09-03-2025
'There's a lot of rough and tumble' - York roller derby club nominated for award
An inclusive roller derby club in York has been nominated for a sports award.
As announced by The Press, the YO1 Radio Sports Awards is set to come to York Barbican on June 19. Ahead of the night, nominations across a wide-range of categories have been pouring in before nominations close on March 28.
One such nominee is Haunted City Roller Derby, an inclusive and competitive roller derby team. Before seeing if the team leaves York Barbican as victors, team member Remy Kent-Payne spoke to The Press.
They said: "It [roller derby] is a full contact team sport played on quad roller-skates, there's an oval shape track and each team will field five skaters at a time. One of them will be the 'jammer', they're the points scorer, and the other four will be blockers. To score points, the jammer has to overtake the opposing team's jammer."
Remy added that there's a lot of "rough and tumble", but said the sport comes with plenty of rules.
Scan this QR code to nominate yourself or someone else for the YO1 Radio Sports Awards (Image: Newsquest)
Around a decade ago, Remy watched the film Whip It, starring Elliot Page. They said this was the catalyst for them trying out roller derby.
"I'd never roller skated in my life, so there was a lot of falling over," they said.
After moving to York, Remy found the Haunted City Roller Derby club - formerly known as York Minxters.
Haunted City fields a "men's" and "women's" team. However, in the inclusive sport of roller derby, "men's" refers to people of all genders, and "women's" refers to everyone but cisgender men.
Remy said both the sport and club's inclusive nature is key to their love of the sport.
Follow the link here to nominate yourself, a club, or someone else for the YO1 Radio Sports Awards
"It's personally something I'm very passionate about, trans and non-binary people having a safe space for sport," said Remy. "We're very proud of that."
They added: "It's not just the culture of the sport here in York, it's always been a sport where people from the queer community feel safe and included.
"We always have a stall at York Pride, and we always get a lot of interest from that stall."
Remy said, in today's world, Haunted City's culture of inclusion is more important than ever.
"I came into my own identity when I came to a team and had that unconditional support," they added.
"The same people we knock over on track are people that we're lifting up. We don't hold back on track, we're here to play competitively, but we can still engage as a family.
"For a lot of us, this is the first sport that we've properly enjoyed."
