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This story is jointly published by nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune to elevate diverse perspectives in local media through student journalism.
The first time that University of Utah basketball assistant coach Dasia Young saw Lindsey Kirschman, the reaction was visceral.
“I was like ‘dang, she’s jacked, like she’s ripped,’” Young said.
It’s not easy to create a body that looks like that. It’s even harder to maintain it at 37 years old. But Kirschman loves a challenge.
Now, as she ends her third season as the director of sports performance for women’s basketball at the University of Utah, Kirschman’s challenge is keeping the team in shape. That includes daily workouts, lifts, conditioning, or anything else she thinks the athletes need.
The Utes finished the regular season with a 22-7 record, good enough for sixth place in the Big 12 in their first year in the conference. In the postseason, they scored a No. 8 seed in last month’s NCAA tournament and lost in the first round to Indiana.
Much of the team’s work happens when no one is watching. In the summertime, college basketball players are restricted by NCAA rules that govern how much they can practice on a court, so that’s when they spend the most time strength training to prepare for the upcoming season.
The workouts can be grueling. But Kirschman said she won’t ask anything of a player she wouldn’t do — or that she wouldn’t be excited to do.
“A lot of my hobbies involve physical discomfort,” she said. “My best days are the days where I am just physically exhausted at the end of them.”
That’s what assistant coach Jordan MacIntyre said the players need, too.
Utah women’s basketball strength coach Lindsey Kirschman instructs Grace Foster during the team’s morning lift (Photo Credit: Natalie Newton)
“We play a really fast, up-tempo style of basketball, and we have to be able to get up and down the floor and be in our best physical shape to play the brand that we want to play,” MacIntyre said. “That is so much of a credit to the work that she puts in with people outside of our season.”
All of that effort, MacIntyre said, permits the team “the ability to play the style we want to play.”
Kirschman’s days have early starts. She wakes up around 4 a.m., reads, writes in her journal, goes on a run with her dog, works until 2 p.m., does her own workout, and then goes to bed around 9:30 p.m. She’ll often go to the athletic facility at 4 or 5 in the morning to do the workout that she’s planning on putting her athletes through later that day.
“She actually knows what she’s talking about, which is nice, because, you know, sometimes strength and conditioning coaches don’t look like what they preach,” Young said.
Even though she has often already gone through the workout, Kirschman doesn’t hesitate to jump in alongside the players. At a team lift in late February, for instance, she was stretching, planking and demonstrating different exercises to athletes who needed help. The workout culminated in Kirschman pushing a sled that carried Alyssa Blanck, the Utes’ 6-foot-2-inch sophomore forward, across 20 yards of turf while the team cheered on the sideline.
“I know that they see her own drive. She can have them do whatever in their workouts because they know she’s doing it, too, and she’s probably done it already before we’ve done it,” MacIntyre said. “That absolutely motivates them and she has such an element of respect because of it.”
Strength coaches at the collegiate and professional levels often have degrees in athletic training, kinesiology or sports medicine. Kirschman, on the other hand, earned her bachelor's degree in environmental science at the University of Washington, where she also competed in track and field.
She then began graduate school for rangeland management. During this period, she started coaching at a high school in her free time and found herself pulled back to the world of sports.
Lindsey Kirschman, Utah women’s basketball strength coach, joins the team during their morning workout. (Photo credit: Natalie Newton)
“I would sneak out every afternoon to go volunteer coach at a high school in town,” Kirschman said. But soon she thought, “Why am I sneaking around to do something that I could just do for my job?”
She switched programs to start studying education. After finishing her master’s program, she taught science and coached track and field, cross country, and strength and conditioning at Poudre High School in Fort Collins, Colorado.
“I think a lot of my own coaches have been role models and that’s part of the reason why I wanted to be a coach, because as an athlete I thought about who has had the biggest impact in my life in a positive way and it’s always coaches,” Kirschman said. “I wanted to be that for other athletes.”
Kirschman taught and coached for eight years in Colorado. Eventually she began thinking about how she could take herself to the next level. Being a high school strength coach often means having a lot of teams to oversee, and Kirschman grew tired of working with that many athletes at once.
“I was coaching before school, teaching all day, coaching after school, coaching all summer, but I had hundreds of athletes,” she said. “You can only do so much with each one individual athlete when you’ve got 300 more coming.”
She found a new opportunity at the University of Central Arkansas, as the school’s assistant strength and conditioning coach. Kirschman took a 50% pay cut — and was still training hundreds of athletes — but the prospect of a new mountain to climb was enticing.
“The challenge of that was appealing to me. I wanted to be held accountable to the highest standard possible, and have that risk of, if you're not good at your job you're going to get fired,” Kirschman said. “It’s kind of hard to fire someone at the high school level. … I want to see if I have what it takes to hang.”
Kirschman’s teaching experience has been a benefit.
“She comes with a lot of different experiences that a lot of other strength coaches don't have… she does a lot of teaching of exercises,” Utah women’s basketball athletic trainer Christina Jones said. “She has all of those fundamentals down very well and can connect with the athletes and really hones into the teaching aspect.”
After one season in Arkansas, the University of Utah women’s basketball program hired Kirschman. In Utah, she finally got her wish of working with athletes on an individual level.
“First time in my career that I only had one team to work with,” she said. “I went from working with 300-plus athletes to working with 14, and that’s been a huge blessing and learning experience.”
Her one-on-one work with athletes doesn’t go unnoticed. Jones noted that Kirschman is especially focused when it comes to injured players. Any time the team is on the road, she gets up early with the athletes who are injured to put them through a workout in the hotel gym before breakfast.
Lindsey Kirschman flexes with the Utah women’s basketball team at the university training facility after a workout. (Photo credit: Courtesy of Lindsey Kirschman)
“I think it’s a cool thing that she does, and the ability to adapt and be able to do that in the hotel,” Jones said. “It’s hard to do that when your other teammates aren’t doing that when you’re hurt.”
It’s that attentiveness that gives Kirschman one of her greatest strengths as a coach. Those who work with her say she has an innate kindness, an ability to make connections with people, that lifts her to the next level. Anyone who works with or plays for Kirschman will sooner or later be likely to receive a valentine in their locker, a note, a treat she’s baked, or a moment where she genuinely checks in because she cares.
“She’s probably one of the most, if not the most, kind-hearted people I’ve ever worked with, let alone met,” MacIntyre said. “She really is someone that cares to be there for other people, and wants her impact to be so much more than just teaching people how to get stronger.”
Kirschman gets the best results from people, Young said, because she has their best interests at heart.
“Nobody’s ever going to listen to their teacher if they don’t like them or if they don’t believe in what they do,” Young said. “She mastered that perfectly – to get people to do hard things and enjoy it at the same time.”
Kirschman said she knows that players respect her because she is a good strength coach but, she said, “people love me because of the impact I have on their lives and in their heart and that I have a relationship with them.”
That love can be leveraged into the sort of trust she needs from her athletes to get them to do things they might not do otherwise.
“She just always made sure that we didn't settle. I could be curling 25s and she’s like, ‘Babe, you can definitely go to 40.’ I’m like, ‘I could but do I want to?’ and she’ll come pick up those 40s and hand them to me,” Young said. “I can do more. That’s probably what I took away from her the most: that I can do more. Whatever that is.”
Natalie Newton wrote this story as a journalism student at the University of Utah for a capstone course focused on women’s sports. It is published as part of a collaborative including nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune.
This story is jointly published by nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune to elevate diverse perspectives in local media through student journalism.
During a heated game recently, Utah Jazz center Walker Kessler jumped above the rim to block a shot. The 7-foot Kessler landed on the court as the referee’s whistle blew.
The ref signaled goaltending. The Delta Center crowd booed and screamed at the official.
Madeline Mirrione, a Utah Jazz team attendant, recalls being upset at the call — a reaction that caught the attention of a fan with a full head of gray hair and a booming voice seated close to the court.
“Do you know what goaltending is?” the man asked her.
“Yeah,” Mirrione said.
The man continued: “That’s when they give them the points because they shouldn't have blocked the shot. It was an illegal blocked shot.”
“I know,” Mirrione said, even though she was thinking of a nastier response.
Things like that happen often, Mirrione said. She doesn’t think women employees of sports organizations should have to put up with “fansplaining” as part of the job, but she said she isn’t deep enough into her career to say what she really wants to say to fans like this.
She’s confident, though, that someday she will be.
“Madeline Mirrione in Utah Jazz gear. Photo by Ava Hart.”
Growing up in South Jordan, in the Salt Lake City suburs, Mirrione often spent time watching sports with her family.
Her dad was from New York, and the family cheered for teams from that city. “Anytime the Jets, Mets or the Islanders were playing, we were always surrounding the TV watching,” she said.
It wasn’t until the fifth grade that her love for sports solidified.
Her school had entered a contest where a Utah Jazz player would read a book to the students. The contest, “Be a Team Player – Read!”, is a large outreach program for the Jazz. Mirrione isn’t sure why this specific experience cemented her passion for sports, but it did — even though the school didn’t win, and the player never came.
Mirrione didn’t play sports, but her interest as a spectator carried on, and blossomed even more right before she was preparing to attend the University of Utah.
“I was getting ready to go to college and I was like, ‘What if I did a career in sports?’” Mirrione said.
And that’s what she began to do.
Mirrione started her sports career as a team attendant with the Utah Stars, in the G League, the NBA’s minor league, designed to prepare players for the next level of their basketball careers. She was promoted to team attendant for the Jazz in her second season.
As a team attendant, Mirrione assists players and coaches, prepares and organizes the locker rooms, and maintains equipment.
Shortly after arriving at the Jazz, Mirrione realized she needed a job during the off-season. She was hired by Real Salt Lake, Utah’s Major League Soccer franchise, as a game day operations intern. Her connections with RSL helped her get a position as a group sales intern for the Utah Royals, the National Women’s Soccer League team owned by the same group that owns RSL.
Mirrione, now 20, said she relishes the opportunity to be around people who exemplify the sort of confidence she is hoping to have in her own life.
“Athletes really do think that they are the hottest people on the planet,” she said. “They are so confident, and I think that we all could kind of take a page out of that book.”
One thing she’s confident about already is her ability to handle a lot of responsibilities. She still holds her jobs with all three teams, while being a full-time student of the U.
“Maddy is a go-getter,” said Keagan Robb, Mirrione’s boss at RSL. “She is actively looking for ways to do her job to the best of her abilities, and this attitude has been a positive example and influence to the team’s overall attitude and productivity.”
“Madeline Mirrione in Salt Lake City, UT, home of the Utah Jazz and the University of Utah. Photo by Ava Hart.”
Mirrione said she would love it if more people were focused, as Robb is, on her abilities and aptitude. However, women employees of sports organizations often face stereotypes questioning why they are even interested in doing their jobs.
Mikell Rasmussen, a Jazz coworker, said one assumption is particularly hurtful. “We aren’t there to hook up with NBA players. We truly like the sport or want a future career in sports,” she said. “Being friendly doesn’t always mean we are flirting.”
Mirrione said it is challenging to get past comments people make about her reasons for working in sports. And it is annoying to have to hear men — it’s pretty much always men — explaining things she already knows, and often knows better than they do.
“I’m really polite to their faces, and I kind of play into it, which I know I shouldn’t,” she said.
She sometimes even thanks the fans for explaining things that she already knew.
“And then,” she said, “I go in a back room, and I scream at a wall.”
Mirrione said she would like to be done screaming at walls. But she also knows that, for now, she can only take one step at a time.
At the next game, perhaps, that step will be to stop playing into the stereotypes. Maybe she’ll be a little less polite, and won’t just smile and shrug it off when people suggest that the reason she is there isn’t about sports.
“I think it’s a slow climb, but I do think we’re seeing better progress,” Mirrione said.
Ava Hart wrote this story as a journalism student at the University of Utah for a capstone course focused on women’s sports. It is published as part of a collaborative including nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune.
This story is jointly published by nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune to elevate diverse perspectives in local media through student journalism.
On a February morning at the Zions Bank Real Academy in Herriman, the building echoed with the rhythmic beat of soccer balls passing back and forth, as players for the Utah Royals FC warmed up for a preseason practice.
One of last season’s rookie standouts — 22-year-old defender Lauren Flynn, known to fans and teammates as “Lo Flo” — wasn’t running drills with the team.
Instead, Flynn is spending her training hours in physical therapy, recovering from a season-ending injury that the team announced on Aug. 28. Since going on the injured list, and undergoing surgery, Flynn said she works every day to get back on the pitch, but the journey has proven itself a challenge beyond the physical aspects.
The Utah Royals huddle together at their pre-season practice. Flynn said she’s excited for the upcoming season having seen how much the team is already grown. Photo credits: Elle Crossley
“I was not prepared for the mental toll it would take,” Flynn said.
Almost half of athletes who sustain physical injuries struggle with their mental health as a result, according to research published in Arthroscopy, Sports Medicine, and Rehabilitation. As Flynn gets a start in the 2025 season, that number is more than a statistic – it’s her reality. After two rounds of surgery this fall, she’s had to navigate this unseen side of recovery. For many athletes, returning to the field after an injury takes work on the body and strengthening in the mind.
After four years at Florida State, Flynn was chosen by the Utah Royals as the 16th pick in the National Women’s Soccer League’s 2024 draft. (Her teammates, forwards Ally Sentnor and Brecken Mozingo, were the first and fourth picks.) Halfway through her rookie season, Flynn led the team in combined tackles and interceptions. In week 10, the league recognized her sportsmanship for the Impact Save of the Week.
Through these highs, though, came an unexpected turn.
In May, Flynn said, she started experiencing intense calf pain. As the weeks went on, she hit a point she said she couldn’t push through. In August, doctors diagnosed her with bilateral compartment syndrome in her lower legs, and she was placed on the season-ending injury list. When decreasing her workload didn’t ease the pain, Flynn said she learned surgery was the next step.
Preseason training for the 2025 season looks different for Flynn compared to her teammates. Most of her time is spent recovering in the gym and working on technical drills. Photo credits: Courtesy of the Utah Royals
“I was thinking about how hard [others have] had to work to come back, how long it is,” she said. “And so I think that to me was very daunting. I didn't have any experience with it. I was just scared, honestly, and I was also sad.”
A 2015 study published in the Journal of Athletic Training found sport-related injuries can have a significant psychological influence on athletes. But the sporting world treats injury as a taboo, said Jon Osborn, owner of Utah Sport Psych, so people don’t think about the less visible side of the healing process.
“Athletes [and] coaches don't like talking … about injuries, right?” said Osborn, who hasn’t worked with Flynn or other Royals players. “I think athletes are under-prepared for it to happen because we don't want to talk about it.”
Clay Frost is another mental coach for athletes. He also hasn’t worked with Flynn but said many of the athletes he trains, from high school to the pros, have expressed her same uncertainties. They aren’t prepared, he said, for the mental barriers brought up in recovery until they’re in the thick of it.
“An injury will introduce way more obstacles and unknowns than almost anything else will,” Frost said. “It puts everything that you thought was controllable into an uncontrollable state.”
At the start of her rehab, Flynn said she set a specific date when she wanted to be back playing to her full capabilities. The arbitrary deadline, she said, ended up being a disservice.
“And that was just, kind of feeling a lot of anxiety, because I was like, ‘ok, well, if I have any setbacks, then what does that mean?’” she said.
Flynn said navigating a life without soccer was hard, since it’s always been her greatest passion. When it’s going well, she said, she generally feels happier and more positive. Losing her main outlet came with an emotional cost.
Osborn said this emotional experience is one of the biggest challenges in recovery, especially at the professional level, when the sport becomes a part of an athlete’s identity.
“This is a fort that you have built over 18 years that, in a matter of days, weeks, months, is under attack and sometimes destroyed – this idea that I am an athlete,” he added.
But just as athletes retrain their bodies, they can also retrain their minds. Frost said it starts with trusting the process and focusing on the few steps they can take one day at a time. With this mindset, he added, it’s easier to recognize and celebrate every small victory along the way.
“Confidence is having an undeniable stack of evidence that what you've been doing is helpful,” he said. “And [that] is just a way to count all of those things.”
Flynn said giving herself credit for her progress has served as a reminder of her own strength and willpower, she said, especially when times get tough.
“Some days are hard to come to practice when you want to be in it so badly,” she said. “I think those are the days you really just have to … trust the process, and believe if I work as hard as I can every day, I will get back there.”
Flynn said recovery has taught her lessons she will use for the rest of her life, and she’s looking forward to the season that lies ahead. Photo credits: Courtesy of the Utah Royals
Osborn said he has seen athletes who have overcome injury thrive by applying the skills they learned in recovery to their play. That’s been true for Flynn, who said her journey has reignited her passion for every part of the game. The unexpected challenges made for unexpected growth, she said, reminding her of the power of positivity and making her a better player and teammate.
“Physically, I'm like, ‘OK, great. Things are looking much better,’” Flynn said. “But also mentally, it’s like, ‘OK. This is the progress that I've been waiting to see.’”
As of early April, she has been medically cleared to play and has made two game-day rosters on March 22 and 29, though she did not play. She said taking recovery one day at a time helped her see the growth in her own game and her team. Between the lessons she's learned and the progress she's made, Flynn emphasized her optimism for the future.
“It's been a roller coaster of a year, but I'm really excited for this [season],” she said. “The environment is just really positive. It's really intense and energetic.”
Elle Crossley wrote this story as a journalism student at the University of Utah for a capstone course focused on women’s sports. It is published as part of a collaborative including nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune.
This story is jointly published by nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune to elevate diverse perspectives in local media through student journalism.
At Salt Lake City’s Derby Depot, where music ranges from fat P-Funk bass grooves to buzzsaw punk chords, a jammer glides smoothly around the bend.
In roller derby, jammers are the players who score points by successfully lapping a track and the opposing team’s gauntlet of defensive skaters, called blockers, who simultaneously clear paths for their own jammer. Most of the skaters in the sport are women, though an increasing number of men and nonbinary players from a spectrum of gender identities also play.
When jammers try to get past the blockers, the result usually is a wall of lunging limbs and hellacious hips.
One part of the wall is Brikel Weeks, aka Witch Slapped, a human battering ram who formerly outlasted addiction and, on that day in March, outlasted all other competitors at Uinta Roller Derby’s “Sur5al” special rules bout. She walked out of the building with her team, trophy in hand, with the words inscribed: “You didn't die. Congrats on surviving.”
Weeks said sometimes people ask her about competing with men.
“Like, ‘oh, is it scary to play?’” she said.
No, she said, it’s not.
“I'm way more afraid of like half the women I play against than the men,” she said.
Salt Lake City's roller derby scene has moved beyond the debates over alternative-identity classification and athlete participation that still trouble other leagues. Body checks don’t discriminate here. And if you want to join, that’s all the better, Weeks said.
“Roller derby is kind of ahead of the game.… We're already done talking about that,” she said.
The sport's countercultural roots continue to provide what many participants describe as a "safe haven" for those who might feel like misfits elsewhere — creating bonds that extend far beyond competition.
On Feb. 5, President Donald Trump signed an order designed to prohibit transgender women and girls from competing in women’s sports. While that order was aimed at high school and college sports, the panic about protecting the “sanctity” of women’s sports has echoed beyond academic institutions.
The people often missing from these discussions are athletes, like Weeks, who just don’t care who they’re competing against. And that includes many of the other players in this full-contact sport, who see things differently — starting with the value of their community.
A jammer, center, decides how to skate past the opposing team’s defensive blockers. On March 22, the Beehive Skate Revolution held a “Twilight” movie-themed Team Edward vs. Team Jacob event for Salt Lake Roller Derby’s Crash Course program graduates. Photo by Frank Regalado
Weeks, 31, found roller derby fresh out of rehab 3½ years ago. She said people who come to the sport often don’t fit into regular culture.
“There's a really cheesy derby saying that's like, ‘Derby soul saved my soul,’” Weeks said. “We joke that we're a lot of outcasts, misfits or whatever.”
The punchline to that joke, she said, is that everyone who comes to roller derby finds community.
When she started her path to sobriety, Weeks said she stumbled upon Wasatch Roller Derby’s crash course program for new skaters. She found friends fast, and the support they provided has endured.
“Going from an addiction, which I think is one of the worst things you can do to your body, and then being able to be in a community that was accepting of the fact that I had a really long way to go,… everyone was very supportive of it,” Weeks said.
The community kept her going, she said.
Hannah “Menstrual Psycho” Rivas stands underneath her team’s banner. Skating as a defensive/offensive blocker, she finds pride and satisfaction in being able to contain other skaters on the track. “Because this is not something you think you can do, especially when they're coming in hard and like with full intentions to take you out,” she said. Photo by Frank Regalado
For Hannah Rivas, 24, whose derby alias is Menstrual Psycho, roller derby helped her find her voice.
“If you want to be heard, you have to scream on the track and make your presence known,” Rivas said.
The former volleyball player went from shyness to standing her ground, she added.
“If a big jammer is coming at me, I have to hold that jammer down,” she said. “It doesn't matter if they're a hundred pounds heavier than me, a hundred pounds lighter than me. I can still take them out.”
Rivas said it’s not just a community for alternative identities, which is a common misconception: Everyone can participate.
“We just want you to play. We just want you to feel welcomed,” she said.
And that makes for unique gameplay.
During Wasatch Roller Derby’s home season opener on March 8, Rivas, a blocker for the Hot Wheelers, linked arms in a defensive tripod to block an incoming jammer for the Disco Devils. The opposing forces clashed, revealing an entangled mess of different bodies laced with killer pads, tattoos and neon wheels.
Once the pain diffused, they hugged it out — then went back to hitting.
“People need to experience what they think isn’t right,” Rivas said of the prejudice against transgender athletes. “I don't think any of us have ever felt uncomfortable or weirded out or like, ‘Wait, we're playing with a trans person?’”
Mismatches on the track don’t matter either, she added.
“I'm 5-foot-1 and I know one of my friends who skates is 5-foot-1, too,” Rivas said, “and we take men out all the time. We take people bigger than us out all the time. Men, women, non-gender, it doesn't matter.”
Rivas said her greatest teammate was a man who was nearly 50 years old, and taught her everything he knew. Befriending him, Rivas said, dispelled any idea that men and women can’t play together.
“Every man that I've met at derby has been so kind and gentle,” she said. “The opposite of what you would anticipate a man being in a women-dominated game.”
If anything, Weeks said, there’s sometimes a level of toxicity and aggression that comes from cis-men who played in other sports. But they find out quickly that’s not how the derby community rolls. It's about respect among competitors.
“There's a level of competition, but people are not trying to hurt each other, and there's not blow-ups that you see in a lot of other sports,” she said.
Weeks said she has an aptitude for the strategy, tangle and tussle of roller derby. It’s not without a cost, though — she said she has endured a concussion and stress fractures in her feet from competition. Nonetheless, she enjoys the physicality of the sport, no matter what type of people are on the track.
“I feel like when I am done playing, I always feel proud of what my body can do. My strength, especially,” she said. “Playing all-gender roller derby, … my physicality and skill can still match up to someone who is maybe twice my size.”
Weeks grew up in a conservative small town. Boys played with boys, she said, and girls played with girls.
“Now it seems silly that I thought so many years ago that like, ‘Oh yeah, it should be so segregated,’ and that gender is this very finite construct, which I don't agree with now, especially since I've seen it in derby,” she said.
Size and strength are not the only things that make someone successful in sports, she added. The gender expansive policy in the Women's Flat Track Derby Association keeps the sport ahead of the game.
“I get that people are hesitant, but I also think that things that were uncomfortable 20 years ago, people [have] got to decide to get over it,” she said. “Because I think once you do, it's like, ‘Oh yeah, this isn't as scary as everyone made it sound like it was going to be.’”
Derby skaters tussle to prevent the jammer, right, starred helmet, from making a pass. Many skaters enjoy the full contact aspect of roller derby. Photo by Frank Regalado
As of last April, the state of Utah has grappled with 11 bills targeting alternative identities, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. With transgender people facing attacks, roller derby is steadfast in radical acceptance.
While pride flags are being removed from government and school buildings, the walls at the Depot are adorned with a varied range of colorful flags representing gender and sexual identities, as well as banners proclaiming human rights.
Neil Wade, aka Colin Deschottes — who has been an announcer, coach and referee for derby since 2007 — said that level of defiance is what makes the sport special in the current political climate.
“I feel like any group of people who are pushing for that and who are holding tight to it and want to protect it,” he said, “I want to be part of that.”
Holly Bishop, now a 10-year supporter after her daughter formerly competed in the juniors, runs “Derby Girl Creations” for fundraising assistance. Having witnessed children embrace the welcoming environment, she attests that derby creates transformation.
When kids who have alternative identities come to watch and participate in derby, “you could see this is maybe the only place in their lives where they felt like they could be accepted, be OK, and be safe,” Bishop said. “And I would watch those kids just really bloom and grow here. They felt something special when they came here. I love it.”
Both Weeks and Rivas acknowledged the current climate stokes fear and concern for the derby community, but they intend to persevere.
“It just makes us want to be that much more loud,” Weeks said. “Because we are a nonprofit hosting these events, we can display pride flags and that we can make sure that people know that trans skaters are in our community and they are safe in our community.”
Katie Buffington, a referee and athletics director for Wasatch Roller Derby, said it’s often people on the fringes and who feel downtrodden who organize derby, and they seek to build people up.
“Derby has thrown down a gauntlet when it comes to politics,” she said.
A jammer skates around the track after successfully lapping the opposing team’s defensive blockers. The Beehive Skate Revolution’s Team Edward vs. Team Jacob event, March 22, saw newly graduated skaters competing for the first time. Photo by Frank Regalado
In New York, the Long Island Roller Rebels lost a bid to temporarily block a Nassau County law banning female trans athletes from participating in women’s sports at county facilities. The New York Civil Liberties Union filed an appeal on the Roller Rebels' behalf in March.
“We protect our own,” Buffington said. “Derby players won’t be intimidated by the unjust and hateful laws being passed. They help lead the charge to overthrow them.”
Rivas added that the Women’s Flat Track Derby Association, the international governing body for the sport, has been in talks of removing the term “women” from its name.
“We’re definitely noticing changes and we're trying to make derby a safe haven,” she said. “We want it to be a place where people can go and be themselves and not have to worry about being persecuted for who they are.”
Because of its openness and representation, those unfamiliar with roller derby lose sight that it is still a sport, Weeks said. She encourages those with preconceived ideas about roller derby and its athletes to check it out.
“If I can get people to come up and see what it is — people seem a lot more open to the sport, and the people in the sport, and they see why I love the sport,” she said. “It's actually a really cool community.”
Frank Regalado wrote this story as a journalism student at the University of Utah for a capstone course focused on women’s sports. It is published as part of a collaborative including nonprofits Amplify Utah and The Salt Lake Tribune.
