Shoves, blocks, jams, whips — Bay Area Derby rolls into a new season

To the untrained eye, roller derby seems like pure pandemonium — players falling over like bowling pins, knocking into each other left and right. But hours of weekly training have taught them how to dodge, shove, turn and jump on four wheels to control the chaos and rack up points. 

For members of the Bay Area Derby league, it’s more than just a sport. Players are there to destress, build relationships with each other, uplift their communities, and work collectively to keep the league going.

“I’ve only been in it for two years, and I already couldn’t imagine what my life would be like without it,” said Jocelyn Suhaimi, one of the newest members of the San Francisco Rolling Dead.

Bay Area Derby kicked off its season earlier this month with the first of four home events  this season. The friendship, grit and love for the sport that BAD players show has kept the league alive. But legislative attacks on transgender people under the Trump administration have left league members fearful and disheartened, as it is home to many queer, transgender, and nonbinary players. Now more than ever, members of Bay Area Derby feel the need to support each other. 

Over 100 fans filled the seats of Richmond Memorial Auditorium on Saturday, April 5, for the season opener, a face-off between the league’s two teams, the San Francisco Rolling Dead and the Oakland Outlaws. The room was noisy with ringing cowbells and the blare of Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club.” The smell of barbecue from the concession stand filled the air. 

The crowd was rowdy and included a party of about 20 people with cowbells that clanged for the duration — two 30-minute periods and a halftime break. Lynnel Wells celebrated her birthday by cheering on the Rolling Dead with friends and family all dressed in neon green shirts that read “Glam Squad,” in support of Wells’ favorite player and close friend, Dani Sands, aka Sacrificial Glam. 

The Rolling Dead were said to be the underdog, having won only a few bouts against the Outlaws in the last 10 years. Nonetheless, the team came energized and ready to play. Dressed head to toe in green and black, they acted out their Rolling Dead shtick — pretending to drop dead, then crawling on the floor like zombies. 

The Outlaws also stuck to their theme, donning fake mustaches, cow-printed clothing, and bandanas in the team colors, red and black. After a pep talk by the coach, the huddle ended in a group “Yee-haw!”

---

Never experienced roller derby? Here’s how it works, straight from the WFTDA website: 

“The game of Flat Track Roller Derby is played on a flat, oval track. Play is broken up into two 30-minute periods, and within those periods, into units of play called “jams,” which last up to two minutes. There are 30 seconds between each jam. 

During a jam, each team fields up to five skaters. Four of these skaters are called “blockers” (together, the blockers are called the “pack”), and one is called a “jammer.” The jammer wears a helmet cover with a star on it. 

The two jammers start each jam behind the pack, and score a point for every opposing blocker they lap, each lap. Because they start behind the pack, they must get through the pack, then all the way around the track to be eligible to score points on opposing blockers.” 

---

By Jam 19, about two-thirds of the way through the first period, San Francisco was up by just four points, 87-83. 

Tension started building in the auditorium as San Francisco’s Amelia Greco dashed around the track, shoving players out of her way and jumping over blockers, scoring point after point. Conversation halted, eyes fixed on the track, mouths went agape, and hands went up in shock, and then in cheers — in just one jam, a two-minute-period, Greco had scored 20 points. 

“That 20-point jam that Greco just pulled off, where she just did a bunch of level changes, and a bunch of jumps, and a bunch of jammer-on-jammer action, that’s what people come for,” said Jocelyn Suhaimi, aka Dumpling Hearse of the Rolling Dead. “They come for drama.”

The Outlaws’ Spider, aka Sam Wood, even had to admire Greco’s moves, saying, ”Just in awe, couldn’t even be upset about it.” 

Roller derby is a space where all members contribute to making sure the league runs smoothly, taking on logistical roles. By day they are teachers, personal chefs, parents and students.   

Wood is a therapist, a profession that may be the antithesis of roller derby — which is one reason Wood loves the sport. 

“For me, my entire job is talking all day and describing feelings, and connecting verbally with them, so what I really like about roller derby is the somatic aspect of it. … so viscerally being in your body,” Wood said.

The physical aspect of roller derby also attracted Suhaimi, a civil engineer who has become obsessed with the sport since joining it in 2022. 

“I think it’s really fun playing a contact sport, because you’ll hit someone really hard, and you’ll be like, ‘Oh my God, I’m so sorry.’ And they’ll go, ‘No, that was really cool.’ And then you’ll give each other high-fives,” Suhaimi said. 

To the Capitol 

In roller derby, everyone is of equal importance. It is not hierarchical. Players aren’t given higher status or more responsibilities based on seniority; instead, everyone pitches in what they can. 

At an all-star team practice in Oakland’s Panther Skate Plaza before the season opener, players swept dog poop off the court and drew chalk lines on the ground, working around kids who were playing basketball. Then they strapped on knee pads, elbow pads, skates and helmets.

Wheels squeaked and skidded across the concrete, as players practiced T-stops, toe stop glides, dumping, controlling and chest catches, cracking jokes in between. Though the all-star team has players from both the Oakland and San Francisco teams, rivalry did not get in the way of their fun. 

The group lost its warehouse practice space in 2024, forcing practices outdoors, mostly in DeFremery Park. Rain had canceled several earlier practices. 

“We’ve been given quite a few hardships with losing our practice space. The level of determination and motivation within the league to keep it moving forward, keep it growing and developing as a sport and community is just really inspiring,” said the Rolling Dead’s Nichole Menezes, aka big perm. “It would be so easy to just let the league crumble, but there’s people who stay excited and stay hungry.” 

The league offers so much more than competition. Players say it’s offered sanctuary and support. Wood appreciated how players made them feel welcome as a nonbinary person. Wood recalled being nervous at an all-league practice in 2022, after they started hormone replacement therapy. But the news was met with cheers. 

“It was like, ‘Yay! Good for you,’ and also, ‘This is very normal,’” Wood said.

Suhaimi, who is also  nonbinary, has felt the same support. “I think one of the really big draws of roller derby for a lot of people is that it’s an explicitly queer- and trans-friendly sport,” Suhaimi said.

That hasn’t changed, despite President Donald Trump’s push to keep trans athletes out of sports by threatening to withhold federal aid to states and school districts that allow trans athletes to compete. Days before the season opener, the California Assembly Education Committee was set to vote on two bills that would ban transgender students from participating in school sports aligned with their gender identity, as well as from bathrooms and locker rooms. 

Though the legislation would not directly affect the derby league, it could have affected morale and might have discouraged transgender athletes from skating for generations to come, said Wesley Haack, a transgender skater who coaches BAD’s all-star team. 

Haack, who goes by the derby name ByeeeeeYonic, went to Sacramento with a couple other league members to protest outside the Capitol and to speak against the bills before the Assembly. 

The Women’s Flat Track Derby Association, the international governing body of roller derby, publicly supports transgender and gender non-conforming athletes, with a post on its website saying they were “welcomed and encouraged to participate in the WFTDA in any capacity,” and adding that the association “does not and will not set minimum standards of femininity or androgyny for its membership, or interfere with the privacy of its members for the purposes of eligibility.” 

The California bills were voted down.  

‘Let’s go Outlaws’

At the season opener, the Outlaws were down 124-85 at halftime. But there was no time to rest. Players were entertaining the fans by letting kids from the children’s league, the BAD Seeds, pull them faster and faster around the track, as music blared, bells clanged and the crowd cheered. 

The halftime show included a raffle and thank-yous to the event sponsors. Bay Area Derby is a nonprofit, reliant on donor support.

As the second period began, more than 30 fans rooted for a comeback for Oakland, chanting “Let’s Go Outlaws!” But as their chants grew louder, the gap only widened.

The Rolling Dead won by 70 points — 215 to 145. Greco was named MVP.

“Next time, we’ll just have to win by more,” big perm boasted, with roller derby bravado. “Rolling dead will eat your head!” 

At the end of the bout, fans were allowed to rush the track. They formed a giant circle, their hands outstretched, as players skated around, high-fiving all of them.

---

Oakland’s 16th Street Station gets historic status, while advocates fight encroaching development