Tucson Roller Derby is a women's roller derby

Roller derby

Roller derby is a contact sport played by two teams of five members roller skating in the same direction around a track. Game play consists of a series of short matchups in which both teams designate a scoring player who scores points by lapping members of the opposing team...

 league located in Tucson, Arizona

Tucson, Arizona

Tucson is a city in and the county seat of Pima County, Arizona, United States. The city is located 118 miles southeast of Phoenix and 60 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border. The 2010 United States Census puts the city's population at 520,116 with a metropolitan area population at 1,020,200...

. TRD is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit public charity organization. A member of the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA), Tucson Roller Derby is a skater-run non-profit organization formed in late 2003. Now entering its fifth season, TRD hosts monthly flat-track roller derby competitions which showcase bouts among the various teams in the league. As of 2009, five teams comprise Tucson Roller Derby: the Furious Truckstop Waitresses (FTW), the Iron Curtain, the VICE Squad, and the Copper Queens — in addition to the TRD Saddletramps, a travelling team formed for inter-league challenges.

History

Initially formed as the Tucson extension of the Phoenix-based Arizona Roller Derby (AZRD), TRD was founded in 2003 by Kim Kysar (aka Kim Sin) when the Tucson skaters, citing geographical and logistical concerns, broke away from the parent league. At the time of the split, Tucson Roller Derby consisted of one team, The Furious Truckstop Waitresses (FTW). Since that time, Tucson Roller Derby has more than doubled in size, adding the Iron Curtain as a regular-season team in 2004, the Vice Squad in 2005, and the Copper Queens in 2007. TRD continues to have a "sisterly" relationship with AZRD, often facing off against each other with both their local-season and WFTDA inter-league teams.

As one of the longest-established flat-track leagues, TRD has kept a high-profile in the Women's Flat Track Derby Association (WFTDA) since the consortium's inception. Tucson had the honor of hosting the first-ever WFTDA National Championship Tournament over the weekend of February 24–26, 2006. Dubbed the "Dust Devil", the event hosted 20 WFTDA leagues from around the United States in a tournament to determine the nation's first-ever WFTDA national champion team.

Due to the success of the first Dust Devil, TRD was chosen to host the 2007 WFTDA Western Regional Tournament

WFTDA Western Regional Tournament

The WFTDA Western Regional Tournament or WFTDA West Region Playoffs is one of four roller derby qualifying tournaments for the WFTDA Championships....

. This second Dust Devil, featuring teams west of the Mississippi River, determined the 4 leagues to head to the Texas Shootout National Tournament in Austin, TX, where they faced off against the top 4 teams from the East.

Tucson Roller Derby received their Public Charity status on August 7, 2006, and is the first team in the WFTDA to receive a tax deductible status on donations.

Past Champions

Tucson Roller Derby completed its fifth season in September 2008.

2004 The Furious Truckstop Waitresses

2005 The VICE Squad

2006 The Furious Truckstop Waitresses

2007 The Furious Truckstop Waitresses

2008 The VICE Squad

External links

TucsonRollerDerby.com