Buzzers howl and whistles chirp! The roller derby jam is on. Players on opposing teams have two minutes to score. Blockers form bulwarks. Jammers, the only scoring players, must bust past these barricades. Crash! Smash! Bodies ram, jockey, and jostle in a rugby scrum on roller skates. For the Durango Roller Girls team, derby is an oxygen they cannot live without.
Since the 1930s, roller derby has morphed from an endurance marathon into a full-contact, fast-paced game. It uniquely treated women athletes as equals to men, eschewing “gentler” adaptations of its rules and tactics.
“A lot of women who see derby say, Oh, I can’t do that because they’ll knock me over. I’m too short for that. Oh, I’m too tall for that,” notes Kendal Teran, derby name Cox. “There is no limit to what you have to look like or what you have to act like in roller derby.”
Cox joined the DRG team in 2019, which boasts nearly twenty players aged 17 to 50. Every player gets a derby name: Skid Mark, Eager Beaver, Lil’ Hellion. These alter-ego aliases are one piece of a derby girl’s armor, along with glam makeup, fishnets, and booty shorts.
Cox was intractably drawn to the sport. “I was going through a moment in my life,” she chuckles.
Divorces. Bad breakups. Overcoming addiction. Countless players find in derby a path to healing. “I do it because it’s cheaper than therapy,” says Tragically Delicious.
Others find an outlet for pent-up professional stress. Data engineers, lawyers, social workers—team members run the career gamut. Women discover a sisterhood and a safe space to exude strength. They learn that hard hits make them stronger, whether they topple an opponent or get slammed to the concrete. The big falls make them stand up taller.
DRG’s first bout is scheduled for Saturday, May 25th, 2024, at the Chapman Hill rink. For first-timers, Cox advises, “Bring a cowbell. Be ready to hoop and holler!”
“There is no limit to what you have to look like or what you have to act like in roller derby.”
