stuff like that. It’s a different persona.

I think we all kind of take on a different persona when we’re out in derby, you know? It’s a part of who we are, but that’s a different persona that we get to play during that time too, so the hair makes that more fun, and I don’t have a job that tells me I can’t! So yeah, I have a couple of products that I’ve used for ten, twelve years, and they’re my favorite, and they’re from Sally Beauty because they’re cheap. I just bought a sticker yesterday from Dollywood that says, “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.” Which I think is funny.

So how did you come up with the persona of Madam Bomb? Like how did you decide on that name?

When it came time to make up names, since I started derby in ‘09 (us playing in ‘09, ‘10, and ‘11) at that time, you had to go to Two Evils to look up your name, and you couldn’t have it very close to anybody else’s. So I was looking at a lot of those names, and I actually started looking at Garbage Pail Kids cards because they had some fun, quirky names. And I think it was Adam Bomb, so the male version, and I was like, “That is cool, and I can make that Madam Bomb.” So that’s where it came from, it came from the Garbage Pail Kids card, and I was like, that’s cool. And then as I started looking it up, I found out that 94 (being a sciency kid, people don’t know that I am) so on the periodic table of elements, that is Plutonium, so that is why, one of the reasons I’m 94. The other reason is because I graduated in that year. So I was like yeah, that makes absolute sense, so we’re gonna be 94 Madam Bomb. That’s where that came from!

I didn’t know that—that’s so cool! So you’ve been a part of derby since ‘09. How did you discover it?

My husband and I, I don’t know if we were out riding motorcycles or whatever we were doing in Toledo, Ohio, but we were at a bar and grill, and it was quite packed from what I remember it usually is, but it looked like they had a band or something going on. But as I got closer, I was like, “No, this is a lot of women in roller skates and tutus and what is going on?” And here, the Glass City Rollers were doing a community event, just being out in the community, promoting their team and letting people know they’re here and we have bouts coming up, and we’re about to start our season and all of this stuff. So I got to meet a couple of the skaters at the time, and one was, of course with her skates because I didn’t have skates on, she was tall already, but with her skates, was just massive, and she was just beautiful and I was like, “How fun!” And growing up, I grew up in roller rinks, and I remember being five and I remember when I finally got to be twelve and got to go by myself, and they’d just drop me off at the front, so I loved roller skating, and I was like heck yeah. And it didn’t include a ball, it was a sport that didn’t include a ball. So I was like this is great, no hand-eye coordination, I think I can do this.

They told me that they weren’t going to be playing their home bout for a few weeks, but they were going to be out of state. And I thought, yeah, I’m gonna make a trip. So I went to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; I watched this team that I’d never seen. They played on a sport court in a hockey place, and I was like, “Yes, I have to do this.” Just the whole team and their camaraderie, it was just like I’d found my tribe, you know? This is where I wanted to be.

So we came back, I was like yes, I am right there, fresh meat, what all do I need? And I got cheap skates (thinking of it now makes my feet cringe). But yeah, and I started, it was a terrazzo floor in this little skate rink, actually in Swanton, Ohio, it’s just outside of Toledo, we bouted in Toledo, and yeah, I played for them. And so started fresh meat I guess in ‘09, I was bouting mostly in ‘10 I think, one of them carried over into ‘11 that I did, and then we moved in ‘11, so that’s why I stopped doing that. They were even the largest table at my wedding when I got married in ‘10, all of my derby girls. So that’s where it started, but then there’s some years off.

I was going to say—is Knoxville the only other team that you’ve played for?

Yes, so when I moved down here in ‘11, I was like, “Heck yeah, I wanna play, I wanna play with Hard Knox, they have a team, great!” Well I came down, we watched a few of their bouts, and I was like, “Ooh, okay, you guys are legit ranked.” So I was a little scared, a little intimidated, new people, new hitters, all of that stuff. I went down after a bout where they were playing where the Ice Bears play, I was talking to a few of the skaters, and found out they practiced in Oak Ridge. At that time where we were living, that would have been like an hour and fifteen minutes for me to get to practice, and I wanted to do it so bad, like I wanted to do it so bad, but I knew I probably couldn’t commit that to the team. It wouldn’t be fair, I wouldn’t be able to commit three hours of driving time a day to be able to do the practices and that wasn’t fair to the team. So, didn’t do that, and just went and watched them, and wished I could.

Goodness gracious, fast forward and I guess it got to be COVID times. I knew they weren’t practicing, like I was still following, and then I saw a post come up. I wanna say it was September of 2021, and they said, “Ahh we just had our first practice at the Change Center!” And something told me, I was like, “Wait a minute, that seems different.” I looked it up and found out it was downtown Knoxville, and I was like, “Oh yeah, yeah yeah yeah.” I immediately sent a message (I now know it went to Kilty, but it was just messenger, so I didn’t know who it went to) and I was like, “Hey, so I used to skate like ten years ago. Interested, how do I come back?” They said something like, “Do you have gear?” And I was like, “Yeah, yeah, I have actually not gotten rid of my gear,” and I went and checked, and I even had my mouth guard from ten years ago (that’s gotten thrown away since). But yeah, I had everything, I put it in there, and went back. I wanna say it was, it ended up being around September 28 or October 28, one of those—it wasn’t soon after I was there, and the rest is HKRD history! Been there ever since!

What was the emotion as you came back to skating for the first time after ten years?

[nodding] Cause I’d had my skates on a couple of times when we went to roller rinks, never my pads, but to put that stuff back on: it’s a little bit of a gazelle, you know? Getting used to it again. I remember taking, I took some pictures that first day, just so I could remember the feeling, and I was like, *gasp* “I’m back! Like I’m back!” And I also felt so grateful, I was so nervous because I was gonna be awful at it, that was my thing. I was like, I’m gonna struggle, I know I’m gonna struggle. I just kept telling myself, “Don’t give up, just don’t give up, don’t give up.” When I got there, I was so grateful that there were so many people who were new to derby, wanted to try this out, give it a thing. The people I had seen there, later come to know that they were very very new. They had been Goose Poop [Island], like I couldn’t believe their skill level at that point when they were like, “Yeah, I had really never skated a month ago.” What! I couldn’t believe the determination, and I also felt…good, so me getting some skills back—I can do this in a group that feels super safe, it’s not something I’m gonna feel so far behind.

And I felt like there were plenty (not plenty, there were a few) of veterans that came back, so there was a whole lot of people that I could be like, “Yes, I want those skills that they have.” Then there was other people that I felt like I could almost like, “Hey, yeah, plow stops, they got me too, I’m working on them too, this is helping me, is it helping you, what helps you get it because you’re just learning it and maybe it’s something I was never really any good at.” They would help with me, so it was just such a good mix of not being pressured too much to be already at this certain elite level, but then also I felt like I could be helpful to those who were just learning to skate too, with the couple things that I remembered or helped me. Plus I had to learn a whole new derby because of course the rules set was not quite the same, not quite as fast, there was a lot.

Well, just sticking with it is an incredible achievement because it can be really overwhelming to come back like that. But are there any other achievements that you’ve had since you’ve come back that you’ve been especially proud of?

Well, little known fact, I played a #2 blocker, which is the inside line blocker. We didn’t, we kind of lined up in four [lanes]. There wasn’t the whole brace sort of thing. The 1 was the pivot, and they kind of could do anywhere, but I was holding the inside line. That was my job, I was a blocker. I have a picture of when they put me in as a jammer, and I was shaking so bad I didn’t even know if I was gonna make it around the track! I never jammed, and I only jammed that time because we were ahead by like a hundred or so, so it was put everybody in, let ‘em get a try. So when I was then going to be a jammer, I was like, “Um, wait, what? I’m gonna do what? I’m gonna stay a jammer?” I was going back and forth between those. But just being able to be a jammer, to get that mindset, cause it’s a little lonely sometimes, you know? You don’t have as much of that team mentality. You try to look for your teammates, but yeah it’s different, and when you mess up, it’s a lot more obvious. When you end up in the box, there’s a lot more at stake for it, mentally. So just getting to do that and still showing up to be like, yep, I’m still gonna do this, and I still think there’s hope for me to be a good jammer, but yeah, sticking with the jamming when I just, I came from such a blocking mentality.

What is your most common penalty, and does that say anything about your personality or derby playing style?

So previous to this year, I would’ve said that’s the cut track; as a jammer, cause when you get knocked out and your brain gets a little scrambled, you remember this person, but you don’t remember where anybody else really was at the time sometimes, but you think you’re in the good, you hop back on, and you get a little discombobulated basically when you’re trying to get back in. And we won’t even talk about Atlanta [2022 bout], because Atlanta, for some reason, I forgot the rules. And I was getting in and I was going back behind everybody, but I was doing it on the track instead of off, and I just didn’t understand until Inga told me what was happening, and I looked at her, and I remember thinking, “I did what? No, like, I went behind everybody!” And she said, “Yeah, but you did it on the track.” I was like what! Why would I do that? So it was cut track. 

We’ve done a couple of bouts this year, and I wanna say, I’ve not been cutting track! I think I got a directional, which that feels really weird for a jammer, because typically you’re going that way, and then a back block. But what it says about me now, what I learned about just the most recent ones, is I gotta be a little more strategic and a lot less forceful, because I think that’s what’s happening with the back block: I am just trying to be an Earth jammer, and just plow through, a little bit of Fire too, and I think that’s getting me in trouble with where I’m knocking into people as I’m trying to move through.

How do you find a balance between roller derby and real life?

How do I think one should find a balance between roller derby and real life, or how does it work in real life? [laughing]

However you wanna answer that question!

Derby is exciting, and derby is a tribe, and derby lights me up in a way that is just, it’s hard to replicate. I mean, the endorphins, this is our drug, right? And we’re allowed to do it, you know? It’s not harmful in the addiction sort of way, of course we’re bruised and beaten, but you know, we’re sadomasochists, we like it. The balance in between, it is tricky. I like to bring [family] with whenever I can, like bringing to the bouts, and I need to prep for this thing or hiding Easter eggs, drive me around to hide Easter eggs, just trying to involve everybody in the process.

Having a daughter—I also think this is a good sport for her. We are more positive for women, but we are also uplifting for any gender, any expression of that gender, very open, so I think that makes that easy; sharing derby is helpful and finding that balance is just really sharing that because there’s so many positives about it and about the community, about what we stand for, what we don’t stand for, cause I don’t understand that also. My husband’s just become accustomed to it, which makes me happy, that’s good for him too.

But the balance can be hard because there’s so many things that I want to do with the team sometimes, and I have to back off and say, “Nope, I need to take a moment and do something non-derby, you know?” But the good thing is, derby’s understanding of that also, and when we need a minute, when we need a minute at practice. I had to leave practice once, Maddie was having some struggle at home, and I just needed to be there. I let practice know, this is what’s going on, and you don’t hear any grief about it. If anything, you get checked in, like, “Hey, you never leave practice early, is everything okay, you don’t have to tell me a whole lot.” So that’s why it’s easy to find balance because I think it gives us so much that helps balance the other parts of our lives and can contribute to so many other parts of life. And our breaks are nice too, but yeah, it’s easy to balance…it’s not easy to balance, but it is. It makes it so it’s easy to balance, cause we’re all here to have fun, right? We don’t get paid for this. It’s our own time and you have a supportive community that’s supportive of exactly what you can give to the team, because when we say we give 100% to the team, that doesn’t mean 100% of my time, of my energy, of everything—that means 100% of what I have to give. Derby makes it easy.

Who would you like to nominate for next month, and what do you want to ask them?

925 Jersey Cyclone. What are you most proud of in something you have overcome with derby? Because we all have to overcome something—what are you most proud of? And sometimes she’s so quiet, and I really want to know that! Because I see things, I see how she’s grown.

Yes! Like every time she’s tiptoeing on the side, I’m like, “Ahh, it’s so fun to watch!”

Yeah, and she just won’t give up. Definitely wanna know that, what she’s overcome, and I wonder if she tells people that she does derby, and I wonder their response.

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Thanks for a fabulous conversation, Madam Bomb! Readers, you can catch her in both of our home bouts this Saturday, June 3, against The World and Greenville Roller Derby. Our fans had quite the presence at our first home bout, so you don’t want to miss out on your chance to be a part of the crowd! Until next time, be like Madam Bomb and don’t give up on something you really want.

-smalls-

May Featured Skater: Sin City Rebel

Name: Sin City Rebel

Number: 702

Travel Teams: All Stars & Marble City Mayhem

Home Team: Moonshine Moxies

Years skating: 8

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She’s always a calming presence on the track—unless you’re her opponent, in which case, you’d better watch out for a hard hit outta nowhere! Get to know this seasoned blocker: May’s Featured Skater, Sin City Rebel.

You were nominated by Magically Malicious, who has a few questions for you. First, how excited are you this year as co-captain of the charter, because, in her words, you are rocking it and you are so awesome? (And I agree with her!)

I’m pretty excited. I really like to be involved in trying new things when it comes to the team and all of that kind of stuff, so I’m very excited. I don’t know if I’m rocking it since I’ve only done it for one game, so I don’t know if it’s really rocking it, or I was just kind of like, “I’m here!” But I’m pretty excited for that, especially with as many good people as we have and as many people that have been there a little longer than I have been there—it’s a big honor for me, that my own skaters and friends and people that I spend a lot of time with chose me. It’s great.

And second, how do you stay so calm on the track when it is hectic? Because you are calmness personified somehow for the entire game, no matter what.

I’ve really thought about this for awhile, because I’ve always felt that I am out of control, but I have had a lot of people say when things are getting really tough on the track and everything, you’re always the one that’s like, “It’s alright, let’s get together, calm down, small movements” (is what everybody likes to make fun of me about). But I think on the track because of the fact that, when you are on the track, you are a figure of your team. If you are running at the mouth, or if you’re yelling at referees and stuff like that, it doesn’t just look bad on you, it looks bad on the team. So one thing I do not want to do is make my team look bad for any reason whatsoever. So I stay as calm as I can in the situations on the track. I mean, of course I get a penalty and sometimes I look at the refs and put my hands up like, “Really?” But when I’m not on the track and I’m on the bench though, I do not feel like I’m very calm, because I’ll be the first one to say something about something. It’s nice to know that I do put off that I’m very calm and collected, even though in my brain I’m probably screaming inside, like “Oh my god!” It’s just something I think that I got from playing sports before that, you know, you are a reflection of your team, so if you are doing something that is not a good reflection of your team, then it doesn’t just look bad on you, it looks bad on everybody.

How long do you think it took you to develop that sort of mindset? Was it strictly a derby thing, or did it come from those other sports that you just mentioned?

I didn’t have to do it in my other sports because I had my parents to do it for me! They were the voices, and I was just the player, you know? But as I’ve—even when I was coaching a sport for my daughters, I was (between me and the other coach) I was the calm one. I was like, “Hey, you know, they’re little, we can’t be out here screaming and all of that kind of stuff.” But when it comes to derby, I think once I really got the whole gist of derby—which, I like to tell the new people, it takes years before you get everything, before you understand. And then sometimes even after as many years as I've been playing, I’m like, “Oh, I didn’t know that!” You really never feel like you know everything, but I have found that my team keeps me that way. When you have people on the track like Bush and Lyda, and they’re calm, even in the worst situations on the track, it rubs off on you, and you want to be, you’re like, “Okay, if they’re still calm, then I should still be calm.” So I think that’s where that comes from with this team.

How did you discover roller derby then?

This is a really hard one. So I had a friend up in North Dakota that—she had told us that she was playing roller derby, and she had invited me and my family to come watch her. So I went and watched, and of course I had no idea what was going on, but I thought it was really cool, and I thought all of these girls were really cool out here, and I loved the fact that everybody was different—different sizes and different race, different everything. And at the time, I didn’t really have anything that I was doing. I was telling my sister about roller derby, and we saw a sign for a game, and of course, the town that I was living in was like, five miles wide, so it wasn’t very big. So I said, “We should go watch. I think you would like it too.” She came with me, and at the end of the game, we’re talking and I think I had talked to a couple of skaters, and they were like, “Hey, we’ve got a bootcamp coming up really soon.” And I was like, “What is that, or fresh meat?” They were like, “If you want to join!” And I was like, “Well I don’t know how to play.” And they were like, “Oh no, we teach you everything!” And I was like, “Okay!” I looked at my sister and said, “What do you think? We should do this?” And she said, “Yeah, let’s go to the informational!” Because you go to the informational and you try on gear, you see if you can—if you’re a baby deer or not. So we go and by the end of the information, I am smitten. I am like, I’m doing this. I look at my sister and said, “We’re doing this!” And she was like, “Oh no, I never was going to do this. I just knew that you wouldn’t go unless I came with you.” So that’s how I ended up going to fresh meat because my sister, she literally duped me. I thought this was something me and her were going to do together, and she was like, “Oh no, I’m going to sit up here while you go get your butt creamed, and I’m going to be your biggest fan!” Which, of course, she is my biggest fan. So that’s how it happened.

So how long were you with that team?

I was with the Grand Forx Sugar Beaters. I joined them in 2015 and then in 2018 I stopped playing with them and then I, instead of playing with them, I was actually playing with teams around the area. I would go and foster for them and actually, I consider having three teams up there that I ended up falling in love with (a bunch of other teams, and being part of their team too) so I have tons of jerseys from other seasons and stuff. So got the Grand Forks Sugar Beaters, we’ve got the Kampeska Krushers, which are in Watertown, South Dakota, and then we’ve got A-Town [Roller], which is in Aberdeen, South Dakota. They are all my family. I actually have three derby wives up there, who will forever be my derby wives, and we all are family and all of that. So I played there until 2019 up there, and then I moved here to Tennessee.

When you were on each of those three different teams, did you find that you inhabited a similar role, as far as what position on the track, or how you interact with the other teammates, or was there a different vibe for each team?

Well the two teams in South Dakota, they played exactly like each other. They were all family too because the teams were very close, and we would, if Kampeska was coming to play us and they didn’t have enough people, you knew that A-Town was going to be there with them. So the derby community up there is very small because the towns are so small. I just remember the first time I played against Watertown. There was a girl on the team, her name is Juanna B. Out, is her derby name. And I remember, it was in my first year playing and I remember watching her, and I was like, “I want to be her, that’s who I want to be. I want to hit like her, I wanna have the confidence that she has, and all of that.” And me fostering for those teams, I got the skills that I have from watching them play, and them teaching me. I’d be like, “How did you do that?” And they’d be like, “Oh, it’s easy! Just do this, this, and this.” And it was like, “Well it sounds easy, you make it look easy, but I don’t think I’m able to do that!”

So I just tried to—I was a sponge, and I tried to sponge off of all of them, and learn from them, which eventually I did become the captain of the Forx Sugar Beaters, and I was part of their training. In my last year there I did training and captain. I’ve been treasurer on the team too, so I’ve been in some roles before, but there was a lot of stuff that happened in the last year that I was there that just kind of made me want to, “Okay, maybe I’m just going to be a foster for people for awhile, and step back from those roles.”

What would you do if the teams played each other? Would you just pick a team?

So it was one of those things where it was like, who asked first? So if A-Town and Watertown were playing against each other, of course the Sugar Beaters were one of the closest teams to them, so if they were playing against each other, it was who was gonna ask you first, and that’s who you would go for, you know? You would have to, because, “I’m sorry, they asked me first!” So that was always a hard decision. I’ve played more games against my derby wives than I’ve ever played with my derby wives.

When you’re out on the track, how would you describe your derby playing style?

I feel like I’m very aggressive, and my aggressiveness tends to send me to the penalty box a lot. We all know, we’ve all seen it. I feel like I have very good track awareness, so because of my track awareness—and I can only, I can say that Bush has better track awareness than me, but I feel like me and Bush are bookends: you know, I’m lane 1, she’s lane 4; I’m lane 4, she’s lane 1. I feel like my track awareness ends up getting me those bigger hits that you see. I have been kicked out of the game for hitting someone too hard (which there’s no such thing in roller derby, unless it’s malicious—it wasn’t, it wasn’t malicious) but I have been told that, you know, that was a little too hard.

But I just, I get into that mindset of it’s just like playing softball. You don’t want that ball to get past you, so you do anything you can possibly do. You don’t want that jammer past you, so you do what you have to do to make sure, and if there are times where I’ll hit a jammer, and I know I’ve hit them so hard, that even I go, “Oh God, did I do that? I’m so sorry!” But in the end, it’s about, you know, roller derby is aggressive. Roller derby is a contact sport, and the girl that got me kicked out of that game, I told her, this is a contact sport. You would do it to me if you had the chance to do it to me. 

I do love—more than anything—hitting a jammer and the whole crowd going, “Ooooh!” That pumps me up so good because I may not be the fastest, I obviously cannot jam, we’ve all seen it, so when I can do that and give my team a time to either get back together, regroup, refocus, then I feel like I’ve accomplished something.

So kind of with that, with people who might be intimidated by, you know, how aggressive we can be out there, what advice would you give for people who want to play roller derby?

Don’t ever think that you’re too old, you’re too big, you’re too skinny, you’re too small, you’re too anything. I had the pleasure of playing with a woman who was 75 years old. She was, at the time, the oldest active skater in the US, and she was badass. So I always say, when people say, “Well, I don’t know how to skate!” We teach you. You know, everything can be taught. Everybody is taught how to do this. I did not walk into roller derby and be the skater I am today. Obviously it takes years to get some of the skills or you know you have those epiphanies like, “Man, it’s taken me five years to learn that!” Don’t ever think that anything about yourself could prevent you from playing roller derby, because I have played with small people, I have played with big people, I have played with older people, I have played with people that are freshly out of high school, eighteen-year-olds. I have played with a dynamic—I have played with men, there’s no reason why you cannot try roller derby. There’s physically—everybody can do it.

Amen! So how did you decide on your skater name and number?

Oh, it was the biggest ordeal of my life! This was harder than naming my four children. I had never had to name myself. So backstory: originally I grew up in Las Vegas. I moved there as a teen and Las Vegas is home, so I threw around all these Las Vegas themed names. There were so many of them. I put on Facebook, “Hey I joined roller derby and I made the team, and I need suggestions, and I want it to be something that is hometown related, or something that has my name in it” (because my name is kind of a unique name). So I put it out, and I’m gonna tell you right now that, there at one point, there were 82 different roller derby names that people had given me! My brother, my oldest brother, Bryan, had given me so many derby names that I couldn’t even pick the best one out of it.

So when it came down to it, being from Las Vegas, Sin City, of course, I wanted to rep being from Las Vegas. So that’s where the “Sin City” came from. The “Rebel” part is a two part: the UNLV Rebels, that’s the college team, you know cause at the time that’s all Las Vegas had was a college team (there was no football or hockey or anything like that back then). So I ended up going with “Rebel,” but also because me myself, I’m a little bit of a rebel. I always have been in my life. My family says I just wing everything, so that’s why I was like, Rebel was definitely what I was going for. So Sin City Rebel it became, with the thought in my head that everybody was going to call me Rebel.

Because I was going to ask about that, how you feel about us calling you Sin!

First day it literally was—one of the girls came up to me, one of the girls that had been a vet on the team. She came up to me and said, “What’s your roller derby name?” And I said, “Sin City Rebel.” And she goes, “Alright, Sin! That’s what you are!” And I was like, “I—but I—I kind of wanted to be called Rebel?” But as I’ve gotten into playing roller derby more, there are a lot of Rebels out there, so maybe Sin is okay. And my number is the area code of Las Vegas, number 702.

But I also have another roller derby name that I recently got when I joined Mayhem. I went back to that post that my brother, and my name being Rhiannon, he had said that my roller derby name should have been Rhiactor. That’s the best one he thought he had come up with. So when I joined Mayhem, I had seen a couple of other girls that had joined Mayhem had different derby names on Mayhem. So I was like, for my brother, I decided to take Rhiactor, so that is my derby name. At the beginning, my number was 82, which was the year I was born, but I messed up when I made my jersey last year and ended up with 702 again, because I didn’t think about it when I was putting all the information in, and just was like, “Number? Yeah, 702!” So I’ve got the two derby names, and I feel like, when I’m on Mayhem, I feel a little bit of a different skater because of the guys playing against the guys and stuff like that, so I feel like the name kind of fits me in the co-ed situation.

You mentioned that it was easier to name your kids than to name yourself—what do your kids think of you as a derby player?

My kids think I’m pretty badass! They have always been my biggest fans (next to my little sister, of course, my sister Shelby is #1 fan) but they have always been there, they travel with me when I go to travel games. My son still lives up in North Dakota, so I send him pictures or show him anything that I can of, “Hey, we played this game today,” and give him updates and stuff, and you know, so they think I'm a pretty badass mom. They tell everybody that I play roller derby, and so it’s very, it makes me feel really good that I can share that with them, and that they don’t think it’s lame, and that they think that it’s cool. I’m pretty sure that I will have—my girls will probably play roller derby one day.

Who would you like to nominate for next month, and what do you want to ask?

Let’s pick Madam Bomb. How does she get ready for a bout, and how does she always keep her hair looking so magnificent all of the time?

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Thanks for a great conversation Sin! We’re so lucky to have you as a part of Hard Knox! Readers, you will be able to see her and the rest of the league in action for our first home bout on May 20. Until next time, be like Sin and stay calm even when everything around you is pure chaos.

- smalls-

April Featured Skater: Magically Malicious

Name: Magically Malicious

Number: 515

Travel Team: All-Stars & Marble City Mayhem

Home Team: Lolitas

Years skating: 7

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April’s featured skater wears a lot of hats behind the scenes, but she’s equally hard to ignore on the track! Get to know the feisty blocker who always has a smile on her face: Magically Malicious!

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You were nominated by Slamwise Gamgee, who wants to know: How is it different being on the team now, post-COVID, as it was pre-COVID? What are some pros and cons?

It’s weird because I went from being one of the newer skaters to one of the older skaters overnight. Some of the pros are: we have a really good team right now that are very positive and willing to put forth effort to get better. Some of the cons are: I miss my old friends too! They were cool, they could come back—just for all those reading, y’all can come back!

Yes, I agree, some of them need to come back! We need some friends! So how did you first get involved with roller derby?

There was a punk rock flea market by Purple Heart Tattoo, long time ago when they used to do them versus who does them now. I was new to Knoxville and I had just gone to check things out, and Stabby and Kitty were running a table and they were like, “Do you need friends?” and I was like, “Yes…” “Do you need exercise?” “Yes!” and they were like, “We have both!” And so I just showed up and kind of stuck.

Had you ever roller skated before?

Maybe every once in a while as the kid holding the wall at a birthday party. They taught me skating from scratch.

What was an early victory that you had as far as skating?

Man, everything was a victory! Any small thing I learned how to do, I was excited about, because I couldn’t do it before. One of the hardest things to learn was backwards skating, and I’m still not very good at that. Still not great at plowstopping, so kind of think, I don’t know how I stopped at ten feet [for the test], pretty sure I didn’t.

They were like, “Yes, you’re good, you got it.”

Someone did, I don’t know!

What is the story behind your skater name and number?

515 is my anniversary because if I didn’t have that as a number, I wouldn’t remember it, because I’m really bad with dates, and I forget every year when May comes around, I’m like, “Oh yeah, that is 5.”

My name, my boyfriend came up with. It was one of his friend’s group names on WOW [World of Warcraft], so he’s like, “What about this?” And I was like, “Sure!”

And I was intending on being called “M” because that’s what I’m called in life, but it didn’t happen that way, so…

Most people call you “Mag.”

Pretty much, yeah.

I call you M.

You do, Lorri does—sometimes…no, just you and Lorri.

If Magically Malicious had a theme song, what would it be?

My favorite song growing up for the longest time was “Having a Blast” by Green Day, but I don’t know if that’s really appropriate any longer because I tend to be a little bit less destructive in life than I was at sixteen. Let’s see…I don’t know…[laughs] You know the song from Finding Nemo, “Just Keep Swimming”? That Dory sings? Probably that one. That’s about where I am in life.

Well I feel like that really is you on the track because—and I already had this [as a question]—you always give off a positive and present mindset out on the track. So does that come naturally to you, or did you have to cultivate that?

I think I tend to be a pretty positive person, but I also bounce between major negativity. So I’m negative inside, but positive outside. If you pretend to be—if you find the good stuff, the bad stuff’s not as bad, so just always be positive.

What is your favorite position to play?

I much prefer blocking, just playing blocking, over anything else. I tend to like to block either on the outside or the middle because I feel very wiggly in the middle. I feel useful there, but I also feel useful on the outside. Not really into jamming, but I’m trying because it’s harder.

What makes you want to try jamming?

I feel like I need more exercise, and it’s murder.

It’s very exhausting!

Yes, and you get your heart rate up and then down and up and down so you’re burning more calories, and sometimes you remember to breathe.

On occasion!

Which is good for you! But I don’t know, I just don’t want to be stuck in the back of the pack, so being a jammer, having jammer skills can help you not be goated [caught by the opponent]. I don’t know, might as well try!

Which of the four elements, what kind of jammer are you?

So I think probably Earth, more than I need to be. The last few practices after we redid the elemental jammer practice, I’m like, “I am going to be Water!” and every time I approach the pack I am like, “I am going to be Water!” and I talk through it, and I’m like, “Now I’m gonna go over here! Now I’m gonna go over there! Where will I be? You’ll never know!” And then I give up and just hit the center and run, so…I am erosion.

I mean, and wearing down the pack, it is exhausting to deal with a jammer like that.

It’s more exhausting to be that jammer.

Very true.

I will one day jump something, maybe ten years from now, but not now.

What have been some of your favorite derby moments?

I did catch a jammer at that last game against the Swarm. I don’t know who the jammer was, they got out, I managed to get in front of them (without a forearm somehow, small miracle). And then it was so great because I heard behind me, Sin, she’s just like, “Hold her, Mag! We’ll be there in a second!” Just nice and calm. I’m like, thanks! I did something!

Yeah because they reformed in front of her, and you were the one who held her to make it so that she had to fight through all of y’all again.

It was great! Demoralizing! And I don’t know, I’ve been getting pretty good at whips. That’s going to be a thing, I think, this year.

What other goals do you have for yourself this year?

Fourth year in a row: I’m gonna learn how to hockey stop. Been learning it now for five years, this year’s gonna be the year I actually figure it out.

I mean, I feel like I’ve seen a lot of growth with you on that.

They’re getting better. They’re not as scary any more, I just gotta add speed.

Speed always makes things scary.

It does! It makes stopping easier, but scarier.

What is something on your bucket list?

Probably like two or three gallons, nothing too big. [grins] I’d like to go to all the national parks—well, not all of them, but a lot of them. So that’s something my boyfriend and I have done, is a lot of national park tours.

I want to finish every trail in the Smokies. So the 900 (which isn’t actually 900, but it’s close) I’m over halfway, I’ll get there soon. I’d like to do it by 45.

Do you have any derby heroes?

Just people on the team that I would like to be more like, but not like outside of Hard Knox. I mean, a lot of people I watch, and I’m like, “Ooh, I want to do that one thing,” but not to say, I’m not fangirling, not the way I should be.

What advice would you have for people who want to play roller derby?

I mean, you can do it! There’s no one who can’t, so if you are willing to put forth effort and not quit, even when your knees hurt, even when your ankles hurt, even when your legs hurt, when you have no toenails left, you can do it. But you have to be willing to put in the effort. It’s not going to come naturally. It is not easy. No one is born with skates on their feet. Everyone feels confused and lost for approximately three years. But you can do it.

How do you find a balance between roller derby and real life?

Mostly just by practicing standing on one leg [laughs] I can’t say there necessarily is one. It’s my hobby, so it’s the thing I do when I’m not working. It’s scheduled out, it’s easy, like if you don’t want to do something, you just don’t do it. Telling people “No,” that’s my thing this year, Imma say, “No.”

Giving yourself boundaries.

Mhmm!

What is something you wish more people understood about roller derby?

It exists! The rules, the rules were so confusing. But mostly just that it is not what you watched in the 70s and 80s, but it is cool and it is here.

What is your favorite thing about being a Lolita?

Oh, everything about Lolitas is the best! There’s nothing that sucks about being a Lolita. And once you’re a Lolita, you’re a Lolita for Life. And we win everything, and we are the best, and they’re wild and crazy but cool and thank god we have Gnarly, because otherwise we’d fall off the rails.

Who would you like to nominate for next month, and what would you like to ask them?

Sin. How excited is she for this year as co-captain of the charter, because she is rocking it and she is so awesome? And how does she stay calm on the track when it is hectic, because she is calmness personified somehow for the entire game, no matter what.

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Thank you for a super fun conversation! I wish everyone could hear how much you made me laugh throughout this entire interview, but anyone who spends a few minutes with you knows that you light up any room. So readers, your assignment for this month is to be like Magically Malicious: have a positive attitude and “Just keep swimming!”

-smalls-

March Featured Skater: Slamwise Gamgee

Name: Slamwise Gamgee

Number: 406

Travel Team: Brawlers 

Home Team: Lolitas

Years skating: 2

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She may be sweet in real life, but she’s always looking to give a big hit out there on the track. Hard Knox wouldn’t have got far without Slam! Get to know March’s skater of the month: Slamwise Gamgee!

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You were nominated by Sinister Siren, who has a two-part question for you: other than your ankle kind of giving you trouble throughout your first year, what was the biggest hurdle that you got over? 

Myself, my mind. I’m really big into thinking that I can’t do things, so when I started doing things, it was a hurdle to A: stop thinking I can’t do it, and then B: having imposter syndrome when I did start to do all of the things.

And also what was your biggest wow moment from your first year?

I mean, I guess same thing. I started doing things correctly, and then I was like, noticed for doing them correctly, and I’m very big on always—I talk myself up a lot, and it’s mostly because I don’t really believe it, so maybe if I talk it, I’m going to manifest it. Sometimes it can kind of seem like I’m coming off cocky or whatever, or like I’m just talking about myself a lot, but really it’s just because I don’t really believe it. So then when I started getting MVP every game, I was like, “What is happening?”

I am definitely a big believer in “Fake It Til You Make It.”

I mean, 100% of that was my whole rookie year, so I guess it works!

Speaking of your MVP Blockers, you did get a lot of those awards last year. Do any of them stick out in your mind as a favorite?

The first one is always going to be my favorite because it was so—”what is happening, I cannot believe that someone actually believed in me enough”. People have different opinions about them, but I’m like, wow, I made such a presence, People remembered me. And I just remember looking over to my husband and I was like “What is happening?” Because they said 406 and okay, great!

So what brought you to roller derby in the first place?

So my husband and his twin sister and his little sister are huge presences in the rugby community in Knoxville, and everybody was always like, “Why don’t you play rugby?” And I’m like, ew, no contact sports, I’m a band geek, no thank you.

And then my rugby wife/best friend, Autumn, bought a pair of roller skates and we were just gonna skate around at the tennis court while our husbands were practicing, and I absolutely refused to stand up on skates. And then once I did stand up, I was like, you know, I’m gonna go for this roller derby thing. And then literally the next day after I decided to stand up on skates, I saw it was the meet and greet. So I was like, “Okay, eff it, let’s do it.”

So then did that lead into Goose Poop Island?

Yeah, exactly. It was literally two days after I stood up on skates, I saw the meet and greet at Goose Poop Island was just the following Sunday. Then that’s when I showed up and met Randy and everything just kind of—I’m the kind of person to where if I see something or I’m like in a situation, I just know it’s mine or it’s for me (I say it’s a Pisces thing). My husband hates it because he knows once I got that feeling, it’s done for- it’s what’s happening. It happened with him, it happened with our dog, it happened with our house, and it happened with roller derby. I just knew it was my thing.

How did you select your skater name and number?

My skater name is the real hero of The Lord of the Rings, Samwise Gamgee. I want to portray him at all costs. I want to be the unsaid hero and the supporter of his friends, and the one who will do it no matter what. If anybody knows me, you know I love The Lord of the Rings. Everybody who knows anything about me knows I love The Lord of the Rings.

And then 406 is actually Samwise’s birthday. I may change it coming up when I have to get a new jersey. I may change it to 3, for different reasons. One being it was his mailbox number, the other being it’s my husband’s rugby number sometimes. So maybe? But either way, it’s because of him.

It’s going to be Samwise-related, no matter what.

Exactly, no matter what.

Well, speaking of Lord of the Rings, you recently added to your tattoos and it was Lord of the Rings related. Care to share the story behind that one, or any other tattoo?

Well, I only have four at the moment—no, I only have three at the moment, I’m getting my fourth one in two weeks. My Lord of the Rings tattoo (my first Lord of the Rings tattoo, because I will be getting my left side of my body Lord of the Rings themed) is Narsil, which is the sword that Aragorn will use to take over Gondor basically.

And I don’t know, I just—A: it’s a cool looking tattoo, honestly, and B: I mean, the cheesy symbolism that you think of is something that broken can be fixed again, and used to take over the world. So just cheesy symbolism for me.

Continuing with cheesy symbolism, what’s something that you've gained from your roller derby experience that you maybe didn’t expect?

Honestly, confidence in my ability to do things that I never thought I could (if you know me you know skating does not go with Stormy at all). Also I’m not the smallest person, so confidence also that not being small is still useful. Also, I have gotten lots of muscles, not only from roller derby but because I’ve been working out more to get better at roller derby,. Being strong and bigger isn’t always necessarily the wrong thing, and I think roller derby has given me that confidence.

The thing that also surprised me is the friendships I have gotten through roller derby. I have always considered myself a closed-knit kind of person—I have really only had one best friend for over 18 years, and another in the past 4—but the people I have met on this team are the most sincere, genuine people who are a huge reason I believe in my myself on the track (which will make my husband so mad, because he always believed in me and hates when I finally believe it because someone else said it). If you were to ever tell me I would have a derby wife (maybe some mistresses as well), and a BFF who is the female version of the love of my life and that I am getting a matching tattoo with in 2 weeks, I would never have believed it.

Yeah, it’s really cool that there’s really no best size or type for a roller derby player. Like there are advantages and disadvantages to all of them.

Right. Everyone is gonna have some type of hating their body, but in roller derby they say, “Hey, literally whatever your body type, you have a place here, and there’s a purpose for what you have.”

Absolutely! How would you describe your derby playing style?

Aggressive, which is very surprising to me. My husband would say that I am a sweet person. That’s also very weird— I’m very girly. His nickname for me sometimes is Princess, and that’s because I kind of am. Then once I’m on the track, I’m like, “I’m gonna hit you…hard.” Literally, my goal for every game is to make the crowd go, “Oooh,” at least two or three times. I don’t want to hurt or injure anyone, but I do want you to get out of my and my jammer’s way.

Is that at all comparable to your husband when he’s playing rugby?

Oh my gosh, yes. Everybody knows that watching him. That is why that’s my goal, because I love it when he hits the other team. They always try to go for him, because they know he’s gonna hit like that, and I love it when I hear the crowd go “Oooh,” and I’m like, “Yeah, he’s mine, thank you.”

What is a song that always gets you out on the dance floor?

No—I do not dance. If I were to move my shoulders, it’s probably gonna be some type of Broadway or Disney, but I don’t dance.

What about karaoke?

Again, Disney or Broadway musicals. I actually can sing. but I do not like to sing in front of people. My husband hates it— “That’s actually something you can do, like why don’t you show it off?” But yeah, Disney music or Broadway musicals, or any soundtrack like Pokemon or whatever.

Do you have any goals for this season?

I wanna get rostered for at least one actual game. I’m going tomorrow to an All-Star scrimmage, but it’s kind of a mixed scrimmage, so I want to get rostered for at least one actual All-Star game. I know I’m a Brawler in my soul, but that’s one of my goals. Also, you know, MVP’s always a goal, just for my own mentality, not for anything else.

Do you have any other favorite achievements on the track?

I mean, it’s kind of crazy to me when I’m actually a team player. When I get with my favorite walls— like Mental, Bear or Ruby (my blocking partner) whenever we actually stop a jammer and it’s halfway through the two minutes and we’re still two feet away from the jam line, that’s a favorite, and we’ve done it multiple times. Sometimes we’ve even taken the jammer back past the jam line, and they never even got the initial pass. That’s always my favorite achievement, when we utilize our teamwork like that.

Also being slightly comfortable on my toe stops. Because if anybody who remembers me at Goose Poop Island and before even, like my friend Autumn—I tried to run on my toe stops once and she says it was the most traumatic thing she’s ever seen in her life when I fell. So now I’m slightly comfortable on toe stops, so that’s also one of my major achievements in my head.

How do you find a balance between roller derby and real life?

I don’t think I have yet! Derby has consumed my heart and soul. Luckily my job is amazing and it’s just a 9 to 5. I do what is needed, and I put my whole effort into that, and then I can clock out and go focus on the next things. So I try to make it to where Sundays and Wednesdays are 100% derby. If I have a game on Saturday, I’m going to, especially this year, try not to do anything on Sundays—devote it to my family, my husband. Then Mondays and Fridays, me and Ray try to go to the gym together, and then Tuesdays and Thursdays, I’ll try to go work out at Hero Athletics with Shamir (I say “try” because sometimes it doesn’t work out) while he is at rugby. It’s a lot. It’s hard to have every single day devoted, but sometimes in order to live a balanced life, you have to do it like that. And then there’s no plan, it kind of falls apart, but that’s the goal.

What advice would you give people who want to play roller derby?

Just do it, honestly. Channeling my inner Shia LaBeouf here, but literally just do it. If you’re thinking about it and saying “I don’t know, it’s not for me,” just try because you could be like me where you have a princess mentality and think that all you’ll ever be is a band geek, and then put on skates and then start doing crazy things!

Who do you want to nominate for next month, and what do you want to ask them?

Magically Malicious. How is it different being on the team now, post-COVID, as it was pre-COVID? What are some pros and cons?

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Thanks for such a fun conversation, Slam! You can catch HKRD at the Mardi Growl parade this Saturday, March 4, in Old City and downtown Knoxville! Until then, be like Slam and fake it til you make it because the “making it” will happen sooner than you think :)

-smalls-