In the final bout of last weekend’s all-female Roller Derby World Cup—the first held anywhere in the world—a member of team Canada broke through a pack of American players and scored. The crowd cheered wildly and an audience member dressed all in red ran out onto the converted-warehouse rink, pumping a Canadian flag in her fist. Game officials updated the scoreboard accordingly: Canada 9, U.S.A. 105.
The Americans’ dominance in the gold-medal match was no fluke. Thirteen teams from countries as far away as New Zealand and Finland gathered at Downsview for the four-day tournament, and the Americans crushed all comers by point margins in the hundreds. For Canada to have scored even nine points was cause for major celebration. That they eventually managed 33 points (against the U.S.A.’s 336) was a sporting miracle on the order of a game-winning grand slam in the bottom of the ninth. All the other teams scored fewer points than that—combined.
Dave Miller, who writes a Toronto roller-derby blog under the name The Derby Nerd, thinks the U.S.A. rules the sport by dint of ownership. “They’re the creators of this modern version of the sport,” he said. “They are playing it at a level we’ve never seen.”
Derby originated in the 1930s before dying off, but enthusiasts in Austin, Texas, started reviving it about a decade ago. The game consists of two teams of five members, on roller skates, skating around a circular track. Each has a designated scoring player called a jammer, who attempts to lap the other team, and four blockers playing defence, who try to block the other team’s jammer by any means necessary.
“U.S.A. is a very strong team and we knew that,” said Team Canada member Amy Thompson (derby name: Gunpowder Gertie) while clutching her silver medal after the match. “We went in with the intention of very much learning from it.”
Thompson, far from dejected, sounded fired up when contemplating the next World Cup. “I think that tryouts for the team next year will be even more competitive,” she said.
