Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da

Grr…Arrgh.

I am so over this ankle sprain. I got hit during scrimmage last Thursday on turn 4 and fell awkwardly on my right ankle, which resulted in a high ankle sprain. My team-mates felt bad for hitting me and causing an injury, but I honestly don’t blame them. They were doing their job and preventing the jammer (me) from scoring. I blame myself. I stupidly ran 10 miles on Tuesday and came to practice on Thursday with legs that were still recovering and not up to an intense scrimmage. They just couldn’t support me properly and the ankle took the fall.

I am now on day 5 of being hurt and the pain hasn’t seemed to improve. The swelling went down by half, but the pain and stiffness is still there. I was told by the therapist to take a week off of running and skating is a ‘play it by ear’ thing. But, as of Monday (yesterday) when we had our next practice I knew I wouldn’t be ready to skate for at least another week. The ankle is just too weak to handle sharp cuts and stopping. And I am now in that angry and frustrated phase. I just want to skate! And run! My half marathon is 2 weeks away and I’m really worried I won’t be able to finish the race. :( I realize I’ll have to walk some of it because the ankle will still be weak, but this just pisses me off more, because I put all this time into training so I can have a good race and a possible PR, and it’s pretty much over because of an injury. UGH. (And don’t ever tell a runner that “there’s always next year”, because, yes, we know we can do better next year, but we trained for THIS race and we were going to do well THIS year and even better the next.)

So, in the meantime, I’ll be the lame-o sitting at home moping and doing my ankle strengthing exercises like a good girl so I can be back out on the rink kicking some ass as soon as I can.

I think I might actually enjoy being a jammer.

Now to work on my speed… anyone have any tips on getting faster?

Derby Boot Camp- The Day Poor Bex Broke Her Leg

So, yesterday’s boot camp practice was a bit overwhelming. It was a review day, so we were going over everything- pack work, bumping skates, weaving, getting hit, hip assists, pushing, whips, and blocking. I hold my own pretty well with each. I suck at giving whips- mainly because I don’t quite stand correctly to transfer my momentum to the other person. Something I need to work on. But, I thought I was okay at everything else.

We were practicing the whip when Bex went down. No one is even sure what happened, because it wasn’t in the area where the whips were going on. She went out on the track to skate towards her partner to recieve a whip and I think she collided with someone as she was crossing the track to get in place. She fell awkwardly and immediately started panicking. Which is understandable. You fall hard and something snaps and suddenly you’re in severe pain. Yeah, I think I would have screamed like she did. She was laying face down on her belly with her right leg laying flat and left leg held at an unnatural awkward angle. We stopped immediately and went to the middle to give the First Aid crew room and to give her some privacy. We were all shaken and scared; this was the first injury we’ve seen. Poor Bex. Turns out she broke both her tibia and and her fibula (both shin bones) at the knee. Yikes. She has to have surgery to get a rod put in.

After the paramedics wheeled her away, practice continued on. But, after that, we were all so timid and scared whenever anyone fell. I’m still shaken.

It sounds like she’s in good spirits and will be a NSO this season, but it sure has to suck for her to make it to the very last practice before becoming an official derby girl and have that happen. I hope she doesn’t get discouraged and I really hope she tries out next year.

And we have our skills test tomorrow! I’m already getting nervous.

Roller Derby Boot Camp

Day Two

When they said it was going to be hard, I kind of didn’t believe them. I mean, how hard could it get? I can do most of the things they ask us to do, and if not, I at least attempt it and learn it. That’s not hard, right? Well…come to find out, they mean hard on the body. I didn’t feel sore at all yesterday. I felt fantastic! Then I put on the skates. Man oh man were my legs and lower back not feeling it. The soreness showed itself during warm ups and stretching helped some, but the back…man the back. I need some heating pads. I have to keep reminding myself that I’m not in my low 20’s anymore and things are going to be a little rougher. I’ll be 29 at the end of this year, and while that’s not old by any means, it does make me older than most of the people there by at least 5 years. And 5 years is a long time. I’m not as fast as I used to be, and things don’t heal as quick as they used to. Sigh.

Anyways. After we did our little “speed” test yesterday, they grouped us into 4 different groups based on our speed. Group 1 is the fast people- mainly comprised of people who made derby teams already and for some reason have to go through boot camp again. Group 2 is comprised of the few guys who are trying to be refs and those girls who are quick (most of them apparently took a speed skating class- I wish I knew about that class, I would have taken it!). Group 3 is those of us who are decent on skates, but probably won’t pass the 25 laps in 5 minutes test (although- there are two of us who seem to be relatively quick and we might be able to pass it right now). Group 4 is comprised of those who most likely just put on skates for the first time in years. They are improving fast though. :)

I am in Group 3. I was slightly disappointed, because I thought I was fast! But, after really seeing where I was at after watching the 1’s and 2’s, I’m definitely not as fast as I thought. I have to keep reminding myself that I put skates on for the first time in nearly 20 years this past June and that I’ve come a long ways since then. I’m more stable and can almost stop properly (almost). I couldn’t do any of that in June.

Now onto what we did:

• Warm ups skating counterclockwise and clockwise
• Stretching
• Lined us up into 6 different lines and we worked on falling. We would skate towards the other side of the rink and do a left knee fall, then a right knee fall, and then both knees at the end.
• After that we worked on doing falling and turning 180 during the fall. Learned I can’t do this with a right knee fall, but can nail it every time with a left knee fall. My body is goofy.
• T-stop drill again. Starting to slowly improve on this. (Yay!)
• “Sticky” skating- skating with all wheels on the ground. They had us do laps for god knows how long and then switch direction and go that way for god knows how long. We had to keep low and oh my god were my thighs and lower back burning. No pain, no gain, right? And while I have the logistics down for this, I was thankful when Ima Firestarter gave me some pointers on making it less horrible. “Use your hips.” What a difference using more of the body instead of just hip down makes. (She always has the most useful tips for me. I really hope she sticks around and helps us out more.)
• They then broke us into two groups- the 1’s and 2’s stayed on the rink while the 3’s and 4’s went off to the side.
• Us 3’s and 4’s worked on plow stops. Something I’ve been struggling with. I can slow down dramatically, just not actually, you know, stop. Learned some more tricks on how to do it and I improved.
• After that drill, we switched places with the 1’s and 2’s and worked on crossovers. Crossovers are easy for me. It just seems natural. But they had us work on each leg pushing individually while the other leg never lifted up, which was HARD. Ima Firestarter also gave me good tips on crossovers and made me a little more efficient.
• Then we grouped back together with everyone and did a drill they “stole” from Kansas City. First straightaway, work on pushing with your stride, first curve do crossovers, second straightaway get speed, and then second curve do a plow stop. This is hard with that many people. I couldn’t effectively do strides and I couldn’t get up speed. Stopping was nearly impossible at times due to too many people in the way. We tried, and I guess that’s all that matters?
• And then, thankfully, cool down laps and stretching.

Sunday, the 1’s and 2’s are doing their 25 in 5 test. I kind of want to go and see where I’m at, but I’m not sure if they’re including that in the 3’s and 4’s workout or not? I guess I’ll see. At least we will only have 1.5 hours of practice instead of the full 2 on Sunday. :)

And I think I might go to the park down the street and skate in the tennis courts and work on stopping. I definitely need to work on stopping.