ABOUT

Our History

We are Fort Wayne's only and Indiana's first all-female, flat track roller derby league. Our season runs from January through April and our home bouts are held at the Memorial Coliseum Expo Center. With the resurgence of roller derby across the country, our goal was to create Indiana's first all-female roller derby league. We were Co-founded by Lil' D Evil (Danielle Abbott) and Minx (Tonya Vojtkofsky) in October 2005 after they returned from a vacation in Seattle where they watched The Rat City Roller Girls. They thought roller derby was something new and fresh that could work in our demographic and that Fort Wayne would benefit from a roller derby league. We have since grown from 5 skaters to around 50 skaters along with many dedicated volunteers that make our league well over 100 people.

We held our first public bout at Roller Dome South in May 2006 to a sold out crowd of 1,200. Our first full season consisted of 4 bouts between two exhibition teams in 2006. In January 2007, our all-star team, the Bomb Squad, made its debut against the Gem City Rollergirls from Dayton, OH. Since then, the Bomb Squad has played the Naptown Rollergirls, The Windy City Rollers, The Chi-Town Sirens, Grand Raggidy Rollergirls, Rocky Mountain Rollergirls, The Chicago Outfit, Grand Raggidy’s Rebelles, the Mitten Kittens, CT Rollergirls, Madison's Dairyland Dolls, Cincinnati's Black Sheep, Ohio Rollergirls All Stars, BrewCity Bruisers, Arch Rival Rollergirls and Burning River Rollergirls, Nashville Rollergirls, and many others.

In early 2007, we made a move to the PLEX and held 5 out of 6 of our 2007 home bouts there. We also formed three home teams: Alpha Dollz, Little Arsenic Annies and The Smokin' Guns. For our 2008 season, we featured 2 home teams, the Smokin' Guns and the Lucky Harmers and played our bouts at the PLEX.

In 2009 we took a leap of faith and dissolved our home teams to create travel teams which will just play inter league (against other leagues) teams. We created the SWAT team which is the feeder league into our chartered nationally ranked all star team, The Bomb Squad. All of our bouts became double headers held at the Coliseum.

In 2010 we kept the same business model and teams.

For the 2011 season we still have the same season schedule of Jan-May and the same teams of SWAT and Bomb Squad, but we created a team for our newest members called The Academy. We have the Academy play other new leagues or established leagues that have newbies to play so everyone can gain experience and knowledge of the game in real time play.

Mission Statement

The Fort Wayne Derby Girls encourages community involvement from all socio-economic groups in Fort Wayne and its surrounding communities. The league embodies the strength, courage, and vitality of Fort Wayne women but also serves to provide another form of semi-professional athletic entertainment to the Summit City.

Fort Wayne Derby Girls encourages its members to contribute to the community through both volunteering and monetary contributions to Fort Wayne charities. The skating program includes regular supervised training and instruction for competitions between leagues all around the country. These competitions serve to train and prepare skaters for our chartered team selection. The Bomb Squad, which is comprised of 14 permanent members and 6 alternates, represents Fort Wayne in national competitions.

Sponsorships, fundraising, and event ticket sales are the primary financial means of the league. Roller girls are not financially compensated for skating and must pay monthly dues to secure practice space.

Skaters must meet the following requirements:

  • Female
  • At least 18 years of age
  • Have current health insurance
  • Be willing to skate up to 3 times a week
  • Supply own gear (skates, knee/elbow pads, wrist/mouth guards and helmet)



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