New season, new team, new players: the Royal City Roller Girls are ready to roll.
The Roller Girls kicked off the new campaign by unveiling the logo for their new team, the Royal City Rum Rollers, at Royal City Brewing recently.
The Roller Girls are entering their sixth season, having started out with about 25 members the first year. Now they're up to over 100 players, coaches and volunteers.
"We've grown steadily every year and we get players coming in from all over," said the Roller Girls Sonia Preisler.
"There was a great revival in the early 2000s and since then the sport has really evolved," Preisler said. "Better skaters, better rules, better organized. It's really cool."
During the winter the club trains and practices at various schools, then we move to full arenas in the spring once the ice is out of arenas.
As with all the team logos, the new one is courtesy of renowned Guelph illustrator Seth, who has done the logos for all five teams in the organization.
The Rum Runners are the newest entry and will act as a second travel team, feeding the Roller Girls' top travel squad, the Brute-Leggers.
The club has three teams that play their home games at Exhibition Arena: the Killer Queens, Violet Uprising and the rookie squad ("Fresh Meat" in roller derby parlance) Our Ladies of Pain.
The two travel teams play outside the region, travelling as far as Indiana for games.
The 2016 season officially kicks off on Saturday May 7th at 6 p.m. with a doubleheader at Exhibition Arena featuring Our Ladies of Pain vs. Tri-City Roller Derby’s Total Knock Outs, and a battle of home teams Killer Queens vs. Violet Uprising.
Doors open one hour before games and a beer garden is part of the offerings.
For more information and ticket details go to www.royalcityrollergirls.com.
