Coaching Co-Ed in Gothenburg

Bootcamp time DAY 1

I got invited down to Gothenburg to coach their mens team, Salty Seamen, I know... great name... wait until you see their logo... it is JUST a fish, I promise. Well, now when that is out of the minds... It was fun to coach, to be honest, I was a little nervous the first hour, it has been a long time since I went and coached. But everyone seemed really happy, and I think everyone learned a few new things and pushed themselves outside their comfortzone.

The camp was acctually co-ed, and I dont think I have coached co-ed before, but it really is not that much of a difference. Well, guys are bigger, and YES they in general are.
I am a "big" girl with my six feet frame, and I usually weigh about 170 pounds (we are talking about this later). But most women are not my frame, I am not the avarage, and nor is the tiniest guy on the team. SO yes, guys are in general bigger and more muscular than women players. Playing with men, I have to contain even more, and hit even less. I can't hit people that weigh that much out of my way, and if I wanted to, I would have to crazy SWING at them, and that is usually not advicable, ever.

We worked on walls, walls, walls, skills and some offence, and on Sunday we ended it with a 2 hour scrimmage, and I joined in and scrimmaged. Made me miss skating with NYSE a little, but I had a REALLY good time! This is what I love doing, skating with different people, and learning from coaching others. Understanding your and others strength and weaknesses... makes you and your team better.

I had a really good time, and it felt good to be back coaching! Made me wanna watch and coach more derby and analyze how we all can get better... I need more friends to do that with...

NYSE manager 2015

I am superhappy to have been elected for a New York Shock Exchange manager for 2015 together with three other amazing Gotham Allstars (Maven,Vish and Salydie). I'm happy to be working with in my eyes the best MRDA team... YAYAAAA... it is going to be a great time... I love to be a part!

Monday, Monday is today

Silly days in New York, it rains outside and we sit together on our computers and write away. My best friend is photoshopping pomerians into a photo with me while I’m sipping on a beer. I answer emails and think about laer tonight when I have a date with some random person that I met on Tinder. I don’t know what to expect, and at this point I see it all as an adventure. It all seem so dumb, I really don’t think that I will meet someone on the internet and then spend the rest of my life with them. But being me, I am of course willing to try, even if I most of the time have a better time here in my best friends apartment watching her photoshop while I work or not work. I enjoy my friends more than random people, but then, I am supposed to have an open mind, so I do. Maybe I make a new friend, or maybe it really is the person I will spend the rest of my life with… maybe I should stop having so much doubt… or maybe not…
We are sining along with the Dixie Chicks and share a beer, and I guess I cannot complain about life much. Tomorrow I will wake up early catch up on my Blocker Seeking Jammer work, walk to the CrashPad (it's where Gotham practice) do my off-skate work-out and then attend Shock Exchange practice as one of their new managers. 

Another practice, blisters, and just that thang... learning

Sometimes everything is just great, just great, I'm hyper (most of the time) and I want to do everything. Yesterday I went to open skate and then stayed around for NYSE practice that Jonathan R lead. I had blisters when I started skating... 4 hours later, they were no better... that's all I can say on that matter. We all choose dumb things at times... my blisters choose to not go away... but dont worry, we will have words.

I am constantly feeling like I am catching up on skills, the past four years I developed a lot, but my prime focus was to teach and coach others, to develop teams and rollerderby in general. On many oaccations me being the most seasoned and skilled skater. And as I've said before, I don't mind, I love being able to coach and share all the derby with everyone.

BUT it is really amazing to be able to go to a practice and learn a bunch of new skills, well, at least take a stab at them. Yesterday it was fun, because we did a bunch of skills that were derived from speedskating, artistic skating and jamskating... and against my own better understanding, we scrimmaged for a bit.

Yeah.... I am hurting today, from using a bunch of unkonwm muscles and from a nice hit I got that really sent me flying... happens... it happens...

So far this month I have skated for about 36 hours (including my outdoor skate) - and I've gotten better at feeding myself. I've started to cook at home, at this point I might be making a little too much pasta, but yesterday I made crepes filled with mincedmeat sauce. Freaking amazing in my mouth after practice. 

Pink hair and NYSE getting THIRD

I woke up this morning wearing a gold lamé dress and my hair pink with golden jewlery stuck in it. Sometimes things just don't end up the way you plan them to be, and for the past few months I've tried to be more carefree... I guess this really shows success...

I even felt slightly hung over, and when checking my e-mail I realised that I missed dodgeball with NYSE. I was still in time for the GGRD/NYSE combined on-skate part of practice. Most of the dudes were in Tacoma an dcurrently GGRD are in off-seson, except from us Allstars... so it was not really the busiest. We ended a little early to grab food before we sat down and watched NYSE play.. .and that was the rest of the day... I watched mens derby with a bunch of people and I enjoyed it. I still have to say that "come on my chest" is a thought that pops up ever so often... sooo much chest to chest action... at times in the Puget Sound/NYSE they skated so close chest to chest I think they were about to ask each other out on a date. At least they seem to have enought time to share some real intimte time...

NYSE ended up third - so we celebrated that with some nice cava...  SO many CONGRATULATIONS to NYSE, you guys did awesome and it was great to watch you. Being able to skate with those guys really have given me a new and more positive look on merby, and it has been superfun. And it was fun to watch Southern Discomfort... GO England! Derby truly is sreching allover the world...

And then I went home, L-train through Bushwick while Maven was falling asleep on my shoulder. I am for once starting to feel like I have my feet under me in a very long time. I think I'm starting to feel like I'm home.

Night ending with listen to all sorts of music together with Vish and eating ice-cream... yeah... it is life!

Insomnia is for sure still something that I have to deal with, and at times I think we might have a korean waterghost in the apartment... 

Coaching Junior Rollerderby and MRDA Champs

Today I asked Gotham juniors, and it was so much fun. I never coached junior, well, in a very long time, so it was a great experiance. It's funny, when I got there Mick said to me: Oh, the big kid is coaching the smaller kids. And it might be that way, I am a real big goofball... it was a little odd coaching at first, since I really have not been coaching since I left Sweden a few months ago. But coaching juniors is pretty much like coaching anyone. Maybe their attentionspan is a little shotrer, but then half of the derbyplayers I know seem to suffer from ADHD or some simular attentionspan deficency. It is what it is....
I did my favorite off-skate and the warm-up I used to run with Stockholm all the time, I havent either coached such a small group in a long time, it sort of reminded me of when I started coming over to Sweden, and all leauges only had 7-15 players at practice.

After coaching I went over to a friend and watched NYSE play their first game in Tacoma at the Man Champs. They did good and won with alsmost 200 points... it's cool to see two of your coaches play, and some part of me want to tease Buster about going to the box so much.

So today been full of derby, and I am still watching the men play, my first coach from Jet City plays on Puget Sounds, so it's fun to watch them play Bridgetown (Portland) that I also slightly know some players on.

As I*ve said before, I adore derby, womam, man and junior... the rollerderby I play will always be closest to my heart... but at the same time... the more derby, the better. Tomorrow NYSE will be playing the Gatekeepers, so it's gonna be real exciting.... I am sooo down for watching more roller derby!

A great Sunday on skates and some thoughts about men derby...

This morning I woke up to NO coffee, taht is for sure not a great morning, I woke up, took a shower, trampled a small cockroach, emailed Abe and asked if I could join the Shock Exchange practice (that's the New York mens team) and took off to Crashpad to spy on Fresh Meat and help Bones with some paper filing. I met her on the subway and the great rson she is, she had COFFEE in a jar to share with me. Right then I knew it was gonna be a great day. After over an hour of filing paperwork for our rec leauge I ran into Abe who told me I was welcome to skate with the dudes. Yay, day was getting better.

To be honest, I've always have had very mixed feelings about men and their desire to play rollerderby. It's not that I have anything against mens rollerderby, I for a long time felt like rollerderby was something that I as a woman worked really hard to make what it is today (absolutley with help from male referees and volonteers). I felt that if men wanted to play a fullcontact sport, why couldn't they just play hockey or something else that men already had a really big presence in. I felt very entiteled to rollerderby, and there are several reasons to it, several things that are to personal to write about in this blog and some simple reasons as in that we live in a patriarchy. I don't hate men in any way, some men annoy me, so does some women. And to be honest, I don't mind playing rollerderby with men, most men I've played rollerderby with are delightful and amazing. They love this sport just as much as I do and work hard to push it forward, they recognize that women are what made rollerderby to what it is today.
What worries me is that it might get lost, the respect for women, but there are so many things that might get lost, and when it comes down to it all, "the more rollerderby, the better". I love to play rollerderby, and who would I be to take that away from anyone. Still I have to admit it scares me.

I had a great time skating with NYSE today, they are all really nice and cool dudes, some of them freaking amazing derbyplayers, and their size really does challange me, I am used to be able to push other players out of the way... not so much here. They have a different style of play, MUCH more backwards blocking, def a skill I need to work on more, and are all really hardworking. I had a great time, and they are going to MRDA champs next weekend. And I wish them ALL the luck, and some more in Tacoma... ahhh... good old Tacoma!

After practice i had a beer and then I went home and made a great pasta meal for me and Vish. Yepp, life is not bad at all...