The London Roller Girls hosted the European championship tournament this past weekend with 12 teams (10 UK, 2 German) descending on Earls Court for a bit of a brawl.  Obviously we (being myself, Mitesh & Neal) were there to take some shots.

The venue was huge compared to what we’re used to, so there was lots of room to move about and the lighting was much more even.  Also, since there were so many matches to watch there was plenty of time to fool around with camera settings and get everything just right.  All of that resulted in what I feel are some of the best Roller Derby shots I’ve taken so far.

Here’s a couple of my favourites.

In addition to the usual “rest are in the gallery“, I’ve gone ahead and set up a Flickr account so that I can post a few more shots that I think derby fans (or the skaters themselves) may be interested in seeing.  Stuff that I wouldn’t normally post to my gallery in other words.  Anyways, those photos are located here.

Another great night out provided by the lovely London Rollergirls.  This time it was a double header event with the London teams hosting competitors from Leeds & Birmingham.

The final scores weren’t all that pretty for the visiting teams, but it was an entertaining evening none the less.  A couple of shots from the night, and more in the gallery!

After last years Mutiny on the Mountie event, we all knew we’d have to go back to watch another roller derby event.  As the league is progressing, they’ve now divided up the girls into a few teams and at Clockwork Carnage it was the Ultraviolent Femmes vs. the Steam Rollers.

In addition to crew that came along last year, a few of my photographer friends from POTN came along for the unique (and challenging) experience of shooting a roller derby.  There are quite a few of their shots here, as well as on the Roller Girls forum here.

Incidentally, I don’t know who does the flyers for their matches, but they’re all awesome!

Here are a few of my shots from the day, and the rest are in the gallery.

I managed to get a few tickets to go and watch the London Roller Girls compete against Team Canada this weekend. Brian, Clare, Robert, Victoria & I had a really good evening, though we all felt a bit dodgy bringing our Tesco bags full of booze into the community center.

With Canadian Flags in hand we were cheering like mad, but our cheers were drowned out by the London fans. In the end, the Brawlers dominated Team Canada but the final score was quickly forgotten with the help of a few pints at a local pub.

Here’s a couple of quick shots from the evening. My first vantage point was terrible as the folks in front of me were standing so most (all) of those shots included the tops of people heads. Very annoying. The second spot I wedged myself into was much better, but as it was on the corner there weren’t many action shots. Some of the portrait type photos turned out quite well though.

As usual, the rest of the series (there’s a few) can be found here.