First it bears mentioning that the clinic overall was exceptionally well run and organized. Check in was easy. The exhibit hall at the Monroe Fairgrounds is a great space with a smooth floor, tons of natural light (such as it is in the Pacific Northwest) and plenty of clearance on all sides of the three practice tracks. Coaches refrained from using whistles so that there was no confusion from one track to the next, which I deeply appreciated. Food was available for purchase although I brought my own so I cannot speak to its quality.
Each hour had classes designed for beginning, intermediate and advanced skaters and I felt appropriately challenged in the intermediate and advanced options with many other players who are near my own skill level. My only real complaint would have been that some classes felt crowded although that was less of a problem as the clinic reached its conclusion.
But enough of that. You really wanted to hear about the skating.
Agility
When I started skating two years ago one of my coaches said that we'd all eventually learn to do everything we can do in tennis shoes on roller skates. I always thought this to be true until one of my friends pointedly asked whether I could climb a tree in roller skates. Leaving aside the question of whether I could climb a tree at all, I'll go ahead and stipulate that advanced skaters should expect to be able to do most ground based activities in roller skates as well as they can in tennis shoes.
The problem is that it's easy to get caught up in only working on agility maneuvers as you see them in your own league and there's so much more out there to explore. For instance, Smarty Pants asked a question I've never heard: Are you using your toe stoppers as a tool or a crutch? She went on to explain that after playing roller derby for years on the banked track without toe stoppers she transitioned to flat track and subsequently added toe stoppers to her skates. Not because she couldn't maneuver without her toe stoppers but because she wanted to use them to augment the things she could already do.
Now that's an interesting concept. If you had to play a game without your toe stops could you? Would you even know how to start? After all we know that the equation of agility in roller derby is rarely that you as a player should do X in Y circumstance but rather that the solution to game play lays in intuition and a certain level of unpredictability. You must be able to move in the way your body dictates, whatever that may be.
I'll be working on a couple of moves in particular in the coming months. I'm afraid I'm not sure what to call the first one, but moving laterally your feet would look like this:
1.) | _ 2.) _ _ 3.) _ |
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So, starting with your feet in an "L" position you transfer weight to your right foot, go into a mohawk, transfer weight onto your left foot and then put your right skate down at a perpendicular angle so that it stops your movement. Why do that instead of a turn around toe stop? I'll have to play around with it but I'm guessing that this particular maneuver is helpful because it allows you to face forward throughout and sets you up to go back in the other direction immediately, without moving your feet from where you stopped.
I suppose the second skill this brought to light was our old friend the duck walk/run. Now - can I duck walk/run? Sure. But if I'm being honest with myself I know that when I'm doing it my right foot turns out and does all the work while the left foot remains pointed forward and does nothing. Turns out that you can accelerate a lot faster if you use both feet. It's also worth noting that when Smarty needs to move backwards in a hurry she duck runs backwards with her toes pointed outward and then comes to a stop using a backwards plow. So you know - something to work on.
Blocking Backwards
After six months of hard work I've finally figured out how to block while skating backwards. I've been very proud. However, it would seem that I'm destined to spend the next six months figuring out when not to block backwards and I have to admit that it's a bit disappointing. Still - it's easy to see that turning around at inopportune times during game play can be ineffective at the least and dangerous at worst. Smarty Pants says "I wish I was a good enough player so that I never had to turn around." Getsome says that players who find themselves backwards and filling a hole in the wall are in the 'danger zone' and to get out of it ASAP and every time Laci Knight had something to say to me it was either "don't turn around at that point," or "quit using your arms."
That's hardly to say that blocking backwards is a horrible idea or that the hours and hours I spent drilling transitions when I was a newb were all for naught. Here were some scenarios where blocking while skating backwards were recommended.
1.) If you're in a three or four wall and your other blockers have the jammer you can flip around and steer your teammates using their shoulders while slowing them with your toe stops.
2.) You begin backwards with one toe stop down so that the wall moves slowly as soon as the jammer begins the jam.
3.) The jammer is right on your teammates ass and you flip around and hold her arms in a death grip, allowing her to stabilize and use you as an anchor for good lateral agility.
Should you happen to have the jammer on your chest while backwards by yourself Shorty and Getsome recommend that you get low (so as not to high block/draw the high block) and put your arms out for psychological impact.
Strategy
These things were new to me:
If you only have two blockers on the track you might consider shifting your priorities from scoring points to limiting damage. We've all seen teams get into penalty sucks where the two blockers who are on the track start working overtime, accumulate penalties and start a vicious cycle of two blocker jams. Instead, consider putting both blockers 100% on offense (or even passive offense), getting your jammer out and killing some time but still forcing the other team to call the jam after one pass. Sure - the other team will probably score 4 points, but giving up one jam and getting your blockers back on the floor might be better than struggling through 5 jams of continuous penalties.
If your team has hit out the opposing jammer and bridged back it might be more worthwhile to have one player bridge back 10 feet while the remaining three wall up 20 feet behind her. Sure - you only brought her back 30 feet instead of the maximum 50 but now she must contend with pushing all those players forward in a wall - much harder than juking around four individuals bridging separately.
If you've hit out the opposing jammer and she's following you back don't go back to the end of the engagement zone. Instead, give yourself some room so that just as she's coming back in you pump yourself backwards and pull the cut.
I suppose if I had to wrap the weekend up in a bow of sentiment I'd say that it was really excellent to get out of my league a bit and skate with some folks I've seen or played against in the area and beyond. The combination of new skills, different players and a vastly different skating surface than the wood at the Everett Skate Deck made it easy to get out of my head and accept a higher level from myself than I think I usually exhibit at home. I'm very excited to continue to work on some of these skills in the weeks and months to come.
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<posted on 10-23-13>
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