Roller derby is a sport that has recently gained attention through films and television and its popularity is growing, as Sacramento is the home to two roller derby leagues – the Sac City Rollers and the Sacred City Derby Girls. The Sacramento Press met with some of the derby girls at a recent practice. The Sac City Rollers, which formed in 2006, are preparing for the first bout of the season this Friday. Roller derby is defined by one derby girl – “H.N. Icy” – as football on skates, but without a ball. She’s known as Jennifer Madrigal outside of derby, and is a lab technician. While some derby girls are in law enforcement or construction, the Sac City Rollers have teachers and a librar

This is not your fourth grade spelling bee. The Sacred City Derby Girls, Sacramento’s women’s roller derby league, along with Bows & Arrows, are bringing a grown-up spelling bee to Sacramento. The event will benefit the Gender Health Center, an organization that provides mental health counseling to the LGBT community with a focus on Sacramento’s transgender population. Participants may sign up to spell at the event, beginning at 7 p.m. on Thursday at the Bows & Arrows store, located at 1815 19th St. The grown-up spelling bee will kick off at 8 p.m. Alice White, whose derby name is “Standard” and skates for the Sacred City Derby Girls, said she got the idea from her home state of Minneso

This Saturday, the River City Rollers’ Capital Punishers will take to the floor against the Bay Area Derby’s (B.A.D.) Berkeley Resistance in a femme fest of endurance and speed that will have fans on their feet and coaches calling till their voices go hoarse. Berkeley will not be easy to beat. “They’re known for having a crazy fan base, which can work to their advantage,” says a lanky, ink-adorned coach known as Motormouth, “This is the first time we’ve been able to host them here at home. We’ve worked really hard, so we’re hoping to pack the house!” Lipstick Librarian, described by teammates as coach, jammer, and marketing genius—and yes, she is a librarian, who teaches punk rock aerobi

The Sac City Rollers (SCR), Sacramento’s first all-women’s flat-track roller derby league, hosted Antioch's Undead Bettys Saturday night at Foothill Skate Inn in Sacramento. The bout, billed as the Star-Spangled Splatter!, featured the Sac City Rollers' Capital Punishers team. The Punishers won the bout 234-103. The Sac City Rollers league was established in January 2006 and includes over 100 active skaters. The league consists of traveling interleague teams the Capital Punishers and the Folsom Prison Bruisers, intraleague teams the Sweaty Betties and Rude Girls, and the Junior Derby League for girls ages 10 to 17. The Bad Apples held a halftime scrimmage at this bout.

It was a night full of spandex and roller skates during the Sac City Rollers’ Honky-Tonk Hoedown at Foothill Skate Inn Saturday night. The Rude Girls conquered the Sweaty Betties with a final score of 168-159. Both teams previously played at the Sac City Rollers Shamrock Slam opener, where the Rude Girls defeated the Sweaty Betties 146 - 126. The raffle proceeds from the bout go to Horses for Healing, a nonprofit therapeutic riding center to improve the physical, mental and spiritual well being of adults and children with special needs through involvement with horses. Debby Welshons, also known as Dr. Diamond, is the chiropractor for all of the derby girls. “They always put such a good

The Sac City Rollers, Sacramento’s first all-women’s flat-track roller derby league, held its 2011 season home opener Friday night at Foothill Skate Inn in Sacramento. The event, billed as the Shamrock Slam, featured the Rude Girls versus the Sweaty Betties in an intra-league bout. The Sac City Rollers league was established in January 2006 and includes over 100 active skaters. The league consists of traveling interleague teams the Capital Punishers and the Folsom Prison Bruisers, intraleague teams the Sweaty Betties and Rude Girls, and the Junior Derby League for girls ages 10 to 17. The league’s competitive season runs from February to December and includes local and national bouts. T

The Women's Flat Track Derby Association 2010 Western Regional Tournament is coming to Sacramento this weekend. And the Sacred City Derby Girls are stoked. The skaters in one of Sacramento's two flat track roller derby leagues have not only become eligible to compete in the regional playoffs for the first time — they won Sacramento the honor of hosting one of four qualifiers for the national championship in November. Sacred City's travel team, the Sacrificers, and teams from as far away as Colorado and New Mexico will be skating at Memorial Auditorium Oct. 1-3. The league's founder, Gabriell Garcia, also known as "Chica Loca," said skating at the auditorium will fulfill a dream for many

Sacramento will soon become home to a new kind of skate shop, born out of the love between a derby girl and a skater boy. Sandy "Motley" Cruz and Gordon "Gordo" Eckler, both 31, said they expect to open Cruz Skate Shop, a hybrid rollerskating and skateboarding shop, at 16th and U streets on Sept. 15. Cruz got into roller derby in 2005. She opened the first location in San Francisco's Bernal Heights neighborhood in March 2008. Cruz Skate Shop was originally a skate shop for roller girls, focusing on the exploding sport of flat track roller derby. She hadn't skated since she was 10, but was so intrigued with the sport that she helped start a new league in San Francisco called the Bay Area

Political ads may be famous for mudslinging, but if you want to see the real deal, drop by On The Y on Aug. 13 to watch the Sacred City Derby Girls duke it out in the mud pit. The girls will be mud wrestling to raise money to pay for one of the group’s two roller derby teams – The Sacrificers – to travel for the 2011 season. The tournament at the bar, located at 670 Fulton Blvd., is open to the 21-and-over crowd “We will have drink specials, and there will be a live DJ after the tournament,” said Halee Daily, director of marketing for the Sacred City Derby Girls. “Basically, we pick eight of our skaters (for the tournament), and we have last year’s Mud Queen seeing if she can keep her t

If you think that Roller Derby has gone the way of bell bottoms and bad disco, you are SO wrong. Well, you were right, but NOW you're wrong. That's because, after its heyday in the 1950s and '60s, roller derby faltered and finally collapsed altogether. Now it's back, on a flat instead of a banked track. And Sacramento has its own team, the all-female, full-contact Sacred City Derby Girls. Their 2009 season starts Saturday at Roller King on Riverside Avenue in Roseville. The rollers hit the track at 8 p.m. With players sporting handles such as Belle Dozer, Brawllen Angel, Frita Bandita, Rosey Knuckles and Meg A. Mayhem, these ladies mean business. As the only officially-sanctioned area me