CEDAR RAPIDS — In the three years Motley Cruel (aka Andrea Clay of Cedar Rapids) has been a roller girl, she has broken a tailbone, fractured a cheekbone, had a "skater's fracture" in which hand bones break against the metal of the wrist guard, and suffered multiple concussions.
These are perfectly normal injuries in the sport of roller derby, new here this year.
The Cedar Rapids Rollergirls held preseason exhibition games in October and November and have another Jan. 10 at the U.S. Cellular Center. Regular-season games will start in the spring.
Tryouts were held this fall with another round scheduled in February. Motley Cruel said if women are steady on skates she can teach them everything they need to be rollergirls.
They'll learn how to fall properly to avoid injury to themselves and other skaters, how to jump over fallen skaters and how to hit safely in a pack.
Motley emphasizes skill, endurance, and winning strategy.
"The women are 100 percent real, and the bruises are 100 percent real," she said.
There is some showboating during the games, but roller derby teams want to be taken seriously as a sport, not just as entertainment.
Motley, 36, with three teenage daughters, said roller derby appeals to a diverse group of women. The team has tough girls, soccer moms, realtors, bankers and nail technicians, ranging from 20 to mid-40s.
"Everybody has their place," she said. "All body types are good for this."
Blockers are usually average to large skaters who can hit opponents harder, and jammers are usually smaller, faster skaters. Jammers skate through the pack to score points.
Fans are diverse, too. During exhibitions, young girls in Rollergirls gear sat with parents in the stands, while more daring fans, some in their 70s, sat in trackside "suicide seating" where skaters are prone to fly into the crowd.
The team has grown enough to split into two teams, pink and black. Other than Motley Cruel (the founder and one of the coaches who played for the Heartland Rollergirls in Bloomington, Ind.), everyone is new to the sport. The black team scored more than 200 points last Saturday against the Big Mouth Mickies of Clinton in front of a crowd of about 900. Their first game against the Quad City Rollers drew 1,800.
Skaters pay for their equipment and receive no pay. God Speed Automotive is one of the sponsors and provided the team with black uniforms emblazoned with skate names and a hot-pink skull with a bow on top.
"It's a little bit girlie, but a little more deadly," Motley said of the design.
Players choose their skate names, which Motley said becomes an alter ego. Every name has to be unique on a national roster of more than 20,000 skate names.
"As soon as we're on the track and the whistle blows, they turn into their skate name and they're out there kicking ass," Motley said.
