#10yearsofgrd // 11 March 2017

So, we made it! It has officially been ten years since the first time a group of people led by Mistress Malicious and Teri Toxic skated around Kelvingrove Park as Glasgow Roller Girls, and now here we are (via a rebrand and so many other things to celebrate!).

We wanted to celebrate all of the people that have made us who we are today, so we put a call out for everyone's favourite photos and memories of GRD on social media and we got so many great images! Search #10yearsofgrd on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and you will see everything that's been shared with us. These were all collated into a slideshow which was shown on the day, and we're assured that Puma will turn this into a video and set it to music at some point before our anniversary year is up! So keep an eye out for that, it's going to be great.

There was a vicious inflatable banana attack during the day. Photo courtesy of Ali Maddock.

So: thank you everyone. Whether you've been on our A team, never made a team, officiated for us, volunteered at an event, announced a game, spectated, taken photos, provided medical support or did anything at all for us we want you to know how grateful we are <3

Thanks also go out to all our sponsors over the years, but particularly our current sponsors Euro Hostel, 5th Blocker Skates, S1 Helmets and KT Tape. Without their support, we would really struggle to keep doing what we do on roller skates. So, cheers for that!

For the 10th Birthday celebration itself, we decided to get as many people together as we could who are part of this awesome sport and who have been part of our story. We arranged three games: Rising Stars, Co-Ed and Advanced Women.

To see the programme, go here.

The Rising Stars teams. Image courtesy of Ali Maddock.

First up on the schedule were the Rising Stars, two teams made up of skaters from across Scotland with 0-3 games experience. There's clearly a lot of talent up and coming in Scottish roller derby, so don't be complacent if you're already on a team because these guys were great! The game was pretty close most of the way through, but towards the end Team Black pulled ahead.

Final score: Team Black 180 - 119 Team Yellow

Marshall Lawless sneaks past Optimus Grime in the Co-Ed game. Photo courtesy of Ali Maddock.

The Co-Ed teams were keener on a pun than the newbies, choosing the monikers No Pun InTENdid and The Banana Splits. This was a really tight game with multiple lead changes and very little to choose between the teams, as they were both so strong and showed no sign of tiring! Eventually, after quite the battle, No Pun InTENdid won by a narrow margin.

Final score: No Pun InTENdid 97 - 90 The Banana Splits

The Advanced Women's teams, and the inflatable banana, which got a penalty at some point. Photo courtesy of Ali Maddock.

And, last but far from least, were the Advanced Women. Team Yellow took on the Ten-Ah Ladies who not only kept Puma amused with their excellent name as she made up the programme, but also sent in headshots of them aged 10. These were truly gold, and well worth checking the programme out for (see above).

It's unclear if it was the power of the Pun Gods which spurred the Ten-Ah Ladies on to such a dominant performance given that both teams were fairly evenly mixed, but dominant they were and piled on the points while holding Team Yellow under 100 points despite a valiant fightback.

Final score: Ten-Ah Ladies 255 - 58 Team Yellow

L-R: Venus, Sadie, Chris, Siobhan, Sharizard and Lawless with the picture we got for Chris and the one he made for us! Photo courtesy of Ali Maddock; artwork for Chris by Nuclaire Art.

And as if that wasn't enough awesomeness for one day, we also got a gift for our most loyal fan, Chris. Don't get us wrong, we love all our fans but Chris does have a bit of a special place in our hearts. He is there for us just about every game and draws us wonderful portraits of our skaters so we reciprocated with a portrait of Chris done by Nuclaire Art.

And to round off the day, we had a lovely free skate with music and pals. We had a lovely time and we hope everyone who came along did too.

In the run-up to the event, we were featured in The National and on Commonspace.

And if you're ready for more roller derby, check out our Events Page for what's next in the GRD journey! We also designed some special edition merch for the event which was available on the day, and will be up on the website soooooooon!

Don We Now Our Skate Apparel // 3 Dec 2016

It seems like a long time ago that we hosted our charity fundraiser game (because it is - Ed.). Who knew that roller derby bloggers hibernated like bears? (that simply isn't true, you've just been distracted by other tasks and pictures of cats. My office, now. - Ed.)

Anyway. Cast your minds back to the start of December, when it was still all horrible and cold outside and it wasn't yet 2017 or even Christmas. Being the big-hearted types that we are, we decided to host a charity game to collect pet food, toys and donations for two well-deserving charities: SSPCA and the Community & Beyond Toy Bank.

Everyone knows who that the SSPCA are those wonderful humans who look after animal welfare in Scotland: rehoming pets, rescuing animals, preventing cruelty and investigating abuse. The Community & Beyond Toy Bank is probably lesser-known, but no less important. They collect toys and distribute them to families across Govan who might otherwise go without.

Santa, the Ref-Deers and some elf helpers! Photo courtesy of Sam Skipsey.

So, on to the roller derby! Our teams had both come up with excellent festive names, with the Naughty List facing up to the Slay Belles. Everyone had a great time, and even the refs were a bit less deadly serious than normal, with Santa hats, elves, reindeer and more! There was even entertainment through the day, with some fabulous dancers and a magician who danced with a table AND I STILL DON'T KNOW HOW HE DID IT.

This guy was absolutely using magic to float this table as he danced, no other explanation for it. Photo courtesy of Sam Skipsey.

It was a hard-fought game but eventually the Naughty List lived up to their name and stole the win from the Slay Belles.

Final score: Naughty List 233 - 129 Slay Belles.

Awards:

Naughty List
Best Blocker: Hardcore Jen 24
Best Jammer: Kami-Tazzy 360
MVP: Haberbashery 40

Slay Belles
Best Blocker: Un-Fairley 27
Best Jammer: Monifa The Bus 253
MVP: Nymphadora Bonks 2

Slay Belles in white, Naughty List in black plus bench staff in a super-dynamic shot, courtesy of Sam Skipsey.

The wonderful Sam Skipsey was on hand with his trusty camera to catch some action from the day, and you can watch it here.

The Magnificent Sevens! 21 Jan 2017

For our first event of 2017, we decided to do something a little bit different so after much thought, we settled on an alternative style derby sevens tournament. Lots of skating and lots of pals, what better way to start the year?!

The standard format of roller derby sevens was the idea of Xavier Bacon and Phoenix InFlames of Essex Men's Roller Derby a couple of years ago now. The aim was to create a faster-paced game similar to rugby sevens: seven skaters per team, a twenty-one minute game and no bench staff, no official reviews, no team time outs and only four penalties to foul out. Xavier has spent the last few years building this form of the game up and it's proved really successful.

For our purposes, we wanted to involve as many people as possible so Cara Viola & Janie Bones made some significant changes to this format: keeping seven skaters per team but reducing to seven minute games enabling us to squeeze more derby into the day. A derby sevens/sur5al mash-up if you will.

All our officials, plus sparkly hats. Image by Dave McAleavy of boutday.com.

With a Wild West theme to the day (and the excellent poster; image courtesy of Dave McAleavy of boutday.com), with some cracking team names and sparkly pink hats(!), we were bound to have a good time. With skaters in mostly co-ed teams from across Scotland, there was bound to be fierce competition and the day didn't disappoint.

After all TWENTY-ONE games were played (poor referees and NSOs; I think our sheriffs and deputies deserve a medal for officiating that many games in one day!), the victors were The Seven Deadly Spins! For anyone who missed out on the day or wants to relive the glory, the wonderful Sam Skipsey was on hand to catch all the action on video here.

The Seven Deadly Spins vs Soy Division. Image courtesy of Dave McAleavy, boutday.com.

And for anyone who wants the lowdown on the numbers, read on for all the gory numerical details!

The final team rankings for the day, showing the winners The Seven Deadly Spins.

The teams who turned up to the ultimate showdown

Schedule & game scores for the day.

GRD: A year in the life

Recently GRD held our Annual General Meeting at Euro Hostel Glasgow. At this meeting the Board of Directors reported to our league members on the business of the club over the past year, followed by a financial report and information on the business of each of our committees. This year with the assistance of our Web and Design committee the Directors showed us a wonderful slideshow of some of our triumphs and challenges which took place between September 2015 and 2016. 

Here at the blog we thought our readers might like to share in this little trip down memory lane, so grab yourself a cuppa and take a gander at what we've been up to!

Game Report: Home Teams 2

You might remember the first event in this year's GRD Home Teams calendar, back in June. The T-Wrecks took on the Bad Omens and Death Stars and those giant green guys with pointy teeth and tiny arms were victorious! Twice! Turns out being extinct for several million years is no barrier to being successful at roller derby. If you want all the prehistoric detail, check out the blog.

The end of September saw the Bad Omens and the Death Stars finally getting their chance to fight it out, to see whether magical powers and brooms or lightsabers and something which definitely isn't a moon were the best.

Fever showing Postlewaight her magical flying smashy roller derby powers; photo courtesy of Dave McAleavy boutday.com.

It was a pretty tense game, with a tight margin between the teams throughout and multiple lead changes to keep the crowd on the edge of their seats. At half time, there were only five points in it with Death Stars in the lead 102-107.

Monifa, Belle & Lawless holding back Hadrian's Brawl; photo courtesy of Dave McAleavy boutday.com.

While the Force was strong with our local Sith Lords, any portents of doom for the Bad Omens would have been premature. They appeared to cast a spell over the opposition and created gold from base metal - finishing the game as diabolically good winners.

Final score: Bad Omens 236 - 227 Death Stars.

Despite spending much of the game reclining, the Bad Omens still romped to victory; photo courtesy of Dave McAleavy boutday.com.

The final event in our home teams' season this year will be on November 12th, with a game between the Bad Omens and T-Wrecks to see who will bathe in glory and who will bathe in gravy (or something). Get your tickets here.

Musical Dinosaurs

I'm not referring to your dad's dodgy record collection or a jurassic party game, instead an event happening this very Saturday evening! If you pop along to Audio at 7pm, you'll be in for a treat as our T-Wrecks have organised a fundraising gig featuring Glaswegian nine-piece ska collective Esperanza, The Superlatives and solo acoustic punk Jonzip. For more info and ticket details, go here.

And if you're free earlier in the day why not come along for some more tense home teams action as last year's overall winners the Bad Omens take on the Death Stars to see who will get through to the Home Teams Season Final in November!  Check out our website for more details and to see the package deal we have for game+gig tickets!

Spotlight on Sponsors: Euro Hostel Glasgow

Here at Glasgow we love it when people come to our games, especially if they've travelled from far and wide to see us. That's why we're especially delighted to introduce to you our fantastic new sponsors, Euro Hostel Glasgow! 

You too could stay in a room like this! GRD checks out the dorm room facilities at EH! Glasgow.

Euro Hostel Glasgow is located on Clyde Street just a block away from Central Station in one direction and St Enoch's Underground Station in another, which puts them in the perfect location for access to all the glories Glasgow has to offer. 

Not only do they offer comfortable rooms at great prices but they are a mere 19 minutes walk from The ARC Sports Centre, the venue for our Home Teams Season Opener and many other games throughout the year. Great news for derby fans across the country! Check out the handy dandy map that'll get you directly from EH! to ARC.

There are even luxury VIP suites available which are perfect for a whole team to stay in together; imagine travelling up on your coach and taking care of all your accommodation in one go! No awkward drop offs, no need for complicated meeting places - you're already together in one budget-friendly spot. Oh, and did we mention the free WIFI? Essential for all #teamselfies of course. Sound good? Visit Euro Hostel Glasgow's group page to find out more. 

But that's not all! They also have smaller private rooms, dorms and even a bar and restaurant on the premises so it's great for travelling alone or with small groups of friends and family too. We hope that next time you visit us here in the Dear Green Place you'll check out Euro Hostels, for a budget stay - your way.