TRAIN LIKE A ROLLER DERBY GIRL AND WIN
Roller Derby is not a sport for wimps. That may be why it is exploding in popularity, with more than a hundred registered teams throughout the U. S., plus many teams that compete and have fans, but are not formally registered with the Women's Long Track Federation.
But the skaters need to be tough, says Salt City Derby Girls star Jen Philion, aka: Lady Shatterly. "You need a lot of endurance and the ability to sprint. The games are about an hour long and you go full speed for two minutes at a time. You need explosiveness as an athlete, agility and balance on your skates, and the strength to be able to take a hit and give one back."
The mental side is just as important, says Philion, whose day job is as a writer and editor for Weber State University in Ogden, Ut. She explains, "You have to be able to look at what's going on all around you in a chaotic environment, process it and see where the holes are going to be, and get to them. It's a quick in body, quick in mind, sort of sport."
Kind of like basketball, football and hockey.
But if you're a guy who can't be a derby girl, or a woman who has no intention of being one, you can still use the workout trick that turned Philion into the fastest, most high-scoring skater in her league. You don't even have to go to a gym. Her secret is to exercise upper and lower body at the same time. Aside from the muscle building of any resistance workout, the method greatly improves muscle coordination.
"I do most of my workouts at home. I use dumbbells, and combine muscle groups, so that I'm doing biceps curls and squats at the same time, or shoulder presses and lunges at the same time," she says.
Philion says the method has another benefit: your workout takes far less time. "I think it also helps core strength a lot. When you are doing arms and legs at the same time, you automatically need a strong core," she explains. Since the body adapts to whatever stress it undergoes, creating a need for a strong core means that the body will develop it.
She says she has seen a big change in her body composition. "I'm much stronger. I can crank out pushups like crazy. For specific core work, I push up and hold myself in the plank position for one or two minutes. That strengthens my shoulders and obliques," the petite skater (5'1", 115 lbs) says.
But Philion is also a runner. She has seen a big improvement in her times since she began using the double training system. "My times are better than they've ever been," she says.
The other part of her training secret is simple: skating. Roller skating, blade skating or ice skating; it doesn't matter. It's the motion, not the surface. She explains, "In skating, you're twisting your body all the time. If you want any speed at all, you have to be able to engage your entire core and really get that twist in.
Think of the sports and activities where that twisting motion applies. Better yet, think of one where it doesn't. Whether your sport is biking, hiking, climbing or golf; basketball, football or hockey; train like a roller derby girl and be the athlete of your dreams.