Lansing women find balance in roller derby
Lansing Derby Vixen team member and graduate student Jennifer Slabaugh of Lansing looks over her teammates when practicing a formation Tuesday during a practice at Aim High Sports, 7977 Centerline Drive, in Dimondale, Mich. Jaclyn McNeal/The State News
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Amid her sea of priorities, graduate student Jennifer Slabaugh, also known as Gluteus Maxine, said roller derby is the only thing that keeps her sane.
“I come here, I skate my butt off, and I go home,” she said. “If you’re angry at something that happened earlier in the day, you hit a couple girls, fall on your butt and you feel better.”
Along with her course load in exercise physiology, two jobs and an assistantship at MSU, Slabaugh is a member of the Lansing Derby Vixens, a local competitive roller derby league that was founded in April 2010.
Compared to her jobs as a physical fitness professor at Lansing Community College and a personal trainer at The Michigan Athletic Club, 2900 Hannah Blvd., Slabaugh said she revels in the six hours of weekly practice, where she is the one being instructed.
“My fiance tells me, ‘You need to go to roller derby, or you’re not going to be a nice person,’” she said. “I boss people around all day. I just come here, and I’m being told what to do, and I just skate as hard as I can.”
Photo: Lansing Derby Vixens ...
Although she has been an athlete her whole life and participated in everything from dance to swimming, Slabaugh said she fell in love with roller derby from the start and quit all other sports to join the Derby Vixens.
“I’m a speed person,” she said. “ I love going fast, and I love knowing that the other team is out to get me.”
After a year of instructing, Derby Vixens coach Ryan Knott said he has seen many women find themselves through roller derby.
“I’ve seen shy people become beasts out on the track,” he said. “They sort of discover something about themselves, either something they didn’t know they had or something that they lost, when they join roller derby.”
Graduate student Kaitlyn Teske, or Katom Bomb, who commutes from Howell, Mich., to get to practice, said the degree of camaraderie she feels with her teammates keeps her coming back.
“It’s really good to have a whole bunch of people who are at your level or above to encourage you,” she said. “I just found a group that I love. Before Vixens I didn’t really have that.”
Although Slabaugh said she has bonded with her team as well, she admits she has let other aspects of her social life fall to the wayside.
“I’ve definitely sacrificed being social,” she said. “But it’s worth it for everything I’m learning. I will do roller derby until I have to play it from my wheelchair.”
