back on wheels

Well, sorry for the hiatus folks but things in my life outside of derby have been going a little less than perfectly so I had taken a little break.

Over the past two weeks I did manage to get my skate sent away to have the toe-stop repaired so when I went to Thursday night's practice, I was able to wear my own skates. Originally I had thought I would have to wear rental skates for a couple of practices, and I would have had I not missed the few practices while my skates were away.

The rink had been resurfaced, so we had a couple of practices missed because of that.
Stepping out onto the now super shiny wood floor I felt a mixture of a home-coming and a sense of it all being brand new again. A few strides around the track and I was feeling fine. It was great to be back on skates again.
I only stayed for a little more than half of practice, as I had been suffering with a migraine for most of the week and didn't want to make it worse by dehydrating myself or sacrificing one more hour of my precious sleep.
I think I did ok, even tho I did fall a few times. We spent a lot of time on pack-work, which is something I really need to work on still. I am not good at keeping pace with the other girls and I always feel like I am falling behind. We did some weaving and some whips which were fun as usual.
I was about to take my skates off when we did the 25-in 5 drill. I was really worried that I would not do well with our new grippy floor and having been off skates for a while, but I managed to do my best yet! 17 3/4 laps!
One of the girls acted as a personal cheerleader for me, skating inside the track and encouraging me. It's also really awesome to hear some of the vets cheering me on from the sidelines.
It's awesome to have such a supportive team. they've all been new before so they all know what its like. I can't wait till I'm on the sidelines cheering on some new girl who is fighting through it. I know I'll get there eventually.