Firstly I would like to apologise for the lateness of this blog, and because you all waited so patiently, it’s going to be extra good.

Monday night was pretty much a blur. We were trained by Mama Firefly & Cleo Fracture #30 and we concentrated a lot on blocking. Mama very kindly hit me and took me out, thank you! We did our laps and I got 28 1/2. Can’t remember anything else (this is why I should write my blog the day after).

This Saturday I had my WFTDA minimum skills assessment! I turned up to The Thunderdome tired and hungry and a bit nervous for doing the test. I was scared of not passing, because I would have to wait to do it again, and I was scared in case I did pass because then I would have to scrimmage, which sounded super super scary (and worse than doing laps when hungover). We went through the entire test and it was extra tiring, I really struggled to do my laps and nearly cried half way through when I thought I wasn’t going to do it. But alas, I got the 27 and we carried on. Blocking, whips, transitions, laterals, skating on one foot for a whole lap (pretty difficult), plough stops, T-stops, fast laps, stepping and literally everything you could ever dream of, all crammed into 2 hours of intense and nerve wrecking anticipation.

After we had done all the physical skills we moved onto the test part. A really exciting test about roller derby rules, but it had to be done. 50 questions later I had finished and I waited to receive my results, a bit like when you drop your phone and it lands face down and you have that moment of “oh no, has it smashed?”.

I passed! 50/50 on the rules test as well to please all you zebras.

Now I am currently laid in bed recovering from my first scrim on Sunday night. I have got a bruise forming on the top of my left leg and my right leg isn’t co-operating with the rest of my body. But it was so good! I had the intention of only skating 5 jams, but I did more than that. I even got to be jammer and scored some points (unluckily not 4, so everyone couldn’t shout “4 for you Glen Coco!”). And I would like to take this opportunity to say to any Team England scouts that might be reading, I got lead jammer against Missy Rascal. Just saying.

I have been training with the Bet Lynch Mob now for a while, and since I won’t be going to New Skater Nights any more I might change the name of the blog to ‘Diary of a new(ish) skater’.

Fancy giving roller derby a go yourself? Our New Skater nights are held every Monday at The Thunderdome, 7:30-9:30pm. Click here for more details.