Rockville Women On a Roll with Roller Derby

Roller derby isn’t the most popular of sports. You won’t find it on ESPN or the local news. But that hasn’t stopped the sport from gathering speed with a team of women in Rockville.

The Black-Eyed Suzies are the only team in the Free State Roller Derby league.

The team was founded in Nov. 2009. At first, only three or four people attended practices. The team was open to any skill level, which made it a challenge to prepare members for competition.

“Imagine trying to start a baseball team and no one had ever played the game,” said team member Caroline “Crum and Punishment” Crum.

The team now has around 30 regular members, including Sandi “Slaughter Lily” Burtseva, who said she became interested in the sport after watching the Drew Barrymore-directed roller derby movie “Whip It,” starring Ellen Page.

“I remember I watched 'Whip It' five times. After the fourth time, I was determined to try,” Burtseva said. “I had no skating experience but I had to try it.”

Other team members said the movie was entertaining, but it doesn’t exactly portray a true roller derby experience.

Although the sport looks like a combination between NASCAR and hockey, the most important rules are easy to follow.

Each team sends four players out on the track, three blockers and one jammer. The jammer scores points by lapping the other team’s blockers—who try to prevent the jammer from passing.

Only after the jammer laps their opponents the second time do points start to accumulate.

"Awareness is very important to the game," said coach Bryan Johnson. "It's like a chess match is going on at 30 mph."

While the basics seem simple, there is a 34-page rulebook.

Roller derby has a character—and characters—distinctly its own. Players taken on aliases like those of pro wrestlers or the short-lived XFL football league.

“This goes back to the sport in the 1960s and '70s,” Burtseva said. “The sport was more like the WWE where it was fake hits and fights. When the sport was revived in the early 2000s, it was something that stuck.”

Why do these ladies do it?

With the aches and bruises comes a feeling of community, they said.

“We’ve had skaters as young as 20 and women who are into their 50s,” said Julie Nemecek. “It’s a good mix of people. We have police officers and teachers and everyone in between. Its nice to get to know people you otherwise wouldn’t have gotten to know.”

The sport offers the opportunity to break from gender stereotypes, some team members said.

“Roller derby brings out personality women usually don’t get to demonstrate,” Nemecek said. “We get to be competitive and tough.”

It's also a great way to relieve stress in the work place, said Laura "Scarring Nightly" Davis, who skates as a way to work out the angst of emails she receives as an administrative assistant with a corporation.

"So sometimes I see the email right before I hit someone," she said.

The one-team league is looking to expand in the fall. They expect to skate their first bout in November and are may break up into smaller teams for 2012.

“We’re going to have big things in six months,” Nemecek said. “We’re ready to take over Rockville and the surrounding area.”

Read more about the Black-Eyed Suzies in The Gazette.