It is almost impossible to believe that less than a year ago, August 2010, I had never played roller derby in my life. I hadn't even been on roller skates since sometime around 1986. And to think that our very first bout is coming up...it's a bit of a mind-blower.

Ok, so it isn't really a bout, it's more of a scrimmage...but still, it's a full 60 minutes of gameplay.

And it isn't too public, it's just friends and family...but this is the first time most of us will get to share this part of our lives with our friends and family in this manner.

And we've only been on teams for a week...but that's ok, most of us have been skating together at LEAST since January, and some since August.

Yesterday morning when I heard that we'd be scrimmaging with the Lansing Mitten Mavens, my first thought was "we're going to DIE." However, as I learned more about the setup of the scrimmage (mixed teams, not us vs. them) I got more excited about the whole thing. However, by the time I showed up at the rink, the excitement was giving way to nerves. We've never scrimmaged with or against another league...were we about to get destroyed? Would we look like fools in front of these other girls? Would someone get seriously hurt like had happened at fresh meat practice the night before? I was definitely worried.

Going through our usual warm-up helped quell the nerves a little but I was still a bit hesitant to throw myself in the proverbial ring with these other girls. Sure, they seemed nice enough but they're ahead of us by a bit and have had real public bouts which we haven't had yet. 

After a weekend full of derby-related activities (karaoke party, brunch, league meeting, recruitment fair and board of directors photo shoot) I was really excited to head to practice and hang out with such an awesome group of girls. Last Wednesday's practice was awesome and I felt on top of the world. Although a bit tired because of the insane weekend, lots of grading and the final stretch to Thanksgiving break, I was psyched to see the girls and train for our upcoming skills test.

As I mentioned in a previous blog post, I used to be really involved with figure skating. Kind of like USARS is the governing body for roller skating, the USFSA is the governing body for figure skating. Kind of like how in martial arts you can take tests to move up skill levels, the same holds true for figure skating. For example, those skaters you see in the Olympics? They're skating at the senior level in USFSA. So, it goes from preliminary on up with a lot of stops on the way to senior. Even though solo skating and competing wasn't the area of my greatest ability, I adored synchronized skating and that has its levels as well. So, in order to skate on a senior or collegiate team, skaters still need to pass certain skill levels or they aren't eligible to skate on a team of a particular level.