Memphis Roller Derby is turning 20, and the Midtown league is marking the milestone with a $15 anniversary bout at the Pipkin Building on Saturday at 3 p.m., complete with a mini-museum, chuck-a-duck, beer, and, of course, skating. What started in 2006 with a group of moms looking for something fun, active, and cool has grown into a roughly 50-skater organization with a ranked travel team and a full developmental pipeline for newcomers.
The celebration will acknowledge former teams and the dedication of skaters, volunteers, and officials who have kept the league running, according to the Memphis Flyer. Chloe Exene Perkins, who joined the league in 2013, told the outlet that Memphis Roller Derby has always been a very DIY league, and that it has benefited over the years from dedicated skaters who wanted it to flourish beyond their own time with it.
From Backyard Rink to WFTDA Ranking
Memphis Roller Derby is organized as a skater-led, tax-exempt nonprofit affiliated with the Women's Flat Track Derby Association, the international governing body that grew out of the United Leagues Coalition founded in April 2004 before adopting its current name a year later. WFTDA now represents more than 400 member leagues across six continents, and Memphis currently sits at 28th out of 89 leagues in the association's North American South rankings, per the same association's data cited by the Flyer's report.
The league's roots go back to January 2006, when co-founder Sam Red got the idea after watching the A&E reality show Rollergirls, according to Wikipedia. The team held its first practice at Skateland Raleigh after a fire damaged the venue originally planned for the league, Skateland on Summer. Memphis Roller Derby earned full WFTDA membership in late 2008, a milestone reached during an undefeated 13-0 season, per the same source.
Building Skaters From Scratch
Before its current team structure, the league's primary travel squad skated as the Hustlin' Rollers, who won their first away game against New Orleans' Big Easy Rollergirls in 2007 and climbed to a national WFTDA ranking of 77 in 2013, Wikipedia notes. The league has since restructured its competitive ranks: it established the Ghost River Ghouls and Memphis Minions as recreational home teams in 2023, and founded the B-Sides as a B-level travel squad in 2024, according to the Flyer's reporting.
Those home teams give members bout experience before they advance to the competitive A-Tracks and B-Sides travel squads, according to Memphis Health and Fitness. The league also runs its own skate and derby schools, which the Flyer reports accept anyone and everyone regardless of experience. To keep the sport accessible, Memphis Roller Derby offers seven-week Skate School bootcamps for a flat fee of $15, including access to loaner gear, and structures its seasonal player dues on an income-based sliding scale, according to Focus LGBT Magazine.
What Happens on the Track
Flat-track bouts run in two 30-minute periods broken into short jams of up to two minutes each, during which jammers score a point for every opposing blocker they pass while blockers physically check the opposing jammer, per the same Memphis Health and Fitness report. Under WFTDA safety rules, contact to a player's head, back, knees, lower legs, or feet is prohibited and draws a penalty box trip; the league also maintains a dedicated helmet fund to help concussed skaters replace damaged gear, Focus LGBT Magazine reports.
Amelia Gingras, a current skater, told the Flyer that playing derby has helped her feel strong physically and mentally, and that members of the league uplift each other. The organization supports both team and player development, and by its own description combines competitiveness with community building — celebrating goals as much as wins.
A Party at the Fairgrounds
Saturday's bout takes place at the Pipkin Building, an open-plan multi-use event hall at 940 Early Maxwell Boulevard on the historic 168-acre Memphis Fairgrounds in Midtown, according to Historic Memphis. The fairgrounds site has long served as a hub for Memphis civic and entertainment events. For $15, attendees get a bout alongside the mini-museum, chuck-a-duck game, and beer that organizers have built into the anniversary celebration.
Two decades in, league members say the anniversary bout is meant to be more than a nostalgia lap. It is billed as an opportunity for both the community and league members to celebrate the organization's growth and legacy, marking two decades of skaters who kept a scrappy, self-run league on its feet.
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