DA 45

Well, since Rollergirl, from Rollergirl.ca, was going to be in the same city as me for Quad City Chaos (awesome!), and my pivot cups did not seem to be arriving anytime soon, we decided to meet at MTLRD's merch table so she could drop them off in person.  And that we did!  So I carried them home from Toronto, along with my new Smith Scabs knee pads (love at first fitting, I'll be talking about them at some point), as though they were precious gold.

Four tiny nylon white cups.

In the style of most road trips, the ride home took much longer than the required 5.5 hours, and I got in at 2am to go directly to bed.  But the next morning, I got up, set up all the required equipment, went to the store for what I still needed, and put on the new DA 45 trucks that make everything worth it.  I did take picture, but when I went to post this I discovered that they did not save for me!  So my planned detailed post was lost.

Now, I don't have a lot of space in my apartment, so I did what little I could to feel them out before I has a chance to skate them.  This included balancing stationary on two wheels, some tight spins, and rolling from the chaotic living room to the kitchen (5 feet, if anything).  And I liked them.  A lot.


But the truer test came for the derby practice last night.  When I first got the skins as a SA set up, it took me a week to skate them as well as I could.  But last night, I hopped on and did my thing, no problems.

 Now, I'm not saying I can do things with these trucks that I wasn't able to do before...  but I *might* be saying that I can do the stuff I could do before a little better, and with less effort...

Time will tell how much of a difference these trucks make, as the cushions need to be broken in and I may actually get a better performance out of some softer cushions, but my current thoughts are that I like them, feel stable, and more like a super star.

And in other news, tonight I will trade wheels with a fellow gear geek, my Omega's for her Jukes, so we can each try them out for a bit and see what we think.  Honestly, if these Jukes are everything I've heard, then I'll get a pair and move from a super star to a super hero on skates.  Beautiful.

Quad City Chaos

I'm heading to Toronto in a few hours to watch Quad City Chaos!  It will be a two day tournament style play of the three leading leagues in Canada, and it's only five hours away!  So I'll be following my A-Team to Toronto to watch them in action and sell some t-shirts.  Should be good fun, and I'll see some people who moved to Toronto that I love seeing.

Now, to tell you the truth, I expect that The New Skids on the Block will blow all the competition out of the water.  They are far more experienced (as far as I can tell), and are on a super hot streak at the moment, with 4 consecutive WFTDA wins.  But as always, I am excited to see how the other leagues play.  I've seen CN Power in action against my home team, and I played (mostly from the bench) against the Eh! Team, but a huge unknown to me is the league from my home town, Terminal City Roller Girls.  If I hadn't moved from Vancouver to Montreal when I did, that's the league I would have played for.  So it's like watching two presents, one real and one potential, battling it out on the track.

Another thing I'm looking forward is to finally be receiving those pivot cups I've been dying to get.  They were sent out and then promptly lost in the mail, so Rollergirl, who plays for TCRG as well as running an awesome skate shop, will bring me pivot cups this weekend.  That means that Monday I will install the suckers (hopefully with few problems and many pictures), and Tuesday, finally be skating the set-up I've been dreaming about since December.