Get your skate on at Raw Meat's Meaty Roller Skating Sessions

Raw Meat Vancouver is excited to announce the debut of our Extra Meaty Raw Meat  Roller Skating Sessions at the Royal City Curling Club, 75 6^th Avenue East, New Westminster. Our Meaty session will run all summer from 10 AM to Noon at the Curling Club beginning May 7, 2011.

These sessions are for more advanced roller skaters who are looking to tryout for a league this fall, and for current/retired roller derby girls looking for a little extra fun on skates. These sessions are non-contact, so it’s all the fun of roller derby, and none of the crap being beaten out of you.

What to Expect on the First Meaty Session

Our first session will focus on testing skaters on the WFTDA Basic Skills (with some modifications, particularly to sections 4 and 5—we will not test contact skills).

Our complete test will be available by May 1 so you can see what we are asking for, but in the meantime, have a look at the WFTDA Basic Skills: http://wftda.com/rules/wftda-minimum-skill-requirements.pdf

You don’t have to be a master of everything to come to testing, but we will not be explaining any of the drills. If you don’t know how to do any of the moves on the list, please continue with our regular Raw Meat sessions for a few more weeks. We’ll test again throughout the summer.

Meaty sessions will feature some more advanced scrimmages than Raw Meat has done in the past. Only skaters who have passed the basic skills test will be allowed to participate in these scrimmages. You do not have to pass all of the skills on the test in order to take part in most drills at Meaty sessions, and we will not have scrimmages every session. However, skaters at Meaty sessions must be stable on their skates, and be familiar with basic stops, falls, agility and proximity work.

If you are new to Raw Meat, or have questions as to whether you are ready for Meaty work, please attend a regular Raw Meat session (Saturdays, 5-7 PM, 2311 Cassiar St.), and ask a coach if you are ready for Meaty goodness.

A Thank You to Our Volunteer Testers

A number of experienced skaters have volunteered their time to attend on May 7 and mark our skaters. They are all extremely awesome, and we thank them for agreeing to help out.

Because of our fabulous tests, each skater will receive a report card with your scores. This will help you to know what to focus on in your quest for roller skating awesomeness.

What Meaty Sessions Will Be Like

Our Meaty sessions will raise the bar set by our regular Raw Meat sessions. Meaty sessions will present:

• Fitness challenges (endurance laps, jammer starts, etc.)
• Advanced technical drills (tomahawks, transitions, backwards skating, speed skating, etc.)
• Fast-paced proximity and pack drills
• Roller derby strategy
• Practice scrimmages (i.e., running though derby strategy, positioning, rules, etc., but with no hitting allowed. Ever.)

Our Meaty sessions continue to be ABSOLUTELY NON-CONTACT. This is a condition of our insurance. Any engaging in contact at one of our sessions will be asked to leave immediately. When we say non-contact, we mean no hitting, leaning, pushing, shoving or overly aggressive skating. We cannot, under any circumstances, practice derby hitting drills.

We do allow:

• Hip whips
• Arm whips
• Safe touching of teammates (ex. touching/holding hips, non-aggressive bumping of elbows, etc.)

The Rules

Raw Meat has two rules: 1. Don’t be an ass-hat. 2. Be safe. There is zero tolerance for breaking these rules, and anyone violating these rules will be asked to leave.

For a more complete explanation of the rules, see our FAQs: http://www.rawmeatvancouver.com/about/faq

Get ready for a summer of Meaty fun!