Photo Credit: Sean Hale

Alright, let’s talk about some wild shit.

My amazing roller derby team, the Santa Cruz Boardwalk Bombshells traveled to the East Coast Derby Extravaganza last month, and I was invited to come along  for my first trip as a D1 Chartered skater as a relief jammer.

After a crazy travel mixup and a bunch of other shifts, the day before the tournament I found out that I would be playing a much larger role for my team than we had originally anticipated. Instead of dipping my toe into the D1 water for a few jams in just one of our games, I’d be skating relief for all three.

What.

Even.

When I got the news, at first… I kind of wanted to panic. Am I ready for this? Who do I think I’m kidding? I’m a baby D3 skater who is still completely out of her element here, right?! And then… I just made a conscious decision to be calm. I stopped, took a deep breath, centered myself, and thought… you know what? You’ve been training for this. You’ve got it. And you have a whole team behind you, so no matter what, everything is going to be alright.

I stepped out for my first jam in our first game of the weekend, a matchup vs Rainy City, in jam 8. I definitely won’t say that jam vs Lauren Swaffield was the best jam of my entire life, but I WILL say that it was probably the most excited I’ve ever been about not having lead, and hitting a 0-0 jam by forcing the OJ into a calloff. I’m *so* not the type to be really extra on the track, but even in re-watching the footage tonight, the announcer noted that I was “pumping my fist” to my bench, that’s how hype I was about that first jam.

(You can totally watch it here, if you want to relive it with/for me: https://youtu.be/8CubaYOPIC8?t=1047 )

So much of the rest of the weekend is a complete blur, but there are definitely a few “highlight-reel” moments that stick out and I’m seriously so proud of every. single. jam. (Except maybe that double penalty I earned in the first half of the London game, maybe not that one…)

When I look back on the tournament, and on this season so far, I simply can’t express enough gratitude to SCDG and my All-Star teammates. I’ve learned so many physical derby skills from my new leaguemates in the past few months for sure, but the biggest thing that Santa Cruz has given me, point blank, is a family. The teamwork and just outright pure love and support that my teammates have for each other is just above and beyond, and the way that those relationships transcend onto the track has pushed me so far past anything else that I’ve ever experienced. They’ve completely welcomed me into their world, and I’ve become so much better because we skate not only for ourselves, but for each other.

You can’t fake this kind of shit.

After the derby career that I’ve had and the teams I’ve been on, I’ve previously experienced some of the best and the worst that roller derby has to offer. Because of that I feel that  I can say, without reservation, that Santa Cruz is the real goddamn deal. This league’s Charter stands at #14 in the WFTDA heading into playoffs this year both because of their skill AND their heart, and I couldn’t be more proud to be a Bombshell.

#oneheartbeat #scrappylittleteam #happylittleteam #scdg #boardwalkbombshells