Hi-Line Living: Roller Derby comes to Havre

The Bullhook Bombshells are bringing to Havre a sport the town has never seen before - women's flat track roller derby.

Roller derby brings together a myriad of personalities to participate in an alternative sport that gains popularity every year. Anyone who can don skates can take part - this is unanimous consensus among the members of the Bullhook Bombshells.

The sport's current form has been going strong since its rebirth in Austin in 2001. Since then, well over 1,000 leagues have been formed worldwide and one is about to finish off its first year in Havre.

Amber Wells goes by the roller derby name of Amber Lee Misery. Each player on a team must pick a name and number. The names are usual humorous, tough-sounding and often utilize puns or plays on words.

Wells decided to put the call out to the community to see if there was an interest in forming a team and was met with resounding support. Since their first meeting October 2014, the Bombshells have amassed more than 10 skaters and three junior skaters who will eventually fill the ranks of the Bullhook Brats, the junior league of the Bullhook Bombshells. The group has formed a board, held multiple events in the community for fundraising and will soon be skating indoors at the Community Center at the Great Northern Fairgrounds.

Wells said she has lived a lot of places that have roller derby teams and thought it would be fun to be on one. When life brought her back to Havre, she decided to bring roller derby back with her.

"It looked like a really fun thing to do," Wells said. "It gets women and kids involved in healthy activity that supports the community. And it's also awesome."

The Bombshells have been skating at the Havre skate park on 9th Street twice or three times a week, preparing for their first bout next year.

They have a multitude of teams they could play in Montana alone. Every major city in the state has a team - Butte, Helena, Missoula, Bozeman and Great Falls. So far, Havre will be the smallest town with a competing team in Montana once the Bullhook Bombshells begin playing.

THE GAME

The rules of the game are not well known, but are simple enough:

A match between teams is called a "bout." A bout is two 30-minute periods and takes place on an oval track. There are five players for each team playing at once for a total of 10 skaters. One skater from each team is designated as a "jammer" and the rest are "blockers."

In order to gain points, a jammer must get past the other team's blockers and skate around the track to overlap them. After the initial breakthrough and first lap, each member of the opposing team the jammer passes is worth one point.

Blockers are playing both offensively and defensively as they try to stop the other team's jammer from progressing while opening up paths for their own jammer to pass.

If the jammer is ahead of the other team's jammer, she is called the "lead jammer" and has control over the "jam," which is a time segment of a maximum of two minutes in which the jammers can score points. If the lead jammer calls off the jam, the points are set and they all regroup to begin the next jam.

The team with the highest score at the end of the bout wins.

THE TEAM

Nikki Adamson, a board member for the Bullhook Bombshells Havre Roller Derby League and one of the original founders, said she plays roller derby for one reason: She loves it.

Adamson, or Nikitina Toxic, said that pretty much anyone can play.

"I don't think that there is a specific type that plays," Adamson said. "You don't want to be completely out of shape, but you don't have to be in great shape for it. There's always a risk of getting hurt."

She added that if there is one thing that is a requirement to play, it's that "you have to have a little backbone."

Other than that, she said, she's seen big girls as great jammers and tiny girls knock over big ones.

Wells said blockers are 98 percent of the game and the bigger the girl, the sturdier their defense is. But size isn't the only key to the position.

"Size does not matter," Adamson said. "It's willpower and ambition."

Samantha Duran, or DoZerElla, has been an active member of the group for some time.

"I like roller derby because it's competitive," Duran said. "With both my fellow teammates and bouts."

Duran said that she used to skate as a little girl but had to learn it again.

"It's not like riding a bike, that's for sure" she said.

Duran said that anyone can play roller derby. Many women have told the team reasons they can't play, like they're too old, too out of shape, too afraid and more. Duran said these are not valid excuses to pass up being a Bombshell.

"I would tell them 'look at me. I'm overweight, but I'm still doing it,'" Duran said. "All you can do is try it. I would just encourage them not to be afraid."

Women seem to be worried about their age and size when thinking about joining up with the Bombshells, Wells said.

"My advice would be - look at the other teams. Great Falls has older women on their team and your age shouldn't be something that should stop you," Wells said. "Basically, don't be afraid."

Wells added that the only people who shouldn't be skating are people with major health issues. The Bombshells have in their ranks women from their 40s down to their teens. Team members are women of all sizes; they are mothers and they are representatives from a wide spectrum of lifestyles. When all is said and done, any woman without medical concerns and who is able to skate can join - and anybody can learn to fall.

Falling while playing roller derby is an inevitability. However, there are correct ways to fall that help avoid injury and incorrect ways that bring injury on. As part of the Bombshells' twice- or thrice-a-week practices, they practice techniques and maneuvers that they will employ in bouts. This includes how to correctly fall.

"Once you overcome the fear of falling, it's not that bad," Adamson said.

Each skater is required to wear proper safety attire - helmet, mouth guard, elbow pads, wrist guards and knee pads. A couple of the Bombshells have already been injured in practice as they learn to skate properly, though there have not been any serious injuries. Falling is part of the game and when a woman falls during practice, she is generally met with several yells of "Good fall!" from her teammates.

SUPPORT

The Bullhook Bombshells are not without support from the numerous women's roller derby teams around the state and farther. They recently attended a bout in Great Falls in which they acted as non-skating officials, performing tasks like keeping track of penalties and scores.

"I loved helping out Great Falls with their bout," Adamson said. "I learned a lot about the gameplay and how much of an effort it takes to make it work. The girls were great. They accepted us; they treated us as members of their team. It was a very welcoming experience."

Adamson is referring to the Electric City Roller GrrrlZ, Great Falls' team that invited the Bombshells up to help out and watch the bout.

Wells said the Great Falls teams have been nothing but supportive since she reached out to them, and they're not the only ones who have been rooting for the Bombshells to get a team together.

The team out of Butte may be coming to Havre to help get the girls geared up for the next roller derby season, Wells said. Skaters from Great Falls have pledged their knowledge to help Havre train to be bout-ready.

The current season is almost over, and Wells and Adamson said they hope the team will be ready by the next season.

There is currently no official season as mandated by the Women's Flat Track Derby Association. Leagues kind of just play when they can. Electric City holds bouts at the Four Seasons Arena at the Great Falls fairgrounds, and the arena decides what four days out of the year they can use the facility. Many Great Falls teams' seasons match school years. There's a team in New Hampshire that only plays home bouts during the summer because they're using a hockey rink.

Wells said the junior league, Bullhook Brats, is coming along and she hopes it expands soon. The junior league is for ages 5 to 17 and trains separately from the women. The kids have different levels of contact they play under, so if they're not comfortable with contact or are just too young, they don't have to jump into a potentially uncomfortable situation. All they have to do is skate.

Men who join the team provide support such as by coaching or refereeing.

Part of the charm of women's roller derby is that it has a do-it-yourself aspect that groups of women can achieve without much experience in organizing leagues and events. The women in the Bombshells, except one or two, have never done anything like this in their lives. They all started from the same place - wobbling on new skates with something to look forward to.

Contentions within Bombshells arise, but at the end of the day, they have to be a team in order to keep things rolling.

All-in-all, the Bullhook Bombshells is a ragtag group of women from all paths of life that share one thing in common - the thrill of being on skates and waiting for that next bout.  

"I hope we succeed and we're able to kick ass," Duran said. "I know we will."

Bullhook Bombshells Roller Derby roster:

Players

• Nikki Adamson

Nikitina Toxic #22

• Charlie Cline

Mega Charlizard #π

• Lana Dramstad

Raven P Sycho #69

• Samantha Duran

DoZerElla #64

• Ayla Estell

Stardust Psycho #121

• Charlotte Gregori

CharZard #02

• Tia Gregori

The Bean Reaper #44

• Bless Paquette

Psycho Gurlfren #23

• Ana Suda

ANA TEKILLYA #517

• Angela Toldness

Mocha Mayhem #32

• Shannon Vaulthier

Ginger Snap'Necks #38

• Amber Wells

Amber Lee Misery #27

Juniors

• Lily Gregori

Bad Kitty #7

• Vondra Suda

Frozen Heart Princess #100

• Avery Wells

Gnarley Quinn #13

Coach

• Harold Ferguson

Captain Harold #113

Referees

• Lincoln Elijah Holt

Cone Crusher #87

• John Paul Schmidt

Gnarlemagne #10/4