Going for grand slam, roller derby team raffles $1000

Lita Riot says the league is proud to be able to give people a space “where they can feel comfortable and safe.” Photo: Colin Pendziwol, used with NIRD permission

This is the world of roller derby: physical, proud, and welcoming. 

North Island Roller Derby, or NIRD (pronounced ‘nerd’), is an open gender league in the Comox Valley with around 15 skaters. The organization is running a raffle, fundraising to help cover expenses, expand the league, and engage the community.

The sport itself is a game of skating in a wide circle track, checking and blocking to allow your team to score points, or to stop the other team from scoring their own. Lindsey Ryzak, better known for her derby name “Lita Riot” is a skater and member-at-large on the NIRD board of directors. She says the game is fast paced with a lot of strategy, and “really fun.”

Lita Riot first started playing more than ten years ago, living in Vancouver, when the hit movie “Whiplash” popularized the sport.

She said, “I answered an ad on Craigslist and then I ended up moving to the island and I skated in Campbell River for a while. Now, here I am!”

Lita Riot said that for her it’s the quick thinking involved in the sport that has kept her coming back for over a decade. She has said the game can be confusing at first, but once you’re hooked, you’re hooked for life.

Riot said that the sport took a hit on the island during the pandemic, but Comox Valley’s local league started much more recently.

“North Island Roller Derby has been going on for about just over a year. There used to be a lot more teams on the island. A lot of them didn't quite make it through Covid, which is really sad. But there are still ones that are trying to regrow and there are some that are still going strong, like in Victoria. Our team has been doing so well and we've really grown the last year, and so many new skaters and so many people are coming through our Learn to Skate program; that has been really awesome to see,” she said.

Riot said the league has enough skaters currently to make up one team, whereas bigger leagues like the one in Victoria have multiple house teams under their banner. 

The North Island league is a non-profit, sometimes donating their proceeds to other local charities, but in order to grow larger they need some support of their own.

“Right now we travel usually to Victoria, or we'll travel to Vancouver. There are games and tournaments in places like Armstrong, Chilliwack, there's some going on right now in Alberta, but the ones we'd really like to go to are a little bit farther on the mainland and always those ones, you know, the costs start adding up, like ferry, driving down to the ferry, all those kinds of things. So sometimes we do have to go quite far to be able to play, but it's worth it in the end. I find it's always so much fun just to go on road trips with each other,” she reminisced.

To help meet some of these costs, and continue to grow the league with more home and away games, and by drawing more community into the sport, NIRD is running a raffle.

The prize is one thousand dollars cash, which Riot joked is nothing to laugh at right now.

“It's a really great prize and the odds are– I believe it's one in 300, which is pretty good. Tickets are $20 and you can sign up or buy tickets for those online. You can find one of us and give us cash, but it's probably easier just to do it online,” she said.

The draw will take place at a practice on May 21st, then be posted to social media. Riot said that one goal of the raffle is to reach more of the community that isn’t connected to the sport yet, and strengthen that connection.

There are more ways to get involved with the league as well, from supporting the team at local games, to even lacing up and joining in.

“We have our learn to skate program, it's the intro to roller derby or 'IRD’; like we have ‘nerd’ and we have our ‘-erd’ skaters, and that is through the Cumberland Rec Centre. You can sign up through the Cumberland Rec– it's at the ‘Cumberland Recreational Institute’ I think it's called, the Rec Centre in Cumberland. And you can sign up through their website; whenever they put out their activity calendar, it's right through there,” she said.

Riot said that some equipment is available to rent, and the league will support new starters in finding the gear that is right for them.

“Mostly we're just teaching you how to skate safely. So stopping, starting, how to fall down without hurting yourself, just skills you need to be safe roller skating in general, because sometimes that can be a real big deterrent. People are afraid, because they haven't been skating [recently] or they've never been skating before. So we're not doing anything like– we're not bashing into each other in these Learn to Skate programs,” she said.

The course is to help new skaters become comfortable on their skates; then they can choose whether to join the team, or continue to level two training, or simply use the skills for roller skating outside of derby. 

NIRD hosts local games at the Comox Valley Curling Centre, with two double headers planned this season on June 14th and July 19th. Photo: Colin Pendziwol, used with NIRD permission.

Anyone interested in checking out a NIRD game and seeing roller derby first hand can mark their calendars for two home games coming up this season, on June 14th and July 19th. Home games take place at the Comox Valley curling rink, which the team loves for the skating surface, and the upstairs viewing area and bar.

“Our games, they’re always at the curling rink in the Comox Valley, and it's so much fun. Last year we had food trucks, there's the bar upstairs for people to watch from, and it was a really good time,” she said.

Information for upcoming games, their Learn to Skate program, and more can be found on the North Island Roller Derby website. Raffle tickets can be purchased online. Keep an eye on NIRD’s social media, Facebook and Instagram, for updates and announcements.

“I think [the league]’s something that's really great to have, especially because it is– we do play open gender and it is a very queer welcoming space, and it's really great for people to have somewhere they can go and play a sport and know that they're gonna be accepted, no matter what their identity is. And there are more and more of those places opening up in the Comox Valley and we're just really proud to be able to offer that to people, and have a place where they can feel comfortable and safe,” Lita Riot said.

Funding Note: This story was produced with funding support from the Local Journalism Initiative, administered by the Community Radio Fund of Canada. Reporting done in the Comox Valley is done in partnership with CVOX.