Bout Report: Glasgow Roller Girls Intraleague Final, Death Stars vs Bad Omens

The 7th of May saw the final of the first Glasgow Roller Girls Intraleague Tournament, featuring the Death Stars versus the Bad Omens. Previously, the Death Stars and Bad Omens had both defeated the Hells Belles (the Death Stars in a bout featuring many Bad Omens guest players for the Belles), so on first appearance this looked like it could have been a tight bout.

In the end, however, the Dark Side betrayed the Death Stars, possibly scared off by the corvids always hanging around the Bad Omens, and the Bad Omens flew home to an impressive 162:87 point victory.

Before all the skating happened, however, there was the theatre of the skateout, both teams having pulled out multiple stops to wow the crowd:

Skateout: here

And then the bout began.

After first third of the first period, things seemed relatively evenly matched, with the Bad Omens on 20 points to the Death Stars' 14, and both teams obviously still sizing each other up.

The very next jam was when it started to go wrong for the Death Stars, with three of the team (including jammer, Zombelina (15) ) ending up in the sin bin together.

Despite her usual form, however, Bad Omens Jammer Hardcore Prawn (88mph) failed to capitalise on the power jam by much, due to determined blocking by Jackash (911, pivot) and Moxie Blitz (20). Passing the star to Bad Omens pivot Betty Gogo (999) seemed to help break the deadlock, and the first power jam of the bout ended with the Omens up 14 points.

Even here, though, the Death Stars had all to play for, and effective blocking out by Viper (29) and Wild Oates (3) of Bad Omens Jammer Slain Austen (823.7) allowed Death Stars Jammer Marshall Lawless (42) to start pulling back points in the very next jam.

This blocking skill did remain consistent, however, and a strong Bad Omens wall (Tarcenic (41), Haberbashery (40), Coco Pox (76*) and Love Hurts (117) ) stopped Marla Mayhem (13) in her tracks in the next jam, and Kausin Kaos (311) blocked out the Death Stars' Fighting Torque (531) the jam after, resulting in Torque heading off to the sin bin, and a power jam for Sykes (360°). The Death Stars once again showed their determination and skill as blockers in a power jam, however, Lucky Hateball (8) and pivot Viper first knocking Sykes down, and then forcing her to attempt to cut outside - the latter causing confusion as Sykes mistakenly thought she'd accumulated enough minors to be sin-binned, only to be pulled out of the bin as soon as she sat down.

Indeed, despite the power jam, and excellent jamming by Hardcore Prawn and Slain Austin in subsequent bouts, with only 12 minutes in the first period, the Bad Omens lead was still only 45 to 18, when an official time-out was called. Some totting up of minors later, the Death Stars' Sister Grimm (57) joined the Bad Omens' Betty Gogo and Mistress Malicious (99) in the Sin Bin for the next jam.

The next jam, Hardcore Prawn proved she was back on form, whizzing through the pack despite excellent blocking by Death Stars' Wild Oates and Jackash. In her efforts to catch her, Death Stars Jammer Zombilina managed to get herself sent to the sin bin instead (perhaps she thought Sister Grimm would be lonely there), followed by Jackash just as Sister Grimm left. This time the Death Stars blocking was less effective against the Prawn, who managed to bag 12 points, despite being knocked down at least twice.

Another timeout later, the next jam started with the power jam still in effect. The Death Stars kept the speed of the pack high, with excellent coordination between pivot Marshall Lawless and Dreaded Dragon (33), requiring Bad Omens jammer Chemikill Hazard a whole lap to catch up with them, just as the pack was about to split. Even then, some dramatic blocking/falling from Lawless and more conventional blocking from Moxie Blitz held Chemikill back until Zombilina was safely back onto the track. In the end, only one point was scored!

Another timeout, providing time for photos.

Another jam, another power jam for the Bad Omens, with Death Stars' Marla Mayhem picking up minors passing Haberbashery and Tarcenic. Despite some mighty blocking from Hateball, Bad Omens Jammer Slain Austen picked herself up and tried to take full advantage (helped somewhat by some pack splitting), but failed to pass pivot Viper when scoring

This was starting to become something of a pattern for the Death Stars - excellent damage control in power jams, but too many power jams in the first place…

Still, the next jam started with the power jam in effect still, as well as most of the Death Stars blockers off the track, and with Hardcore Prawn jamming for the Omens there was every possibility of the lead being extended. And, indeed, that's what happened, with Prawn circling the track whilst the Death Stars' Marla was held back by excellent blocking from the dominant Omens (particularly from captain Lily Lethal (5) and pivot Haberbashery).

Score: 73:18

With six minutes to go, a fight back was still conceivable for the Death Stars, and Marshall Lawless fought hard for one, dodging past Betty Gogo into the lead jammer position. The Omens' Sykes, meanwhile, was given big trouble by the Death Stars blockers, including being pushed right into the crowd by Moxie, and walled in by Dreaded Dragon, Moxie and Viper.

Result: 13 points in one jam, and something that looked like a fight-back.

An official time out should have added to the Death Stars' glee, as it resulted in Sykes (as jammer) joining the Death Stars' Viper in the sin-bin for the next jam. With their first powerjam of the bout, could the Death Stars capitalise?

With Bad Omens Tarcenic and captain Lily Lethal blocking, perhaps not. The Death Stars' Torque was flung off the track dramatically as she tried to pass them, requiring a second try (and able blocking out of the Bad Omens by team mates Hateball (pivoting) and Sister Grimm) to complete her first pass. The delay allowed Sykes to come back on and end the power jam, and it was called off before points were scored.

With less than 2 minutes left in the first period, the Death Stars desperately needed to pick up their fight-back again, but Omens' Betty Gogo fought back pivot Moxie Blitz's attempt at an assisted pass for Marla, allowing Chemikill Hazard to break the assist and push the Death Stars jammer to the back again. In the aftermath, Omens Jammer Mistress Malicious slipped through the now Omens controlled front of the pack. All was not lost, as Wild Oates managed a whip and assist, chucking Marla out the front of the pack at significant velocity. In the end, the jam was called off early, Malicious being unable to score safely.

This also meant there was time (just) for one last jam before the end of the first period… With everything to play for, the Omens stuck on their star, Hardcore Prawn, while the Death Stars fielded Marshall Lawless. It looked like excellent blocking and walling would let Lawless take lead jammer easily - the Death Stars partitioning the pack and pushing Omens pivot Lily Lethal to the inner edge of the track. However, Lily proved the stronger of the two pivots, blocking Death Stars' Hateball to the ground, and breaking ahead just in time to block down Lawless too! Meanwhile, Prawn snuck around in Lawless's wake, and then between teammates Sykes and Kausin Kaos to snatch Lead Jammer out of nowhere. Safely in the lead, Prawn allowed the jam to end after picking up most of her points, making the score at the end of the first period:

78 Bad Omens : 31 Death Stars

The second period started with

Jam video on YouTube: here

Omens Jammer Slain Austen dodged a blocking attempt by Death Stars' Wild Oates (which appeared to nick her own Jammer, Marshall Lawless instead), powering to lead jammer. Mistress Malicious and Haberbashery kept Lawless back in the pack whilst Slain Austen picked up a couple of passes.

Score after a single jam of the second period:

86:31

Definitely not what the Death Stars needed; Vader does not tolerate failure.

Possibly spurred on by this, in the next jam, Marla Mayhem powered through the pack (and blocking by Bad Omens' Betty Go Go) to take lead jammer, whilst Hardcore Prawn was squished between the Death Stars' Wild Oates and Viper, blocked out by pivot Moxie Blitz twice before actually escaping the pack. Meanwhile, Marla only had problems with the Omens' Tarcenic on her scoring passes, picking up a welcome 12 points - although Prawn's tremendous speed once out of the pack let her pick up points as well.

Similarly, the next jam saw the Death Stars' Zombelina slip around the outside of the pack to take lead jammer, avoiding blocking by Love Hurts (117) and a last-second attempt by pivot Haberbashery, whilst the Omens' Mistress Malicious was blocked out handily by Jackash and Sister Grimm. More points for the Death Stars, and a sin-bin period for Omens' captain Lily Lethal.

With the score now 90:47, and still most of the second period to go, a glimmer of hope was emerging for the Death Stars once more, which continued as Marshall Lawless effortlessly took lead jammer in the next jam, as Hateball and Sister Grimm squished the Omens blockers, and jammer Sykes, out of her way. More excellent blocking on the scoring pass (although costing Wild Oates and Moxie Blitz a tumble) saw the scores further narrow to 90:56.

It couldn't last. The very next jam, despite pivot Viper's best efforts, Slain Austen slipped through to get lead jammer, aided by the confusion caused by a multiple fall - first Love Hurts in blocking out the Death Stars' Marla (jamming), then Moxie Blitz and Viper together. Proving unable to make her way past the Omens' blockers, Marla Mayhem then managed to commit a fourth minor, getting herself sent to the sin-bin, and handing the Omens a power-jam. To cap it off, most of the rest of the Death Stars also managed to get themselves sent off, at one point leaving only Wild Oates to attempt to block against a full-strength Omens. Despite valiant efforts, the results of the jam were predictable - a massive 20 points to the Bad Omens, and a distinct fading of hope for the Death Stars.

But in the most hopeless of situations is where the Death Stars apparently exult. The next jam saw the tables swing again, Death Stars' Marla fighting past Haberbashery and pivot Coco Pox to get lead jammer, while Hardcore Prawn was knocked down by the Death Stars wall (in particular, Zombilina).

114:63

All that effort resulted in 2 Death Stars in the sin-bin at the start of the next jam, and there was no way for ( Moxie Blitz and Hateball) to prevent Mistress Malicious from escaping the pack. (Returning jammer Marshall Lawless did a creditable job of taking out the rest of the pack, though… despite it sending her right back to the sin-bin)

Another official time-out, and no score for the previous jam - with Marshall Lawless returned from the sin-bin.

The next jam saw a brief glimmer of hope - only the second Death Stars power-jam, as Omens' Slain Austen got sent off near the very start. The Omens were determined not to give them an easy time of it, however, with Lawless heading for a fall from Omens captain Lily Lethal, and then picking up enough minors from blocking out by Love Hurts to get herself sent off! With the tables reversed again, Wild Oates and Death Stars pivot Sister Grimm gave Slain Austen a hard time, with Viper and Hateball taking over after Oates got herself sent off.

All that excitement resulted in another no-score jam, even after Marshall Lawless returned to play.

With only about half of the period left - about 16 minutes left in the bout - the score still remained at 114 : 63.

The next jam started looking as if the Death Stars' Zombilina would leave the pack first, with excellent blocking helping to hold Hardcore Prawn back. However, excellent blocking from Haberbashery and Betty Gogo, and a whip assist for Prawn from pivot Chemikill Hazard (LD50) saw her take the lead, and the points.

Instead, it was the next jam where the Death Stars looked initially better - Marla Mayhem having space clear for her pass by cooperative blocking from Jackash, Viper and Moxie Blitz, with Wild Oates, then Viper and Moxie, blocking out the Omens' Mistress Malicious from doing much. It all went wrong second later on Marla's scoring pass, a big tumble resulting in her entering the sin-bin, whilst Mistress Malicious outplayed her blockers (even with a leap), and much of the rest of the Death Stars joined their jammer in the sin-bin (once again, it was Wild Oates left as solitary Death Stars blocker for a period , her determination in stopping the Omens from scoring leading to her being sent off as well, to be replaced by Jackash as sole Death Star on track). Evn with Marla and the rest of the Death Stars back on the track in the second half of the jam, there was no time for them to score many points before the end. Predictably, with 11 minutes left, the score had now swung far back the Omens way, at

140:71

The next jam was a no-score - Slain Austen leaping around the outside of the pack to get lead jammer, but with no lead over Marshall Lawless, she called the jam off almost as soon as it started.

(Youtube link: here)

The next jam started with highly defensive play from both teams, Death Stars' Jammer Zombilina walled-out at the front of the pack by Mistress Malicious, Lily Lethal and Coco Pox, and the Omens' Hardcore Prawn walled out at the back by Moxie Blitz, Viper and Jackash. Somehow, however, Prawn was the first to wend her way to the front of the pack, knocking Zombilina back to the back in the process. The Omens were happy with just picking up 5 points, so they did.

Another official timeout followed.

When play resumed, the Death Stars looked like having a good jam - a failed early block against Omens' Tarcenic by Dreaded Dragon also taking out the Omens' jammer Chemikill Hazard, whilst Death Stars' Marla wended her way out the more loosely defended front of the pack. Five points only to the Death Stars, thanks to effective blocking on the scoring pass by Haberbashery and Love Hurts.

With two players in the sin-bin, the Death Stars slowed the pack for the next jam until Fighting Torque could get out, with Wild Oates also making space for Marshall Lawless, jamming, to get through (after a little tussle with Omens' pivot Betty Gogo). Unfortunately, despite scoring well, Lawless' timing was a little off on calling off the jam, and Omens' Mistress Malicious also scored, keeping the points differential still roughly constant.

With only 6 minutes to go, the next jam saw a Omens fight back, with good blocking work by pivot Chemikill Hazard and Kausin Kaos helping Hardcore Prawn take lead jammer, and holding back the Death Stars' Jess E Ska (31). More effective blocking on Prawns' scoring pass by Hateball and Dreaded Dragon reduced the points gained by the Omens, but, with 4:36 on the clock, the score stood at:

156 Bad Omens to 80 Death Stars.

The fourth last jam of the bout was a bit of a wash-out for both sides:

Preantepenultimate jam: here

Good blocking from Hateball and Sister Grimm held back Omens' Slain Austen from passing for a long while, allowing Marla Mayhem to leave the pack first… but she did so uncleanly, failing to attain lead jammer status. With essentially no chance of catching up, Slain Austen ended the jam as soon as she escaped from the pack and attained lead jammer status, with the Death Stars picking up just two points (and wiping out at the end).

The third last jam also failed to make much of an impact, despite hard work by Death Stars' Marshall Lawless in attaining lead jammer status, she picked up only a single point thanks to sterling blocking by the Omens.

Similarly, the second last jam, despite Omens Slain Austen attaining a reasonable lead out of the pack due to superior blocking from Lily Lethal and pivot Mistress Malicious against Death Stars' Fighting Torque, they failed to pick up more than a handful of points, as Slain Austen was knocked down on the scoring pass by Sister Grimm.

With just enough time left on the clock (1:10) for a final jam, the score stood at

159 Bad Omens to 83 Death Stars.

It was obvious at this point that the Death Stars had lost, but they could still go out fighting, and that they did:

Final jam of the period: here

Death Stars Marla Mayhem whipping around the track as lead jammer (with some whip assists from Jackash), despite having only two blockers on track to assist her (Jackash and Dreaded Dragon).

The final score, with that last minute fight-back:

162 Bad Omens : 87 Death Stars.

The Bad Omens were the Champions of the first Glasgow Roller Girls Intraleague … .

(But no hard feelings between the teams.)

… the Death Stars' sponsor, however, felt differently:

(We are assured that after some time in bacta tanks, the Death Stars made a full recovery.)

Finally, there's always time for a group photo (with suitable exhortation from Dave McAleavy)

*when numbers on the programme and shirts disagree, I am going with the shirts. Since Hateball is awesome, this was only a problem for Coco Pox (78 in programme, 76 on shirt), and Lily Lethal (not captioned in programme).

The photos and video were taken on a Sony A580 with the kit lens. The photographs were taken at ISO3200 due to the slow maximum aperture of the lens, so apologies for the shot noise.

No notes were taken for this bout report, so it is constructed entirely from memory and photographs / video. All errors are my own.

The Glasgow Roller Girls website is at glasgowrollergirls.com, and you should turn up to their next bout if you have the time.

Bout Report: DRG Silvery Tayzers vs GRG Maiden Grrders in Spiderjam. 23rd April 2011

A hot and humid day in Dundee greeted the superheroic battle between the Glasgow Roller Girls "Maiden Grrders" (away) and the Dundee Roller Girls "Silvery Tayzers" (home) in the bout known only as Spiderjam. Despite their home advantage, the Tayzers' powers proved inadequate against the might of the Grrders, the final score resting at 44:191 to the away team.

Spiderjam had always been planned with a Superheroic theme, and both teams fulfilled this to great effect (although the Tayzer's Viva La Derby (42) won this for the home team singlehandedly, having apparently subjected herself to gamma radiation to expand her full sporting potential).

Skateout here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0UxKHyRlcuY

After the kit inspection, and a demonstration of the basics of derby for the newbie spectators, the bout began.

First Period

The very first jam of the bout set something of a theme for the home team: despite proving fairly evenly matched (although GRG's Slain Austen (823.7) got Lead Jammer), DRG Jammer Psychomilly (69) lived up to her name and managed to get sent to the penalty box for her involvement in a multiple pileup during her scoring pass.
Jams 2 and 3 were both power jams for the Away team (Psychomilly being sent off again in 3 after just managing to score in 2!), Sykes (360°) and Hardcore Prawn (88mph) making the most of their advantage to bring the score to 5:36, despite nifty blocking from DRG's Vice Captain Littlest Peepshow (666), Thunder Cat (82) and Viva La Derby.





Despite GRG's Marshall Lawless (42) deciding to try out the penalty bin for size in the very next bout (tumbling over a prone Unprotected Bex (36*), excellent blocking work by GRG's Fighting Torque (531), Scara-leigh (616) and Tarcenic and Old Laces (41) limited the damage done by Littlest Peepshow's power jam to 9 points.
With the next jam called off with no score by DRG's Cilla Block (24) as LJ unable to outpace Slain Austen, the score after the 5th Jam of the bout stood at 14:37.





An official Time-out was called, giving everyone a bit of a breather.

After normal service was restored, an excellent jam by GRG's Wild Oates (3) combined with effective blocking out of Viva La Derby (jamming) by Sykes (pivot), Coco Pox (76) and GRG Captain Venus Velocity (666) garnered 12 points for the GRG, without even a power jam situation.
Understandably shaken, the Dundee Roller Girls called a time out immediately.




Their morale restored somewhat, DRG resurged slightly in the next jam, but failed to score. The eighth jam of the bout, however, saw the most active penalty area yet. Multiple collisions sent 3 DRG players, including Jammer Dr Carnage (T800), to the penalty area, handing a power jam to GRG's Sykes. It wasn't long before Sykes herself managed to commit a fourth minor and send herself to the penalty area, letting Dr Carnage back out just in time to score some points herself! Points 16:60




All these collisions were obviously taking their toll on the track, as another official Time Out was called to allow spot repairs to be made, whilst the DRG blockers whiled away the time dancing!




When we returned to action, DRG failed to capitalise on their starting Power Jam, Cilla Block scoring no points, and calling off the jam as soon as Sykes returned to the track.

The tension was clearly building, as the next jam saw Slain Austen pick up 5 points for GRG, prevented from acquiring more by an impressive block by DRG's Splatterkiller (3) in her second scoring pass.



More musical penalty boxes followed in the next couple of jams, with GRG's Hardcore Prawn first ending up in the box, only to be sprung by Psychomilly, becoming something of a regular in the box this bout.



Next jam, more blocking falls didn't stop GRG's Fighting Torque picking up more points, followed by Slain Austen in the jam after.



With the score at 16:83, the Dundee Roller Girls clearly needed to do something to get more points. In the next jam, they tried a radical new tactic that failed to work in the way intended: despite GRG's Marshall Lawless calling off the jam after being passed and knocked down by DRG's Splatterkiller, DRG continued to play the jam, with Splatterkiller completing a scoring pass before referees managed to get the players' attention.

Perhaps needing to evaluate this exciting new tactic for their own use, GRG called a time-out, allowing DRG to get in some more dancing practice.





Whatever they decided regarding the concept of ignoring the referees, the next two jams of the bout saw GRG returning to a more defensive blocking procedure, first holding DRG's Cilla Block back whilst Chemikill Hazard (LD50) made multiple scoring passes, then managing less well against Dr Carnage but still handing Sykes a massive lead.
With the score now at 16:94, DRG's Viva La Derby hulked out enough to break through the pack at the same time as legendary Hardcore Prawn, but she'd have been better off tapping into the Speed Force as Prawn powered past her to pick up points.




The final jam of the period was something of a brawl. DRG Jammer Littlest Peepshow actually managed to briefly outpace the pack to pick up LJ (DSC01371), only to be knocked back to the back of the pack, so that GRG's Fighting Torque actually emerged ahead of her with quite a lead. Peepshow powered on, though, and some excellent blocking by teammates Splatterkiller, Crown Jewels (67)* and Whiplash Trash (36) allowed her to pass Torque on the scoring pass, and make a second loop herself.



All this was too little, too late for the first period scores, standing at half time:

24 DRG Silvery Tayzers : 100 GRG Maiden Grrders



Second Period
Entering the second period, the GRG players seemed well aware of their commanding lead and played the first jam cautiously, Slain Austin calling off the jam after a single scoring pass and a nice little hop.
Despite excellent teamwork allowing DRG's Cilla Block to power through the pack for an apparently easy couple of points in the next jam, the tremendous speed of Marshall Lawless eroded that advantage and both teams scored points.
The next couple of jams went easily GRG's way, with Hardcore Prawn and Fighting Torque speeding around the track, whilst the DRG Jammers were held back in the pack.







After an official timeout which resulted in a DRG player being sent to the penalty box for an accumulated 4th minor, play resumed with business much as usual for GRG.
Apart from one tightly contested no-score between Cilla Block and Sykes, (and a single jam where nice blocking of Sykes to the floor by Splatterkiller gave Psychomilly an easy lead), the GRG continued to pick up points in single scoring passes, with Marshall Lawless, Chemikill Hazard and Slain Austen all contributing to the pot.



Approaching the final quarter of the bout, then, things were already looking fairly bad for the home team, with the score at 31:129 against.
Worse, Cilla Block had managed to get herself sent to the penalty box at the end of the last jam, handing a power jam to the GRG. Despite some effective blocking from Unprotected Bex and Psychomilly and a huge GRG mass tumble, Hardcore Prawn did what she does best, and hauled in another 24 points!
In her desperation to get points, Cilla Block managed to end up back in the penalty box again, handing GRG yet another Power Jam (after an official time-out due to confusion over the penalty) just when the Home team could least afford it. This time, however, the Dundee blockers did a much better job of controlling the pack, preventing Sykes from passing before Cilla had served her time, and then obstructing her scoring pass almost completely as well.




Still, with the score now at 31:155, it was time for another Dundee time out to restore morale.

Whatever wisdom was passed to the DRG players apparently failed to make much impact when play resumed, the next four jams (including the 13th jam of the bout:
13th Jam, 2nd Period here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f1RCXXlRsY
) passing with almost no scoring from either side, jammers being fairly evenly matched and unable to create good leads.

Unfortunately for the DRG, Splatterkiller, jamming for the first time this bout, managed to commit a minor and get sent to the penalty area right at the start of the jam, followed over the next 60 seconds by most of her teammates. With only one DRG blocker (Alison Thunderland (18)) on the track at one point, Marshall Lawless easily garnered another 19 points from the power jam, calling it off just as Splatterkiller returned to the track.

With only 6 and a half minutes left in the period, and the bout, tension was hotting up.
While Hardcore Prawn effortlessly escaped the pack in the next jam, a massive fall led to her being penalty binned, allowing Splatterkiller to finally claw some points back for the Home team, although not without getting sent to the penalty bin herself just before the end of the jam.
With the pendulum swung the other way, Power-jam wise, Wild Oates had a rather disappointing time of it, heavily blocked by a Dundee pack desperate not to open the points gap even further.



With less than 4 minutes in the bout, the Tayzers showed a sudden surge of aggression, with Dr Carnage and Psychomilly both managing to score in the final moments (although, unable to prevent some points accruing to the GRG mainly via Slain Austen).


With nothing as potentially balance altering as a series of power jams to rely on, however, the resurgence came simply too late to change the overall balance of things, and the bout ended with the final score:

44 DRG Silvery Tayzers : 191 GRG Maiden Grrders

Thanks to the @DundeeRG twitter feed for providing live tweets which contributed to the composition of this bout report. Thanks also to Bout Announcers Helliverance and Kinkhey for live commentary, and to GRG and DRG for generally bouting and also baking.

All photographs in this report taken with a Sony A580 with the kit lens. (At ISO800, 1/200 second exposure, shutter priority.) They were processed in Picasa.


*due to some discrepancies between the bout programme and the numbers/names on shirts, I've mostly assumed that shirts were correct when the programme disagreed.

Bout Report: Auld Reekie Roller Girls vs Rainy City Roller Girls "Gore-onation Street" (16th April 2011)

The unseasonably sunny (if windy) Edinburgh afternoon that graced the Auld Reekie Roller Girls Twisted Thistles (home) bout against Rainy City Roller Girls (away, Manchester) couldn't have been a worse omen for the away team. Despite this poor sign from the heavens, the Rainy City girls kept the game creditably close, bringing the final score to 92:109 to the home team.

Skateout: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TRfzvKHno8

First period
From the first seven jams of the bout, no-one would have predicted the final score would have been so tight. Whilst the first jam was a cautious no-score, both teams taking each other's measure, the second saw ARRG Captain and jammer Zillah (555) take lead jammer, and score 3 full passes whilst the ARRG blockers kept Rainy City's Ice-berg (66) penned in. Despite an attempted fight back in the very next jam from Rainy City captain Missy Rascal (6), capable pack work from the ARRG blockers (especially Velosidy (16), Minnie Riot (7) and Juicy Lucy (666) ) prevented her from taking more than 4 points. The rest of the early jams were back to the standard of the second, with ARRG Jammers Zillah and Juicy Lucy piling on the points, and the ARRG blockers walling the RCRG's Missy Rascal and Ice-berg out.




The seventh jam looked like it was going the same way, with ARRG's Blazin' Phoenix (28) taking lead jammer and set to score points. However, ARRG's blocking was more sorely tested than before, and RCRG's Missy Rascal impressively evaded and leapt out of the pack, ARRG's Crazylegs (11) being sin-binned as a result.

At the end of the seventh jam, though, things looked bleak for the Manchester team, with the score standing at 41 points to ARRG and only 4 to RCRG.
Understandably in need of a tactical rethink, and some morale top-up, the Rainy City coach called a Time-Out.




Whatever wisdom Vital Sadistic passed on to her charges seemed to have an almost magical effect. With ARRG already one blocker down, RCRG's Ice-Berg effortlessly took lead jammer; to make matters worse for the Edinburgh team, Zillah's attempt at piling through RCRG blockers in pursuit resulted in her visiting the Sin-bin instead, handing her opponent a Power Jam. Facing a severely depleted ARRG pack in the next jam, Missy Rascal happily took advantage of her good fortune, achieving 3 scoring passes before the 2 minutes were up, for a 13 point gain.

Buoyed up by their resurgence, the Rainy City Roller Girls seemed to up their game for the rest of the period, with Lead Jammer alternating between the two teams jam by jam. If anything, the advantage was still somewhat to the home team, with Zillah's speed enabling her to quickly catch up to her opponents even when she didn't get out of the pack first.

With less than 3 minutes left in the first period, the score stood at 34 RCRG, 67 ARRG.

And then, for the second time in the bout, the Team Captains faced off as Jammers… Missy Rascal took the lead, and Zillah ended up in the sin-bin for her troubles. This was starting to look like an unfortunate trend for the ARRG team captain, and it was catching, as at one point all but one blocker (Crazylegs, bucking the tradition for the bout) also ended up joining their Captain in sin during the proceeding jam. Obviously, faced with such a tempting target, Missy Rascal took no time in racking up the points for an impressive 19 point Power Jam… right before the half-time whistle called.

So, with this last-minute infusion, at half-time, the score stood at a close 53 RCRG, 67 ARRG.

Second Period

The second period continued much as the majority of the first period had, both teams achieving lead jammer and points, but the superlative speed of ARRG's ZIllah and Juicy Lucy often letting them rapidly close down on their opponents to deny them the jam. The Rainy City girls opted for more practiced cooperative play, with both Missy Rascal and Ice-berg benefitting from well executed whips and other assists from their team, and RC blocker De-mise (18) proving an especially effective blocker - both at providing whips to her jammers, and at knocking down the opposition. Despite their teamwork, however, by the start of the 11th jam of the period, Rainy City had failed to make a mark on the home team, with the score standing at 63-90.

Usually, being a referee is the safer choice, but Jam #11 of this period demonstrated that this isn't always the case as ARRG Jammer Referee Cherry Fury was knocked down by an impact across her midsection, resulting in an official Time Out being called. Luckily, despite being winded, she seemed relatively unharmed, although opting to take the less-strenuous role of Outside Ref for the remainder of the period.



After Cherry's unexpected experience of blocking, the falling bug seemed to be catching; the next series of jams showed a significantly higher rate of tumbles and pile-ups, but no particular changes in the score. Less than 5 minutes later, the seemingly inevitable happened, and a block between Blazin' Phoenix (jamming, ARRG) and Ice-berg (blocking, RCRG) ended up taking down multiple other skaters, and sending Blazin' to the sin bin.

As she'd demonstrated twice before in this bout, Missy Rascal knows how to manage a Power Jam, and she managed to better her previous performance this time, bringing in 20 points in the remainder of the jam.

Now, with less than 8 minutes remaining in the bout, the score was 88-92. Two jams later, Missy Rascal finished what she started, and brought the scores to level pegging, 92 each, with less than 6 minutes on the clock.

Unfortunately for the away team, Juicy Lucy wasn't taking this lying down, and neither were the ARRG blockers. Encouraged by roaring from the stands, Juicy managed to take Lead Jammer, despite the best efforts of Belle-Istic (13) and Dollface Diablo (16, Pivot) , whilst ARRG's Crazylegs, Mo B Quick (66) and Minnie Riot kept RC's Whoops C Daisy (1006) safely contained. After multiple scoring passes by Juicy, the score, now with only 3 and a bit minutes to go, was 92-105 to the home team.




After a hasty Time Out for the away team, it looked like the score might swing back the other way in the very next jam, with Missy Rascal effortlessly threading the pack to take Lead Jammer. Unfortunately, she couldn't match Zillah's speed, and called off the jam without scoring just as she was passed.

For the final two jams, despite another Rainy City Time Out, nothing much changed. First jam saw Juicy Lucy gaining LJ, and just letting the jam run to burn off time. Despite her relaxed approach, she still managed to pick up 4 more points (while Minnie Riot ended up in the sin bin). With the final jam an evenly matched no-score, the bout ended with the score

92 Rainy City Roller Girls : 109 Auld Reekie Roller Girls

Final Jam: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-Tsij57ngA

Acknowledgements should go to the excellent Bout Tweeting by the Auld Reekie Tweeter (@AuldReekieRG ), without which supplement to my own notes this bout report would be the poorer.

Photos taken on a Sony alpha A580 with the kit lens, showing you can get passable results without an expensive kit.

Red Nose Day - adjusting for inflation

Every two years, the UK has a fundraising drive, with the complicity of the BBC and many companies, in order to support the needy across the world (and in the UK). It's called Red Nose Day.

And, every two years, there's a big fuss made about how this time people have raised even more money than they did the last time, and how generous people are.
Of course, the British Pound, in common with most currencies, loses value over time (the phenomenon called "inflation"). As a result, it wouldn't be surprising if people seemed to be giving "more" over time, even if the value of what they gave remained constant (or decreased more slowly than inflation devalues the Pound).

So, in the interests of sanity, here's the inflation-adjusted values of Red Nose Day donations, since 2001. The raw values in £ are from Wikipedia's Red Nose Day page (and I start at 2001, since that's when Wikipedia starts listing the total money collected when donations stopped, rather than the total donated by the end of the Red Nose Day itself). The values for inflation adjusted Pounds Sterling were produced by http://www.measuringworth.com/ppoweruk/ , using the Average Earnings method (since it seems reasonable to judge people's donations in terms of the amount they earn, rather than the cost of items).
I include the estimated population in each year (as determined by the World Bank) as an indicator of the degree of population growth. If population goes up, the amount each person needs to donate to match the previous event drops.

2001 - £61m
Inflation adjusted (2009): £79m
Population: 59.1m

2003 - £61.5m
Inflation adjusted (2009): £74.6m
Population: 59.6m

2005 - £63m ?
Inflation adjusted (2009): £70.4m
Population: 60.2m

2007 - £67m
Inflation adjusted (2009): £69.3m
Population: 61.0m

2009 - £82m
Population: 61.8m


So, we conclude that between 2001 and 2007, people progressively donated less to Red Nose Day, only rebounding in 2009 with an unprecedented amount. We don't know how much, in total, the 2011 Red Nose Day will earn yet - but when people claim it's the biggest ever yet, bear in mind the salient lesson of the history of the event. Even when people look like they're giving more, sometimes they're really giving less...

Fun with IR photography

So, I've recently been playing with digital and computational photography. One mechanism for detecting depth relies on projecting light patterns ("structured light") onto a scene, and using the light pattern in the resultant camera image to deduce the 3d location of objects (the pattern lets you determine at what angle rays from the projector intersected the object, and we know what angle rays hit any given pixel in the camera, so trigonometry gives the distance of the object, given the separation between projector and camera). Of course, lighting a scene with a bright light source is distracting to everyone involved, so you ideally need some way to "invisibly" perform the same task.

It turns out that cheap CMOS sensors, of the kind you get in webcams, are actually rather sensitive to infrared light. Normally, there's a filter built into the camera which filters out IR to prevent it from interfering with the visible light imaging you normally want to do... but it's easy to remove it with a screwdriver and a pair of tweezers. Exposed developed film negatives (amongst other things) are pretty opaque to visible light (since they're black), but they're actually transparent to near-infrared light.
If we stick a piece of film negative over our modified webcam, we can then image only the infrared light in the scene... we've made a cheap IR camera.
(This is basically how every security camera, and many "nightvision" scopes, work.)

So, as I don't have a strong IR source at the moment, I couldn't get on with doing structured light work. I did, however, do some experimenting with imaging things in IR with my modified camera (with comparisons to the same objects imaged in visible wavelengths).

Firstly, it appears that cola is pretty transparent to near-IR:



Secondly, some dyes may be black in visible light, but highly reflective to IR:



Obviously, there's a lot of other things you can discover when imaging things in IR (at least some banknotes reveal interesting watermarks, for example), and I might get around to making some more posts in the future.