advice
Suzy Hotrod
Dahmernatrix
Gotham Girls Roller Derby, New York, NY
San Diego Derby Dolls San Diego, CA
DEAR BLOCKER AND JAMMER, I have a serious problem with my elbows. I'm a newb to the derby world, and I'm an addict. But I can't stop my crazy arms. Every time I get hit or think I'm going to fall my elbows get a mind of their own and attack anyone near me. What can I do (short of duct taping my arms to my body) to keep my elbows to myself? -CRAZY ARMS
DEAR LOCO ARMS,
DEAR CRAZY ARMS,
(I’m saying this in my best Strong Bad Voice) The bad news is you’re asking advice from the Loco Arms Champeeeeen. I have been known to bean teammates in the face quite a lot as I exit a pack, so know that I’m kinda throwing stones in our glass roller rink here, OK? That being said, I have lots of things you can practice to help control your arms. Here’s the disclaimer. There is no roller derby magic. This is going to take a long time of a lot of hard work to fix. In the heat of the moment you’re likely going to revert to your old ways for a while. Don’t give up on yourself, just know that it’s not going to quickly disappear. Duct taping your arms down. Well sorta. Once my home team had the idea of doing skate drills with our arms in our sweatshirts... with the arms tied. We figured we could undo them quickly to avoid a literal face plant if something went terribly wrong. Well that was sort of an interesting idea, but we wound up moving from that to skating with our hands in our pockets. It’s great as a reminder to girls that so quickly would draw their arms up, to see how often they really had the urge to do it. Then they had to fight it. Crazy arms, a lot of times, come from lack of skating confidence or comfort. Putting our arms up creates the illusion of a safety net. The truth is, the safety net has to come from your strong legs and a strong core to keep you balanced. Another drill I like to teach is “stitching your arms down.” I call it something like “angry stick,” or something idiotic in the typical Hotrod-ism style. Be normal, imagine sewing your arms straight, right down the side of your body, elbows along ribcage, hands near the sides of your upper thighs. Now practice keeping your legs bent and bouncy, tighten your core by thinking about pulling your belly button straight back to your spine and change your height levels, and use your shoulders and legal back zone to smash into your neighbor like an angry stick, no elbows invited. This may make little sense in writing. You are always welcome to hire Suzy Hotrod to come to your league to physically show you. ;) A helpful tip is that I sometimes over exaggerate this motion by overly tensing my arms and actively squeezing them to the spot I’ve “sewn” them. OR put your arm in an imaginary sling. Basically bend your elbow and lock your entire forearm under your boobs and never ever ever ever let it move when you practice hitting someone. Also do not let your biceps sneak away from your upper torso. When I teach this that upper arm likes to sneak around while we’re focusing so much on the forearm. Lock it all down. Same as I mentioned above about overly tensing the arm. I sometimes make my hand a tightly squeezed fist and actively press my arm to my under boob area there to remind me to not cheat it out. Under boob. It’s like, Under Dog? Whatever. Then as with the last exercise, practice using your bouncy knees, your strong core center, and changing your levels to wreak havoc without your elbow. Mentally chop your arms off. Seriously, you gotta get comfortable with your body that no longer has arms. Practice rolling right up to your teammate and bumping into her with your chest. Laughing optional and encouraged. If you’re open and comfortable with using your chest you don’t rely on your arms for protection. Get all football player up in her. Practice some chest bumping. Seriously. Uh and towel slapping on the ass is optional, as well. Bye bye arms, hello under boob.
I was unable to find a reputable source with exact numbers regarding how much force is required to break bones. Suffice it to say, it’s not very hard to break a person’s nose, nor is it difficult to break a collarbone, give a black eye, or god forbid, collapse a windpipe. You see, your elbow is a thick piece of bone that is then covered with padded plastic when you put your gear on. Combine all that with a flailing newbie on wheels, and you’ve got a potentially dangerous instrument of blunt force trauma. I’m not trying to scare you or be a jerk, but you’ve got two truncheons whirling out of your shoulders. Crazy arms are more than just a bad habit, like not letting your equipment air out or not washing your pads enough, because it doesn’t just affect you – it can really hurt the people around you. I’m sure your girls are trying not to make too big a deal of it because they don’t want to put a damper on your budding derby addiction, but I’m going to save them from having to be the bad guy: your teammates deserve a reasonable expectation of safety, and you are not allowed to learn anything new until you get your crazy arms under control. Quit fantasizing about apex jumps, grand slams and huge takeouts. Nothing fun and fantastical until you get this under control. The reason your arms are reaching out and grabbing others when you are about to fall is some part of you feels scared and desperate, and you’re grasping for safety. The problem is reaching out for others is the worst thing you can do because all you’re going to get is an angry league mate, or even someone falling on top of you. You need to develop your core strength so that your balance is more self-contained, and so you’re not reaching out when your balance feels insecure. If your league does not have an emphasis on cross training and conditioning, you can find exercises online to focus on your abs, obliques and back. Additionally, when you’re warming up or otherwise skating in nonscrimmage drills, I recommend trying to focus on holding your hands together and elbows touching together in front of your chest, kind of like a boxer except with your fists away from your face. You will not actually be playing roller derby with your arms in this pose, but trying to skate this way when you think about it will give you an opportunity to further develop the muscles that will functionally help you skate, such as thighs, quads and glutes, and will make you feel less dependent on your arms for balance. After you start to feel considerably stronger in your core and balance, I would continue pushing yourself and focus on staying in control during unpredictable situations. For example, skating outside on somewhat cracked or irregular sidewalks, going to skate parks or doing transitions from going forwards to backwards and vice versa as quickly as possible. Of course, it goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway) that every time you are skating, but especially when pushing your limits, you need to be wearing protective gear and not doing so closely enough that you’ll be crashing into others. I predict that after you spend a couple of weeks focusing on core and balance, you’ll see that your crazy arms will stop being so unreasonable and will no longer attack your friends. Then you’ll be free to focus on the things you really want to be good at, the awesome derby moves that turned you into an addict in the first place!
4 | Spring 2011 | fiveonfivemag.com