Scottish Roller Derby Blog (Posts about white night furies)

SRDB - Vodcasts - Baltic and Russian Roller Derby

SRD — Fri, 24 Apr 2020 15:00:00 GMT

A few weeks ago, we debuted the first of a planned series of SRDB Vodcasts, as we host chats with the Roller Derby community around the World.

We're back today with the fourth edition, featuring the Roller Derby community in the Baltic States (Latvia and Estonia) and Russia.

Highlights include footage from 2019's Fab Slav (the 3rd Baltic/Slavic Roller Derby Sevens tournament, hosted by Warsaw Roller Derby), an extended discussion of Short Track Roller Derby, and a conversation about the best skate shop in Riga.

Due to technical issues (the laptop we use for the video call bluescreened in the middle of the call), there's an edit about 12 minutes in. We apologise for this issue.

We've embedded the video here so you can watch it without needing to go to YouTube:

and we'll be updating this with an audio-only version in the future.

The entire Series Playlist is here, if you don't want to miss out on future episodes: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsfV1BOiVrnF5TiOOxaWE696A_59gz1sp

If your region would like to be part of this project, please email us at scottishrollerderby@gmail.com to discuss, or get in touch via our Instagram or Facebook pages - we'd love to hear from you (and help the world hear about you too)! We're currently working on 3 regions for new Vodcasts, but we don't have a limit as yet.

Upcoming European Short Track Events (June-August 2019)

aoanla — Mon, 20 May 2019 15:30:00 GMT

Note, in accordance with our general policy, team links here are to their website, if they have one, and instagram if not. We try to avoid linking to Facebook if possible, except for Events.

The Short Track Roller Derby events calendar is building for the year already, and there's a lot of things to talk about, so we're bringing you a new edition of the Short Track News roundup earlier than we expected to!

Our first development is that Rolla Skate Club now host a dedicated Short Track Roller Derby Resources page, with the rules and other info. (We know that it's also set to gain more resources, too, as they're produced.)

The new Rolla Skate Club "Short Track Resources page"!

In the USA, the biggest Short Track event upcoming is probably the Rollercon event series. Building on their appearance at the last Rollercon (the public debut of the ruleset, in fact),

Rollercon 2019 will feature multiple items:

"AA-level" Short Track Exhibition Game "Short Skirts versus Sleeves" (20 July, 20:45)
2 MVP-pass holder on Skates sessions on Short Track with Rolla Skate Club [19 July 16:50, 20 Jul 18:00]
Open Track Scrimmage for Short Track (19 July, 20:00)

If you're at Rollercon from the 17th July, then we encourage you to go check it out!

Many other US and Canadian teams continue to use Short Track Roller Derby; Pittsburgh Short Track Roller Derby, in particular, continue to be a purely Short Track league, and are holding regular open training sessions.

In Canada, we know that Nelson Killjoys of British Columbia, will be hosting a tournament for 6 teams, at some point later this year.

In Alberta, Canada, Fort McMurray Roller Derby are planning to use short track rules for their home teams season, allowing them to support more home teams with their current roster. (Scheduled for around October 2019)

The first edition of Iru Navarro's fanzine, including an introduction to Short Track rules.

Further afield, Latin America continues to explore the Short Track ruleset [an Argentine fanzine is covering the rules in translation issue by issue], and in South Korea, OH! Roller Derby (Facebook link) are hosting scrimmages using the ruleset.

In South Africa, Cape Town Rollergirls are planning a second Short Track event after the success of their first on the 26th April. Whilst not announced officially yet, the 8th June is the provisional date.

Calendar of events (blue - games, yellow - Rollercon, purple - bootcamps and workshops)

In Europe, however, there's a bunch of exciting workshops / bootcamps / tournaments coming up:

Literally next weekend: Gdańsk Chrome Sirens Roller Derby are following up on the previous success of a Short-Track double header with a Polish Short Track Tournament.

25 May

[FACEBOOK EVENT]

Vratislavia MadChix Roller Squad
Worst Warsaw Derby Team
3City Piranhas Roller Derby (Gdańsk)
Gdańsk Chrome Sirens Roller Derby [two teams]
mystery 6th team

This will be a full round-robin tournament, with 10 bouts to decide the overall winner. Entry will be free - and the whole event will be livestreamed at https://www.twitch.tv/chromesirens

In the very near future, GO-GO Gent Roller Derby host a special edition of Star Track (their SKOD spin-off) with a Short Track focus.

1 - 2 June 2019

[FACEBOOK EVENT]

Coached by UAE Roller Derby All-Stars' Inga Knee'her, the current design has:

1st June:
- Morning session: Short Track Rules & Drills with Inga Knee'her and UAE Roller Derby (including low-contact and other variants, potentially)
- Afternoon session: Short Track mini-tournaments
2nd June:
- Short Track mini-tournament continues

Changes for this structure are still possible, depending on attendance.

Russia continues its promotion of Short Track with multiple events:

19 June

Public Short Track Roller Derby exhibition bout (St-Petersburg Roller Derby)

In August

public Short Track Roller Derby bout (Baltic Witches (St-Petersburg C) versus Raptors Derby Moscow)

Next up, the

13 July

[FACEBOOK EVENT]

ALL IN Roller Derby Community host their "Short Track Experiment"

A 1 day workshop exploring the Short Track ruleset - including low-contact rules as well as the full contact standard. Includes OTA and WFTDA-gender policy games (open to not-quite-mins-passed-but-internal-scrim-ready skaters for the Low Contact games). Includes time for discussion between games, and a low-pressure environment.

This will run from midday to 5pm in the Ramgarhia Sikh Sport Centre, Leeds.

Also on the

13 July

No event yet

Bad Rangers Poznań are also planning a Short Track fixture, details to be confirmed.

Perhaps the most exciting UK-based event is planned for

16-18 August: No event yet

Save the date, and we'll bring you more info on this event when we can confirm it (which will hopefully be soon)!

The Slavic Roller Derby Tournament grows into its second year, adds the Baltics!

aoanla — Thu, 23 Aug 2018 09:57:31 GMT

Last year, we reported on the first ever "Slavic Roller Derby Tournament", a three team round-robin hosted by Warsaw Hellcats, and featuring St Petersburg's White Night Furies, and Prague City Roller Derby B in addition to the hosts. At the time, we noted that the mere possibility of this tournament existing was a signal for just how fast Roller Derby is expanding into Eastern Europe...

...and that expansion has continued into this year, so it is perhaps unsurprising that the tournament is back for a second year this October; bigger and more extensive.

Competitors in Red, except the hosts (in Blue), and the three teams contributing to Team Czech (in Yellow). Men's Derby bout competitors in Black.

Poland have outdone expectations by doubling the number of contenders this time around, and extending the geographical inclusion to the southern Baltic states as well as Slavic nations. Fitting the resulting 6 team round robin into a single day is only possible with non-WFTDA rulesets (15 games would take 15 hours of WFTDA play, not including breaks), so this edition of the Slavic Tournament is being run as with Roller Derby Sevens rules. The reduced maximum roster size of Sevens also makes it more accessible for some of the newer competitors as an additional bonus.

In fact, this added accessibility has allowed several other firsts at this event:

Riga Roller Derby, representing Latvia, have previous bout experience, as part of the Team Baltic Roller Derby who competed against Team Israel at the 2018 Roller Derby World Cup - but have never played as a team themselves. Their Sevens team will therefore represent multiple firsts here: the first time Riga have competed as a team, and the first time any team from the (south) Baltics have competed in a ranked event! This is very good timing, as the Baltics have just gained their third official league - in Tallinn, Estonia - this week, showing the work done in Riga and Tartu paying off.

Team Baltic is not the only connection to the Roller Derby World Cup, as Team Czech Roller Derby will be representing their country in Sevens form, with skaters from Prague's Prague City Roller Derby and Hard Breaking Dolls, joined by members of Roller Derby Brno. Brno's skaters on Team Czech will all be skating in their first public bouts at this tournament, giving them good experience to take back to their league. (We hope that next time Team Czech plays, they can also include skaters from the newly formed league in Ostravia, also announced this week!)

Host country Poland will be exceptionally well represented, with not only hosts Warsaw Hellcats, and their fellow Warsaw team, Worst Warsaw, competing, but also Vratislavia (Wrocław)'s MadChix Roller Squad! All three teams have at least several games under their belt, and contributed skaters to Team Poland, (although Warsaw's teams are a lot more experienced!). Additionally, all are particularly used to Sevens tournaments, having competed in the 7th Heaven tournament in Poznań only a few months ago.

Also returning to the tournament from last time are the only bouting team in Russia, St Petersburg's White Night Furies; although they are sending their newer B team, Ingria Rollers, to compete this time around. The Furies also gained a lot of experience from their members in Team Russia at the World Cup this year (as well as their continued participation in the Pohjola Cup), so we're expecting a strong performance from their B Team here!

The restrictions of Sevens rostering make it difficult to predict the standings of the Slavic/Baltic tournament from FTS records (not least because several of these teams are playing for the first time!), but we'd be unsurprised by strong performances from the hosts, and the composite Czech team. Given the strong tournament experience gained by many of the competitors here in the past year, however, it's hard to rule anyone out.

In addition to the main event, this edition of the Slavic/Baltic Tournament will also be showcasing two other contests:

Another debut, this time in men's roller derby: Polish Men's Roller Derby, a collaboration of the Polish Eagles skaters based in Poland itself, play their first game on home soil, ever, against the might of London's Southern Discomfort B, Mild Discomfort!

And, finally, a chance to see another fantastic sport on wheels, as Warsaw's Wheelchair Rugby team present their sport in an exhibition game!

The first Slavic/Baltic Tournament will be held on the 20th October in Centrum Sportu Wilanów in Warsaw, Poland. Tickets and more information will be available on the Facebook Event in the coming weeks.

A Slavic Tournament: how Central and Eastern European Derby exploded in just 3 years!

aoanla — Fri, 11 Aug 2017 10:38:12 GMT

Several years ago, back in 2014, we talked to a few teams from Central and Eastern Europe for our series on "The Future of Derby". Three years later, what was very much the edge of the derby world has developed to the extent that all of those nations have teams at the Roller Derby World Cup in February, and some even have Men's teams aiming at the Men's Roller Derby World Cup.

Closer to hand, though, the world's first "Slavic Tournament" - featuring only teams from Slavic countries - is approaching next month, featuring: Prague City Roller Derby (Czech Republic), White Night Furies (Russia) and the hosts Warsaw Hellcats (Poland).

What better time, then, to catch up with the teams attending?

First, we had in depth interview with Prague City Rollers' Mörkö, following up on some of the topics we discussed with the league 3 years back when they were young!

Mörkö

When we first interviewed Prague City, back in 2014, we asked if the Czech Republic would be competing in a World Cup by 2016. Obviously, the World Cup is a little later than we expected, but how does it feel for the Czech Roller Derby Team to be competing in 2018 - and how involved was Prague City, specifically, in making this happen?

It feels fantastic - we have been rolling in Czechia a little over 5 years now and even though we managed to get roller derby covered in the biggest Czech media houses we are still struggling with prejudice and ignorance of our sport. I hope that participating in the World Cup will become one of those milestone moments that will give us positive publicity, show the Czech public how great this sport can be or even just raise awareness, what roller derby is about and make our roller derby journey easier in Czech Republic.

As to how much was PCRD involved in the National team organisation - I can only speak for how I personally see it as a PCRD member. I'm not sure if there was any intention from other leagues, but I know there were rumours about us possibly participating in the World Cup around two years ago. It was still in its very beginnings, nobody was sure what exactly should be done, everyone had their own way of doing things which wasn’t always welcomed by others. However, we always wanted to co-operate with other leagues and not to do it just on our own. Since [Fellow Prague-based league] Hard Breaking Dolls became active we invited them to organise a board that would create a basic platform for hiring managers, coaches and other important figures, who are now active in the National team agenda. Most of them are from PCRD, we have a coach who used to be in Porto, but trains with PCRD, another one is from Vienna (soon moving and transferring to London) and that is pretty much it. Since we have been here the longest, we are trying to push our limits always a bit further even though if our league has to struggle for a while. We're inconceivably stubborn I think.

When we first interviewed the league, you were the only derby in the Czech Republic, and one of the few leagues in Central/Eastern Europe. Now, with the Hard Breaking Dolls (also in Prague), and Brno Roller Derby in the Czech Republic, and a growing set of leagues in Poland, Austria and beyond, it seems that Roller Derby is growing well in the Centre and East of Europe... How much work has it been to get derby this far in the Czech Republic, and where have the bumps been along the road?

It's really amazing to see roller derby grow all around us.

I'm especially happy for Poland who are our neighbours and, even though roller derby is still pretty new there, it gives us lots of potential for future cooperation. For example, in September, our B team will take part in the first Slavic Tournament in Warsaw; playing with Warsaw Hellcats and with Saint-Petersburg Roller Derby.

My personal dream is to have a roller derby league in Slovakia, but we are not able yet to build there a roller derby fortress. Even though PCRD is always happy to do exhibitions in other cities apart from Prague and people are contacting us all over the country to help them build a league, there is lots of work that many people from the outside don't realise or can't imagine. It was three years ago, that PCRD made an exhibition in Brno, but it wasn't until the last year when the team gained enough people to form a league and become active…

The politics of PCRD has changed over the course of 5 years as well. What started as a punk sport for underdogs is now a league aspiring to be seen as professional, athletic and serious at what it's doing. I think it's the same trend worldwide - roller derby has changed and so have we. We're basically following the trend and I think the work is paying off - media slowly starts to put us into the sports category, people are spreading the news, we are changing our approach along the way as we notice what does and doesn't work…

However, we’re still not perfect and still learning. I think our biggest ongoing struggle is our financial stability, which sometimes influences our participation in games or tournaments or organising bootcamps that could move us further, or even our entire existence. After 5 years, we lost our practice venue due to unbearable conditions given to us by the school where we used to practice. So now we're poor and homeless, but still going :D

I really admire the amount of work my teammates are putting into PCRD’s existence. I think what is really pushing us through is taking risks and having a good team of people who are not willing to give up. Even though it is sometimes frustrating having to stand in front of a new challenge every season, I know it will be for the better in the future.

Talking to some of those newer leagues in Eastern and Central Europe (and beyond - Estonia and Latvia...), they've all emphasised how important the support of other leagues has been in their growth. Do you think Support networks, and National (and Trans-national) bodies, are a really important thing for established leagues to "pay into"?

Oh absolutely! If you are a brand new league in your city or even country it is crucial that you have someone to ask for help. Our beginnings were dependent on getting equipment from Germany and advice from people who already knew how the game should look like. The YouTube videos, roller derby forums and a great community happy to share experience don’t beat a personal contact.

Roller derby is growing, but it's still new for many people. We gained a lot through people who visited our practices from all around the world willing to share useful information of any kind. I think it used to be our core source until we established some kind of a training plan and managed to educate ourselves on our own, even though we're not giving up on help from the outside; quite the contrary. Also, we're a little lucky being located in Prague which is a very popular tourist place even for roller derby community, so we have visitors quite often I have to say. I'm happy I could learn from people who played long before our league even started.

As we write these questions, Prague City has just been accepted into WFTDA as a full member. Can we talk a bit about how the journey from first applying, through Apprentice, to the announcement of Full Membership? What was the draw for joining WFTDA?

We started noticing how leagues around us were joining WFTDA and how it influenced our ability to organise games.

Most of our opponents come from Germany and since they have Bundesliga it was hard for us to compete with enough leagues who would find space for us in their bout schedule. Once we were refused by some leagues for whom we weren't that attractive we realised that WFTDA membership is a way to go. Of course it wasn't the only reason, but it was the one that pushed us into sending the application.

The application process is mostly a work of two of my amazing teammates, Lenka and Lulu, who took the responsibility and got us through the painful bureaucratic Apprentice parts. Our mock sanctioned bout was against Roller Girls of the Apocalypse from Kaiserslautern. It was a re-match that took place in Prague and I noticed how our bout organising skills were well balanced with WFTDA requirements. Everybody has been working hard so that no detail could show that we weren't eligible to gain the status of a full member. All paperwork was finished in the late spring this year and in the middle of July we were finally announced as a full member.

Speaking of Prague's development, you've had a very busy bouting schedule since we've spoken to you - with 8 games in both 2015 and 2016 (thanks partly to the Daga Denter tournament). FTS rates you as 140th in Europe (and we rate you a little higher, at 93rd, or 115th if you include B teams), with a pretty steady rise up the rankings since you were founded. How have you worked for this success?

It's a combination of hard work, sometimes luck (the attractiveness of Prague has indisputable role), and having dedicated teammates who are willing to sacrifice their time and money to attend practices and games. We do not count on having full roster unless we're sure everybody in the team knows how to play their role in the game the best. Because the team struggles with ongoing injuries of both A and B team players we sometimes have to improvise, but we learned that it's better to roster 10 players who are ready to give their best than 14, who might not be 100% ready yet.

It has something to do with our coach Jay who is used to this system from her home league in Porto. Once we saw her team play and win the Daga Denter tournament with not more than 9 people in her team two years ago we knew that it's possible to build a team on few people, who know each other well and meet at most practices than count on somebody, who might be talented but doesn't know how to co-work with others on the track. By various circumstances we were forced to choose quality over quantity and it paid off. But who knows how long will this strategy last, since there are some pretty amazing and talented players from the B team who I think will soon join the A team forces.

It's been a successful few years since we last spoke to Prague City... but what do you have planned for the next few, and where do you see Czech Roller Derby itself developing?

At the moment we're in the midst of a turmoil, actually. Our season has just started, we don't have much money, we have to practice outside with little luck finding a permanent venue for inside practices so unfortunately most of our energy goes into this right now.

But I'm not entirely negative, it's hard, but I know we will thrive and get through this eventually and be ready to compete and get better. So, I see ourselves in a nice hall made of polished concrete where we can comfortably practice twice or three times a week, having a busy bout schedule for both our A and B teams who establish their positions as fierce central Europeans of the roller derby world. I see the National team competing in an already lost game against Team USA having time of our lives, getting us enough coverage to have at least one or two more roller derby leagues outside of Prague!

We also more briefly caught up with St Petersburg's White Night Furies, and Warsaw Hellcats to talk more specifically about the Slavic Tournament.

White Night Furies (#2206 Hulk):

It's been a busy year for the Furies - tournaments in Finland [the Pohjola Cup], national teams [Team Russia Roller Derby] and promoting the sport in new countries [Belarus]! When we first interviewed you, years ago, did you expect any of this?

No way. I couldn't even imagine that all this will come SO far and spread so wide. But I can say that the goals that were in our heads years ago just turned into everything we have now and that means we're on the right way!

Mostly I am excited about Team Russia - making a team on an international level is a huge job, but thanks to White Night Furies now I know how things should be done.

How important is it, do you think, that landmarks like the first Slavic Tournament are achieved, and celebrated?

Since the time when the idea about making a Slavic Tournament came to my head, I really wanted it to happen. But this would've never happen without Warsaw, who wrote me a year ago and offered to participate in some of their games. We've had no free time at that time, but I started to think how we can roll :)

In my opinion, the countries that are close to each other should communicate more, cooperate and be good friends and not only, it's our chance to make a warm friendship with each other. And I hope this would be just the beginning of something big and sweaty :)

And, finally: how are you hoping to do at the tournament?

If we make a full roster this time, I'm sure we can take the lead !

Warsaw Hellcats:

How did you come to the decision to hold the first ever Slavic Tournament?

The idea actually came from White Night Furies. Around November last year, we as a team decided to kick it up a notch a little and start playing more. That's when we started making plans for next months and contacting a number of foreign teams, one of them were Furies. The dates we had weren't working for them, but they replied proposing to play during Autumn, and pointed out that we are both Slavic teams, so why not invite 3 Slavic teams and make it a themed event

We don't talk as much about the growth of derby in Poland - how have the last few years been for Warsaw Hellcats since your founding in 2013?

Roller Derby has grown significantly over the last four years in Poland. We've achieved considerable progress.

Our team entered the WFTDA Apprentice program and we played our first mock game; a male team and the National women's and men's teams have both been formed to compete in the World Cups in 2018.

As the Warsaw Hellcats we try our best to play and host events at home to gain as much experience as possible and to get as many people as possible into the sport. We organize bootcamps and tournaments in which we invite derbies from all over the world and other polish cities, we want polish RD and polish teams to grow. We also try to participate in international events not only as players but also as NSO and SO. Still the problem is a training room, but we hope that with the growing awareness of the derby in Poland, it will be easier for us to pass.

The Slavic Tournament (Słowiański Trójmecz in Polish) will be held on the 30th of September, in Warsaw, Poland. There's no event page for it yet, but we will publicise it more closer to the time.

If you wish to officiate the Slavic Tournament, then there is an application form here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdmZYZzUjQH9mdzf12Z3hAEcfkfhwtAKXuBLjKU2j71Wk-GjQ/viewform

Russia at the Pohjola Cup: the Furies feed back

aoanla — Fri, 24 Mar 2017 10:56:39 GMT

As we reported last year, this season's Pohjola Cup - the official tournament for the leagues of Northern Finland - has broken new ground by inviting their first competitors from outside Finland itself.

St Petersburg's White Night Furies, Russia's first Roller Derby team (and currently the only bouting one) have played about half of their scheduled bouts in the tournament now, so we thought we'd catch up with them to see how it has been.

The Furies' Hulk answered a few of our questions.

How did the Furies get the idea to compete in the Pohjola Cup?

White Night Furies decided to to compete in 2016-2017 Pohjola Cup a year ago. We wanted to take a part in a tournament or Cup, to try our derby and team skills and and to see what we can do if we have one game a month, every month. I found the Pohjola Cup organizer (it wasn't very easy ><) and asked if we can join, despite the fact that we are not from Finland. And we're here :)

It's fair to say that the tournament has been a tough experience for the Furies so far, as first tournaments often are. How have you been adapting to the experience - what have you learned?

I can say that all our bouts there were tough :) Each bout we try to use different combinations of tactics and players and see how it works. Each game we change bench stuff and player's roster - from now we just started participating in serious games and we need to know what and how works. That's why I can say that this Cup is very helpful for us - we're learning new things. Also our first two games were on one day, and we'll have the same experience in April, in Oulu. That can be tough, especially if you drive the whole night and then play :) We've learned to play all together as a team regularly (and of course faced a lot of problems inside the team from this), to play a roster of 12, to have a bench and line up for the first time in our team's life :)

At this point, are you hoping to return to the Pohjola Cup in the 2017/18 season?

And of course, we are planning to return to the Pohjola Cup next year, we should climb higher to the first place :)

This year is very much the year that the Furies are breaking out and making waves. What else do you have planned for 2017?

Our plans are huge for this year: we founded a B-team and they will have their first game in May, also all of us will have 3-4 days of awesome practices with a Rose City coach who will come and train Team Russia members in Saint-Petersburg: we'll have a big presentation and couple of newbie practices for girls in Minsk, Belarus. One of our big plans is to visit the Moscow team again and help them with making a team (they are reunited again this year!) and, in September-October we want to play 2-3 bouts and haven't decided yet where, but are thinking about teams in Sweden and Netherlands!

The Future of Derby: Central and Eastern Europe

aoanla — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 17:07:58 GMT

While Roller Derby is rather well established in Western and Northern Europe, it is still spreading to the East, from the Czech Republic across to Russia. Our next Future Derby article covers the expanding Eastern edge of European derby.

We asked Prague Roller Derby's L))) and Semtex Sizzle, and a whole bunch of skaters from Russia's first league, St Peterburg's White Night Furies, about the experience of pushing derby out into the East of Europe. (We believe this may be the first non-Russian interview that the White Night Furies have given, so we are happy to reproduce their answers in full!)

Prague Roller Derby

With derby just established in the Czech Republic with your league, do you think you'll be competing with a National Team or at that level by the next World Cup in, say 2016?

We don't give up hope, it would be amazing to compete on international level. We hope than in few years more leagues will pop up in other czech cities or even in Prague itself and it will make possible to gather best players not only from PCRD, but from whole country. It could possibly help if other central or eastern European countries would establish new teams (like quite recently in Poland, yay!) so we won't be anymore on the 'edge' of Europe.

What difficulties have you had with growth and promotion in the Czech Republic?

To answer your first one, well, we still are the first and the only Czech team. We sure hope other teams will appear in Czech, as L))) says. About the PR activities - we can't do more at the moment since we started, every single newspaper and many lifestyle magazines already covered our existence together with some expat media so we are quite satisfied with our promo.[On language issues with the WFTDA Rules] Not really, we are not perfect, of course, as non native speakers, but most of the players can at least understand English (as most of Czech young people do). Actually... while bouting other European teams we take advantage of our language as nobody can understand us!

Russia - St Peterburg's White Night Furies.

I think you've been working on the league + team since June last year (and there might now be a league starting in Moscow this year?) ? How did it all start, and what have the challenges been over the past year and a bit? (Are there any cultural issues with recruitment in Russia, or language issues with derby being mostly English-language?)

Fight Sparrow: First of all, we don’t have a sports hall to train in. But I think we will solve this problem. There’s also a problem with understanding foreign players, but we can solve this problem too – some of our players speak English and help us to communicate with them. Some of our players started to attend English courses and I'm going to do it too, hope it will happen very soon. The fact that it is an English-language game must stimulate us to develop ourselves. There are some difficulties with the rules, sometimes we can’t understand them, but with the help of our foreign derby-friends and our trainers' communication we will achieve our goal.

Generous Jane (GJ): Roller derby in Russia started from only one girl who brought this game from Belgium. When she came back to Russia and found out that there is no roller derby here, she decided to change this and tell Russian people about the game. And some people (girls and boys) gathered together on the Palace square in the very center of St. Petersburg on the 22nd of May in 2013. They looked puzzled at this girl on quads who tried to heed the eccentric derby rules. They gathered together many times on the Palace Square and, as time has passed, these meetings became roller derby training (practices). The girl’s name was Katerina Rossolovich. She was the ideological inspirer, absolute leader, coach and the first captain of the first Russian roller derby team. During our first trainings we spent much time on leveling up the basic roller skating skills, practicing the derby position and crossovers. Then one artist drew the roller derby track on the Palace square for us and it was the time to start playing, though we’ve played like kittens! Approximately in the beginning of the autumn 2013 we confirmed the name of our team – “White Night Furies” and the logo. When the weather became cold we found a sports hall and started to train there. In December 2013 two Australian coaches – The Flying Nun Chucker and Ruby Ribcrusher - visited us. Besides ten hours of training we got the invaluable experience, the help and world recommendations on all the private and team questions, muscles, knowledge and incredible emotions from the communication with those excellent coaches. Chuck and Ruby's arrival made a powerful incentive to the development of roller derby in Russia and gave motivation to all of us. After the two spring Fresh Meat Days (1,2 of March 2014), the team became almost twice as big. Many of our derby-girls from the team started visiting derby practices while travelling to Europe in the cities they've been staying at. Derby-girls and boys from different countries such as France, Norway, Sweden, the USA came to St. Petersburg to train with us and to coach us. We take part in local events, thus earning the money for the team and promoting our sport which nobody knows about.

FireCracker: After Katerina quit Hulk Hellelujah became our captain, coach and chief. She and two girls are in our coach committee now. Now we even have a sponsor. It's a skateboard shop in Saint Petersburg. And from our trip to Finland we got a mentor-team. It’s a team from Helsinki – Kallio Rolling Rainbow. This summer they said that 99,9% of our derby questions already have answers. So now we can write them anytime and they will definitely help us.

Generous Jane (JG): Difficulties. The first difficulty is that we can't buy quads and derby gear in Russia so we had to order everything from Europe and USA without trying on. And recently the miracle happened and the last girl in our team bought quads, now we can say with a great confidence that we don’t play roller derby on inlines. Secondly, we don't have a sports hall with the suitable floor, changing rooms and the track. It's very difficult to find such sports hall and at present we haven’t managed to find one. Further, we are the only team in Russia – wow – that's cool, but we have nobody to play with! And this is a big minus for our karma, motivation and development. Also, there is no roller derby federation and special medical insurance here. We're trying to solve this problem now. We have to translate the rules and literature into Russian – this is a long and big process. Those who don’t know the language have to learn them by heart. However, learning them and reacting to them during the game play are not the same things. This kind of sport isn't developed in our culture. While telling your friends (if only they are not from Australia) you face to such reaction: “I've never heard about it! What is it? Is it played with a ball?”. And you have to explain as simply as possible that there is a pack, a bout, a jammer. You have to use drawings, pantomime and gestures while demonstration of the elements of the game. But not everybody has studied in a drama school, and that's why this performance, probably, is not so much attractive as it is frightened for the potential players especially when it is a question about contact, injuries, aggression. And this information vacuum makes a distance between us and those who probably were born to play roller derby.

You seem to have travelled to a lot of leagues around Europe to get practices in (from Lisbon through Vienna to Finland?). Could you have grown without the big derby community in Europe? What's been the biggest help to you from the community?

Fight Sparrow: I think that we have grown a lot during the last (2014) year. Now we are an organized and cohesive team. The special fact is that we have visited two Finnish teams and played three scrimmages with them. Some amazing foreign coaches and players have already visited us and it helped us a lot.

Hulk Hellelujah: Definitely not, we couldn't have grown without support from European derby community. Undoubtedly we couldn't even have started roller derby here without this community, because the idea of creating roller derby team here, in Russia, came from Europe, after watching some roller derby stuff. The biggest help was from a lot of people who supported us on Facebook, who wrote and came here to train us, to train with us, who hosted us in Kouvola and Helsinki for during our first scrimmages.

Jochans: This summer I was in Lisbon and trained with the local team. It was very scary at first because I didn't know what to do, how to skate even. And it at was the first time when I'd got quads on my feet. Then I joined the fresh meat group and I realized that it doesn't matter in roller derby who you are and where you come from. Things that matter are your desire to skate and a hunger for learning.

How is recruitment going?

Fight Sparrow: We don't recruit new players now. We hone our own skills. We need an extra time and place in a sports hall, and we can’t do it now, because we haven’t brought ourselves yet to the sufficient derby-standard – namely we haven’t played official bouts with teams from roller derby community.

As this is for our World Cup series, can you say if a Team Russia might be a possibility some day? Maybe by the next Cup in 2016/17?

Fight Sparrow: I believe in that! We must and we will.

Are there any changes in derby culture you see either being needed or coming out of the spread of derby into wider locations (not just USA + Western Europe) as time goes on?

Hulk Hellelujah: Can't tell now about any changes because the Roller Derby that we've started here is a big change in itself :) Everything is new and very exciting, so we need to be not an "isolated" part of the European community to talk about changes. The biggest change will be destroying countries' borders, but that's not a roller derby task :)