Chippewa Valley Roller Derby's Stef Leppard (far right) gets by Keweenaw Roller Derby's Jeffrey Dahminator and Kim Kong while, in the background, Keweenaw's jammer Suomi Slammer attempts a star pass. (Kent Kraft/For the Gazette)

CALUMET — Keweenaw Roller Derby (KRD) has a very ambitious home bout schedule this season with three highly ranked squads coming to compete in the Calumet Colosseum. This week, the rankings in the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA) have KRD at No. 134 in the region compared to their opponents’ rankings of No. 95 (Chippewa Valley), No. 87 (Traverse City), and No. 77 (Rockford).

To start their home season off, KRD took to the track against Chippewa Valley Roller Derby (CVRD) from Eau Claire, Wisconsin. The game ended with a score of 201-119 in favor of CVRD.

The CVRD “wheel and crossbones” logo, which mirrors the Jolly Roger pirate flag, was prominent and ominous on their jerseys as they took to the track. KRD skaters seemed unfazed as they lined up next to their opponents, waiting for the first whistle.

As soon as the first jam started, CVRD’s jammer sped through KRD’s blocker pack and into an early 4-0 lead. KRD met the fast pace in the next jam, bringing it to a tied 4-4. A few minutes later, the teams were still tied at 16-16, appearing to be evenly matched.

Two jams later, the score was 26-16 in favor of CVRD, and as the first half was 15 minutes old, the score had ballooned to 62-31, still in favor of CVRD. While the KRD jammers were often stymied by the blockers of CVRD, the jammers for CVRD managed to go under, around, and sometimes straight through the blockers of KRD.

As halftime brought a break in the action, the score was now 102 points for CVRD, and 54 points for KRD. Passersby in the lobby could overhear the intensity of Coach Melissious Intent who was trying to stoke the fires of competitiveness in the KRD skaters. At the other end of the lobby, CVRD skaters were joking, laughing, and relaxing as halftime passed.

Intensity was definitely present in the KRD skaters as they took the track for the second half of the bout, but a steely resolve was also present in the CVRD skaters. While KRD was able to keep pace with CVRD’s scoring throughout much of the second half, they were never able to claw back any ground on their opponents.

As is the case with most KRD bouts, both teams were all smiles as they skated around the swath of fans who came trackside for high fives when the game was done. MVP awards, chosen by the opposing teams, were handed out to both squads. For CVRD, Scuttlebutt Jibber Jabber was their MVP jammer, while Toxic Hell received MVP blocker honors. On the KRD squad, team captain Suomi Slammer was the MVP jammer and Pippi StrongWhomping was the MVP blocker.

“I think it was a great bout, definitely very challenging, but it’s always great to play CVRD,” Suomi Slammer said. “They’re just a great group of people and it’s always fun. We made a lot of mistakes, also did a lot of great things. We’ll keep improving on it over the season.”

Slammer downplayed her performance as the MVP jammer, saying the selection was, “kinda surprising. When I wasn’t on the ground, I felt I was doing okay as a jammer.”

On the defensive end, Pippi StrongWhomping was similarly surprised by the honor of MVP blocker.

“Oh, that was exciting,” she said. That’s always nice! Not at all expected, but always a good surprise.”

She thinks the KRD squad can improve on defense in the next bout though. Her focus would “definitely [be] sticking together a little bit more once we get scattered out, and trying to hold the jammer a little bit longer by getting back together after the first pass.”

“I thought it went really well, I had a lot of fun,” Pippi said. “CVRD are always fantastic competitors and a ton of fun to skate against. The game went as I expected, and it was awesome.”

Coach Melissious Intent reflected on the loss.

“It isn’t that I don’t want the team to win, but I look at the end result and we stayed closer to CVRD in points than was expected,” she said. “That means they’ll likely go down in rankings and we’ll likely go up, so in some ways, it’s still a win for us.

“How are we going to get better as a team unless we play against teams that are better than us? That’s how we’re going to learn and improve.”

KRD had four new skaters take to the track in the Calumet Colosseum for this bout: Rainbow Bash, Krausefire, Left-Hand Wrath, and Dairy Queen. The first two skaters listed competed with the team in KRD’s away bout last month, but the latter two skated in their first competition with the team.

After skating in both an away and a home event, Rainbow Bash compared the two.

“I was a lot more calm at my first bout [at Grand Raggidy], but this one, I was very nervous through the whole first half,” she said. “All these people I know are here. I could feel more eyes on me because we’re the home team, I felt a little more pressure to try and perform better.”

Overall, Rainbow Bash thought her first home bout was a success.

“I feel like I did pretty good,” she said. “A lot of the veteran skaters were really encouraging to me and helped me get out of my head and focus on what was actually going on. I’m really looking forward to the next bout.”

Up next

The Traverse City Toxic Cherries come to take on the KRD squad on Saturday, June 28, at the Calumet Colosseum. Doors open at 5 p.m., with the first whistle at 6 p.m.