Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Derby hangover

Supermegaderbyweekendexpialidocious was just over a week ago and I ended up suffering bit of a derby hangover but what a weekend it was! Lots of screaming, fun to be had and lessons learnt. It didn't get off to the best start as it took me two hours to get home from work on Friday night after the truck overturned on the main road I use so I just got to training on time. Whether it was being stuck in traffic for two hours or it was something else something felt off as I walked into the training venue. I just wasn't feeling it which was annoying because Womb Raider was taking us through some really good drills. No matter what I did I was absolutely rubbish and as the night went on the worse I got. It did suck that after making some regular progress the last few weeks that I was now hitting a wall. It came down to how I handled this setback. Up until now I'd get the shit's for days whenever I had a setback and be extremely critical of myself. This time around I decided to write off this disasterous session and start again on Sunday which is a pretty big change for me.

Saturday morning and it was up to Gateshead for NRDL's fresh meat info day. I wasn't joining NRDL instead I was going up there to give Cass a little birthday present and for a social skate. I love Cass, she's such an amazing person, Newy are lucky to have her in their ranks. After seeing her reaction to the little Newy and HARD lego skaters I made for myself I decided to make her a set of Dames skaters and her reaction when she them cracked me up once again :)


I saw a few familiar faces and I met Tootsie Turbo, she knew who I was before I even opened my mouth which surprised me because I'm not sure how she knows me. I got to have a skate and although I was just skating it felt a lot better than my attempt the previous night at training. The track up there is nice to skate on. I'm figuring I'll add another ridiculously high target to my list of bouts I'd like to be in. One day I'd love to be able to bout against the Fort Smashleys with whichever team I eventually get drafted into in HARD. I sure love dreaming big hehe but at least it gives me something to aim for whether it's realistic or not. One of my highlights from that session was Danger getting a sneaky whip off me while I was chatting and skating with Cass. Danger's one of my fav Newy skaters so I was like WOW hehe

Saturday night saw me head out to Penrith to do reporting duties for the WSR double header. I had the best seat in the house, I was sitting next to Big Kahuna at the commentators table so we got to have a good chat in between jams. He was such a gentleman whenever I came back to my seat he'd always pull out the chair for me, bless him! It was good to watch some of my derby friend's bout who I hadn't had a chance to see bout yet. I enjoyed watching both bouts and there still hasn't been a bout where I haven't learnt something new.

Sunday morning I headed off to the airport to pick up my relo's from the airport. I was home for half an hour before I headed off down to the 'gong to watch my league in their first ever bout. They were bouting my fav SRDL home team: SAS. I wasn't doing reporting duties which meant I got to be a fan for the day YAY! A funny story I was about to walk into the bathroom just as Freyda Cox was coming out. I wanted to say Oh my gosh you're one of my favourite SRDL players but it wasn't the best time to say anything except hi. I was so proud of our guys, they did a great job especially those bouting for the very first time like Phat. I was on my best behaviour so I wasn't as vocal or animated like I am when I watch Liverpool play otherwise I would have paced up and down the sidelines living every hit and move. Poor Bede was standing next to me though filming the bout so all you're probably going to hear on the audio is my screaming and swearing haha. We play BSK at the WIRD double header on the 18th so I'm really looking forward to watching my fellow HARDies go and skate their hearts out again and do us proud.

As soon as the bout finished I went back home grabbed my gear then headed out to training. I was really impressed with Cherry and Cheya because they bouted against SAS and then came back for training, what machines! It was inspiring. It ended up being one of the toughest training sessions I'd had in a while because I was doing a lot of skills for the very first time so I was really pushed out of my comfort zone. I sucked arse at them but I persisted until the end. I ended up doing a proper transistion for the first time after persisting at it until I got it right and improved on the attempts I made the week before.  No surprise by the time I got home on Sunday night I was feeling pretty shattered from the big derby weekend but I learnt a lot along the way and had fun in the process.

Another lesson I learnt from the weekend was not getting ahead of myself. Most of my derby goals involve different sorts of bouts and training between HARD and NRDL. As much as I'd love to see all those goals happen I'm a LONG way off from that happening. I know our training committee won't pass anyone unless they're 100% sure a skater has passed and while it can be frustrating at times to not be at bouting level it would be even worse to be at bouting level before I'm ready and then getting absolutely annihilated by Newy and not offering any sort of contribution to the bout or training. After such an injury ravaged start to derby I'm slowly starting to make progress and if I keep my head down and keep working hard I'll eventually make it to bouting level even though I'll probably go down in the Guiness book of records as taking the longest to get to bouting level.  

The unthinkable happened last Saturday night - I missed a Newy home bout for the first time in a year haha. I was a bridesmaid at my sister's wedding. The thing's you do for family :P They were completely changing the line up's and it wasn't being revealed until the bout. I made a few predictions on Cass' FB wall before the bout: 1) Bermuda Thigh Tangles was going to be a Smashley based on a Smashley spa party she mentioned on her FB page a few days before. 2) The Danger/Jilla combo was going to be split based on the fact that they said there were going to be lots of changes and new combo's forming 3) Brig and Jilla were going to be on the same team. This one was wishful thinking on my part because I would have loved to have seen them on the same side but knowing my luck if it happened they'd be both put on the Hellcats and not the Smashleys. Funnily enough all my predictions came true except that both Brig and Jilla are both on the Smashleys YAY!! Truth be told even if they both ended up as Hellcats I'd still remain a Smashley fan and cheer them on while hoping their side lost. Confusing? haha. I'm looking forward to the next Newy bout on the 25th August because not only will I be bringing my sister to her first Newy bout, I'll be going as a fan for the first time in over a year and not doing a write up so I'll be able to scream my lungs out. I wonder if you can get thrown out of a bout for being too vocal ;)

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