Plow Stop Tips

I'm not the fastest, strongest, or the hardest hitter on my derby team by any stretch of the imagination.  One thing I can do really well though is plow stop, and it makes me a force to be reckoned with at the front of the pack.  Finally, my ridiculous pigeon-toedness is coming in handy for something.  Thank you mom for passing on your messed up hips. <3 

I put together this list of plow stop tips for my home team a few months ago.  I've had lots of questions about plows recently, and thought I'd repost it here for the world to enjoy.

Photo by Beaker Teh Muppet

• Start low and wide. It's like everything else in derby - if you don't start low you make it infinitely harder for yourself. Think sketchy toilet in a wedding dress. For those of you single ladies who haven't had the experience of helping a woman in a wedding dress pee, the suggested method is to sit facing the toilet tank. 
• Don't lock your knees. You can't get low if your knees aren't bendy. You also lose all agility and stability the minute you lock your knees.
• If you don't start with your feet at least shoulder width apart you're going to pick up a ton of speed as you glide out wide. Recently, I've tried stepping into my plows instead of gliding. This is super effective when positionally blocking someone. 
• The stop comes primarily from your inside heel wheels. You should feel those wheels slip and hear them buzz. If your plow stops are quiet you're not putting enough pressure on your heels. It's ok to put more pressure on one than the other. I've upped my practice wheels to have a 97 under both of my inside heels. It's ridiculous but the slip I get is awesome.
• Few people are as pigeon-toed as I am, but the closer you can get your feet to 90 degrees the better.  I've heard it helps to think more about pushing your heels out than bringing your toes in.  Stretch your groin A LOT.
• A good, fast plow is a quick pop, not a slow controlled movement. Throwing your arms either forward for balance or popping up your shoulders and bringing your arms in can help you force that.
• Don't bob like a chicken. Get low and stay low through the whole thing. When you're just practicing plows, standing up and bringing your feet together at the end of a plow stop cheats you of really getting that buzz in your heels. Part of the reason this is so common is because many people are taught to plow using the all eights rock forward / backward drill, which encourages you to dip up and down as you bring your feet wide and in again.  Only bring your feet together if you need to switch directions or you're only plowing to slow down, not totally stop.
• If you do need to change directions while plowing, use a good hop to the left or right. Feet start apart, come together for just a split second, and then that other foot goes out and you end up just as low and just as wide as you were. 
• Your center of gravity should be even with or slightly behind your heels. Stick that booty out behind you and your hands out in front.  Shake it like a polaroid picture and show that plow who's boss.

My roller derby bedroom

I've been promising to blog about my roller derby bedroom for months.  Here it finally is.  

The Inspiration

My roller derby team had been discussing bout programs and poster art for a long time.  I like to scrapbook (READ: I collect lots of ticket stubs and pretty paper and let them gather dust in my craft stash), and had been meaning to create a derby scrapbook for my husband and I.  I had tons of old programs hiding in the bottom of my stash, and pulled them out.  The more I looked at them, the more I realized that these really are awesome pieces of contemporary art.  They deserved to be hung up, not packed away in the bottom of a closet.  So I went to Target, bought some cheap frames, and turned them into the art they deserved to be.  Unfortunately, they just didn't seem to fit with the flowery comforter that we currently had in our bedroom, so I decided to completely redecorate.  Being me, I of course had to do it from scratch.  

The Quilt

The quilt was inspired by a pattern in 3-fabric quilts, Quick Techniques for Simple Projects by Leni Levenson Wiener.  All of the fabric is from JoAnn.  I was initially going to go with a black, white, and yellow color scheme, but when I found this beautiful bright orange subtle-flowered calico I knew I just had to have it.  I thought the near-neon would really brighten up the the cement gray of our bedroom walls, and of course it's PRG colors.  I found the hounds tooth and old victorian gray prints and fell in love.  The quilt is made of 90 offset T blocks, rotated so the cross pieces touch and then offset every other row to make the diagonal plus signs.  I carried the off-centered orange stripe into the pillows.   It took me about a month to finish the quilt and pillow cases.  I also plan on making some big orange euro-sized pillow shams since we don't have a headboard, but that's a future project.  Some day, I'll also applique a roller skate on a throw pillow, but I've got about ten other projects waiting in the wings before I get to that one.

The Vinyl
Special thanks goes out to Neil at beepart for the fantastic custom roller derby pin up girl.  Neil was great to work with and seemed really excited to do the custom roller girl vinyl.  I just love her.  I'd actually found the vinyl before going quilt fabric shopping, and she's what inspired the choice of retro fabric patterns.  Well, she and the Edwardian-style IKEA furniture that we had.  


The Accents

Our bedroom gets a ton of light in the morning, but later in the day it becomes a bit of a cave.  To combat the dark, dark, dark of it all, I found as many mirrored accent pieces as possible.  We already had the mirrored lamp bases, and I hung up 9 4" square mirrors above the large dresser.  The additional mirror on top of Carl's tall dresser also helps to reflect light from the hallway back into the room.  Finally, I found the fantastic mirrored retro-style floor lamp.  I think the end result is a room that's modern but cozy, with great pops of trendy color anchored by classic styles.  I'm really happy with the way it turned out.