This season in roller derby has been rolling along well for the Coaler Rollers.
The Rollers hosted a tournament at the Bienfait Memorial Arena last weekend and were able to attract teams from Saskatoon, Calgary and Regina for a few games.
“We started panning the tournament after the tournament last year because you have to book your refereeing crew about a year ahead,” said Coaler Rollers president Lorelei Lachambre. “We got the teams and everything finalized within the last two months.”
The junior team of level 1/2 skaters played a pair of games against the Bridge City Bruisers from Saskatoon during the Saturday and Sunday parts of the tournament. The level 3 skaters played games against Calgary’s LegenDairy Rollers, the Bridge City Frostbite from Saskatoon and the Juvenile Delinquents from Regina’s Pile O’ Bones Roller Derby Club.
“They had at least a skater or two that plays for team Canada so we were up against really tough competition,” LaChambre said of the Calgary team. “But we played really well and had a lot of fun.”
The Coaler Rollers level three skaters have matured a lot as players over the course of the year.
“They are a lot stronger physically,” she said. “They used to have a lot more injuries because they just weren’t ready to take the big hits and keep going. Our team this year was noticeably physically stronger and kept in the game. They didn’t give up.”
Next on the schedule for the Rollers is a tournament in Regina on June 9 and then trying to get a team together to go to Calgary to return the favour of their team coming to this area to play.
The numbers overall at the club were very good for the year, LaChambre said as the level 1 and level 2 skaters warmed up.
“We have a full team and there’s 15 of them,” she said. “They range in age from nine to 13. As this group gets bigger and grows and learns the sport better, they will feed into our older team as well.”
One of those skaters that’s been learning a lot is Abby “Bubbagasmoosh” Renkas, who is looking forward to more tournaments in the future.
“We learned a lot more teamwork and that’s mostly what we worked on,” said Renkas. “We were having lots of troubles with that this year so we all just got together and played well.”
Renkas prefers her role as a blocker but gets involved in jamming because of the general lack of experience on the team in that.
