The calm of a summer morning, still cool from the previous night's thunderstorms, is broken only by the sound of an occasional truck rumbling down US 1 and the faint whine of Japanese motorcycles. The whine gets louder for a moment as, in the distance beyond a ryegrass-blanketed earth embankment, a pair of motorcycles arc through the air, their mud-spattered reds, yellows and chromes momentarily vivid against the blue summer sky.

They whip around an oval track hell on wheels in ripped teal stockings smashing into each other falling knees-first/hips-first/face-first onto the hard concrete floor sliding smeared red lipstick/bleared blue eye-shadow/blurred black eye-liner into the suicide seats with folding chairs cheering fans arms akimbo flying.

This is roller derby. This is not the banked-track, fake-fight, carefully-choreographed 1960s roller derby that came on late-night TV after the rasslin' was over. This is real-deal, hometown girls-next-door-gone-bad roller derby. This is something like if the Sex Pistols had been American women on roller skates, but with more muscle, nerve and guts.

Sintral Florida Derby Demons formed last year from the remnants of the Florida Rollergirls and quickly set out to trounce all challengers nervy enough to show up for bouts at their home rink in DeLand. The 2009 roller derby season began this month; the first home bout is Saturday, a double-header featuring the SFDD Demons A-team vs. Ft. Myers Derby Girls and the SFDD Sinners B-team vs. the Broward County Derby Grrls.

Today's roller derby is a fast-paced sport dominated by tattooed, punk-edged women who favor the torn-fishnets look and who probably didn't play softball in high school. They wear self-designed anything-but-uniform uniforms and call themselves by "derby names" that match their personalities - Killa Thug, Little Arson Annie or Kung Pow Kitty, for instance.

Truth told, I'd as soon watch paint dry as watch NFL football or NASCAR. By the end of my first Sintral Florida Derby Demons bout, however, I had become a die-hard roller derby fan. So an hour before the doors opened, I had jostled my way past the fans who were already lined up outside DeLand Skating Center with their folding chairs, waiting to spend 10 bucks apiece for the privilege of watching some of Volusia County's fastest, toughest women finish their season undefeated.

Inside, the hometown roller derby team and their supporters had set up for the bout, marking the evening's killing field on the floor with black plastic tape. Then they had warmed up, booty-dancing on skates to Run-DMC's "Tricky" until Linnzi Young, AKA Daytona Beotch, led them off to the side for stretches.

Young captains the 22 or so Derby Demons and heads up the team's operating board. Standing a head taller than most of her teammates, she's easy to spot among the pack of skaters in her hot pink helmet and long, pink-streaked blonde braids.

As the fans streamed in, the Derby Demons had clowned around, faux-fondling each other for the cameras and high-fiving those who set up their folding chairs on the rink floor. Now, however, the Derby Demons were engrossed in the serious business of battling the Palm City Punishers from Fort Myers.

Roller derby rules are relatively uncomplicated. Each game has three 20-minute periods, each broken into a series of "jams." Four members of each team - three blockers and a pivot - skate in a pack. A jam begins when a referee blows a whistle to get the pack moving, then blows it again to signal the teams' fifth members - the jammers - to come from behind.

The jammer's job is to maneuver to the front of the pack, then zip around the track and try to lap it. A point is scored each time a jammer laps a member of the opposing team. Of course, the blockers try to prevent with body checks and any other legally available means. Elbowing, tripping, and other illegal ploys send a skater to the penalty box - locally known as the Sin Bin.

One of the Demons' star jammers, Little A, is an 18-year-old with a knack for moving through the pack like grease through a goose. In her last jam of the first period, the crowd rises to its feet as Little A does a flying leap over a fallen opponent then shrugs off a hard shoulder block to score four points before lapping the pack and doing it again. That jam leaves the Derby Demons ahead 40-20 at the end of the first period.

During the break between periods, I chat with Ivy Foust, who founded the Florida Rollergirls, a "mother" team that evolved into the Derby Demons. "In high school, I didn't fit in with other girls, really," Foust explains. "I had a good time on roller skates, though. So when roller derby revived a few years ago, it seemed like a natural outlet."

The team's fan base originally trended toward college-age people and friends of team members, she says. "But I notice they're getting more older people now," she says. "A lot of people have finally figured out it's a really enjoyable sport to watch, and they're just coming to have a good time."

Second period goes about like the first until less than a minute from the end, when Little A falls hard and several other skaters fall on top of her. Young flies across the rink, hovering over her while the medic checks her out. The captain and the crowd breathe a collective sigh of relief as Little A rises to her feet. The score is now 91 to 29.

The game ends with the Derby Demons ahead of the Punishers by a margin of more than 120 points. Afterward, Young and other team members return the rink to its normal day-to-day state, then head to OB's, a local biker bar, for the after-party, where Little A, alias Alyssha Littlefield, relaxes and nurses a soda.

She turned 18 in January. "I've been skating since I was 3, hockey and speed skating," she says. "I've been with the team for more than two years, but I was too young to compete."
Her second-period fall "hurt a lot at first," she says. She calls my attention to her belt, a black leather number with metal studs. "I landed on my belt," she explains.

Young sits down to talk to me. There were 349 tickets sold to the game, she says. "Our first game, we only had 150 people, so it's growing a lot," she says. "The community is becoming very supportive."

It costs a lot to keep the team rolling - being a Derby Demon costs each team member $35 per month in dues. Most of that money goes to rent the rink for practices. "Then we have to buy skates, pads and all that stuff," Young says. "So it's nice to have whatever help we can get."

Roller derby is not as accepted in the South as it is out west, where the revival started several years ago. "A lot of people down here still think it's like WWF," Young says. "But we are true athletes - we sacrifice our bodies for this sport."

The Palm City Punishers had played well, she says, but the previous weekend's game against the Bradentucky Bombers had been rougher. She points to a still-sore spot on her ribcage.

"I kept getting elbowed - one of my ribs came loose and was floating around," she says. "Every time I'd start through the pack again I'd be thinking, 'Please don't hit me in the ribs again.'"

"Tomorrow, I'm going to be hurting. I'll probably stay in bed all day watching TV with the heating pad," she adds. "But I feel good right now - there's still a lot of adrenaline left in my system, so I don't feel the pain yet."

SFDD Home Bouts are at the DeLand Skating Center, 1799 N. Spring Garden Ave., DeLand. The SFDD Demons are the Sintral Florida Derby Demons A-Team. The SFDD Sinners are the B-Team.

March 21: SFDD Demons vs. Ft. Myers Derby Girls; SFDD Sinners vs. Broward County Derby GRRLS B-Team

April 18: SFDD Demons vs. Molly Rogers Rollergirls; SFDD Sinners vs. Greater Jacksonville Roller Derby

May 16: SFDD Demons vs. Burn City Rollers; SFDD Sinners vs. TBA

June 20: SFDD Demons vs. TBA; SFDD Sinners vs. Soul City Sirens

July 18: SFDD Demons vs. Broward County Derby Girls; SFDD Sinners vs. Panama City Roller Derby

August 15: SFDD Demons vs. Cape Fear Rollergirls; SFDD Sinners vs. Beach Brawl Sk8r Dolls.

September 19: SFDD Demons vs. Biloxi Roller Derby; SFDD Sinners vs. Gainesville Roller Rebels

For a complete schedule with out-of-town games, visit myspace.com/sintralfloridaderbydemons.

Ava sat beside me at the bar, her spike-heeled pumps straddling my barstool, semi-enclosing me in a triangle of long, leather-chaps-clad legs. The exotic dancer had skin the color of a mocha latte and a full-lipped come-hither smile set in a face that could launch a thousand ships--or at least kick-start a bunch of motorcycles.

As Bike Week drew near, she and her blonde-bombshell counterpart, Kitty (both preferred to use stage names) were anxious to get a lot of bikers' engines revving. Both dance at Pin-Ups, a DeLand gentlemen's club where the coming of Bike Week is as welcome as Mother's Day to a florist.

 

Event weeks, of course, are a chance to make up for slow times. "But I love Bike Week," Ava says. "I get to meet a bunch of different people, and we have a lot of different events."

 

With its crowds and nonstop party atmosphere, "Bike Week is crazy," Kitty says--"hard work, but a lot of fun."

 

 "We do everything we can to keep the party going," Ava adds. "We'll do girl-on-girl shows, run around doing body shots, get them to join in a sing-along, shoot pool, introduce them around--whatever we can to make people feel at home."

 

 

 

When the house is packed, a good entertainer works a little harder to make sure everyone gets enough attention, Kitty adds. "When I go on stage, I'll dance slower," she says. "I make sure to make eye contact--there are a lot of small people skills that can make people comfortable and make someone feel special."

 

All the clubs do whatever they can to bring in the crowds, and Pin-Ups is no exception. The club recently added a package store, for instance, and has live bands during Bike Week playing classic rock.

 

 "Everybody has a bike wash, and we'll have one, too," says manager Darin Campbell. "And guys eventually get hungry, so we set up a barbecue stand out front."

 

"Bikers come from all walks of life--it's not just one type of person, and we get folks from all over the world," Campbell adds. "Of course, we do everything we can to make them feel welcome."

 

The area has about 10 gents' clubs, including two in DeLand and several in east Volusia. During a typical weekend, each club will have between 20 and 100 girls on duty. Sean Bishop, who handles marketing at Lollipops in Daytona Beach, says that number will double during Bike Week.

 

"We'll sometimes have 200 girls working on weekends," Bishop says. "There are a lot that travel the circuit, only doing special events. They come from all over the country--and all the way to Canada."

 

 

 

 Ava and Kitty, however, are locals. At 35, Ava is a veteran exotic entertainer. She holds two college degrees, but the nightclub job allows her the flexibility to spend time "being a mommy," she says. Kitty got into the act after serving four years in the Marines.

 

Being good at what she does takes more than good looks, Ava says. "You have to have a personality," she says. "My job is really to make sure everyone has a great time."

 

Their main role, Kitty says, is to help customers "live out a fantasy."

 

"It's an escape, for the customer," she says. "When we come here, it's our job to not have problems. So you can have a bad day, then you can come here and find a beautiful girl that wants to listen to your problems."

 

"She's a sympathetic ear," she adds. "And she happens to be half naked."

 

This story first appeared in the Bike Week Biker Guide.

 

Photos by Michelle Sullivan: Kitty poses on a pole in the VIP Champagne Room at Pin-Ups, DeLand; Ava and Kitty touch up their makeup in the dressing room during a break.

    

With two legs still to go in the race through Tomoka State Park, I had already capsized my kayak, destroyed my cell phone and chased fire ants out of my shoes.

For the life of me, I couldn't figure out how I got fire ants in my shoes while kayaking, but there was no time to think about that now. As quickly as possible, I checked in at the transition area, tucked my map into the driest spot I could find in my fanny pack and jogged off down a sandy road toward (I hoped) the first checkpoint on the "trekking" portion of the Tomoka Lighter Knot adventure race.

In its current form, adventure racing is a relatively new sport. Born a few years after the first Hawaii Ironman made triathlons trendy, typical adventure races combine paddling, off-road biking and trail running. Some toss in rock climbing, swimming or even hang-gliding, as well.

There is no marked course - individuals and teams use a compass and map that is distributed at the beginning of the race to navigate a series of checkpoints. I had decided to do this particular race because, along with the six-hour Elite race, there would be a more doable three-hour Sport race. Since I'd be a team of one I wanted to be on fairly familiar ground - I knew I couldn't get too lost at Tomoka State Park.

Ormond Beach resident John Sheriff designed the Tomoka course. Sheriff and his daughter are regulars on the local adventure race circuit. For example, they had recently completed a nighttime adventure race that started somewhere between Orlando and Titusville.

"We did the sport race, which started at 7," Sheriff says. "We paddled on the St. Johns, then came back and did the biking and hiking on trails. It was neat being on the St. Johns at dusk - we started seeing quite a few alligators."

Adventure races lasting longer than a day usually require competitors to have a support crew to help with gear and supplies, Sheriff says. He and his daughter crewed for a team in last year's Primal Quest, the sport's highest-profile event.

"We had a little popup camper and van," he says. "They'd come in, eat, bandage their feet, maybe go in and sleep two or three hours, then head out again."

Adventure racing is gradually edging toward the mainstream, says Greg Owens, who runs Pangea Adventure Racing, organizer of several local races including the Tomoka Lighter Knot and the 30-hour Atlantic Coast Conquest which passes through Volusia County in April.

"A lot of people want to try adventure racing, but they're not sure how to get into it and they're intimidated by the long events," Owens says. "So we're trying to have more races that work as an introductory vehicle."

With 2-4 miles of trekking, 6-10 miles of off-road biking and 2-4 miles of padding, sport races are tough enough to attract athletes who want a challenge but are still within reach of less-than-superhuman folks like me.

Many of those entering the sport come from orienteering, competitive paddling and the like, says 64-year-old Lake Mary resident Jack Cash, who started out swimming competitively and entered his first adventure race in the mid-1990s. "I did a 6-hour race in Miami," he says. "We were Team Clueless - and boy, were we clueless."

"You get a lot of runners and triathletes who want to do something a little different, so they start adventure racing," Cash says. "It's challenging, but because you have to use your head, it's less physical and more mental."

To prepare for adventure racing, I cross-trained triathlon-style, biking into the West Volusia back country, paddling the St. Johns River and Tomoka Basin and jogging on roads and trails with my dogs. I discovered moving my workouts into the woods made long training sessions much more enjoyable.

Fire ants and flooded cell phones aside, the race itself turned out to be a lot of fun. Besides taking me down hidden trails and to the top of Indian mounds, the race forced me to learn a new skill - navigation with map and compass. Each control point successfully reached was in itself a little victory.

Awards went to the top three finishers overall in each race. Cash, racing under the team name "Adipose Man," came in third overall in the Sport race. First place went to the Goat Getters, who finished in 1:42. Besides dumping my kayak, I made some other mistakes and finished in just over three hours.

I'm sure, however, that if I hadn't had to backtrack and hunt for the map I'd dropped on the road during the bike portion and had to backtrack again to pick up the passport I'd dropped elsewhere on the trail, I'd at least have edged out both teams of 10-year-old girls.

That's okay - I learned a lot this first race. I'm sure I'll smoke 'em next year.

"Adventure Racing in Tomoka State Park" originally appeared in the News-Journal's Your Health magazine on Feb. 15.

Over the wind noise and the drone from the airplane in front of us, I heard Greg Shugg's voice from behind me.

"See that little yellow ball in front of you, by your left hand?" Shugg asked. "Grab that and give it a pull."
I did as I was told. Suddenly everything changed - the world slowed down and got quiet as our sailplane seemed to sit still in the sky for a moment before gently listing to the right. Our ride into the sky, a Piper Pawnee, banked hard to the left and zoomed back toward terra firma.

We were free, floating slowly through the air 2,300 feet above Pierson in a plane with no engine.

I had gone to the Pierson Municipal Airport to fly with the Eagle Sport Aviation Club, a nonprofit organization made up of recreational aviation enthusiasts. Shugg had invited me to try a flight in the club's new Schleicher ASK-21 sailplane.

"It's the only one of its kind in Florida," Shugg told me. "It can go hundreds of miles and stay aloft for hours."
 
Glider flying - soaring - got its start as a sport in Germany after World War I. The sport involves towing a lightweight, engineless airplane behind a powered aircraft. Once at altitude, the sailplane is released to glide back to the ground. It's a "huge" sport in Europe and Australia, Shugg says, and is a growing sport in the U.S.

"It's pure flying at its best," Shugg says. "A lot of our members are commercial pilots - they do this because it's just a lot of fun."

The Eagles own three gliders--the ASK-21, another two-seat trainer, and a single-seater--along with the Piper Pawnee. Sarah Ferraro, a club member who was recently tapped to fly F-16s for the Air National Guard, towed us to altitude in the former crop-sprayer. It's a good choice for glider-towing, she says, because it can carry a lot of weight for its size and can come down in a hurry, saving time and fuel between glider launches.

It takes only 1.8 gallons of fuel to get a glider up to altitude. "So this is a very green sport," Shugg says. "Considering we can fly hundreds of miles, that's pretty good gas mileage."

Before we flew, Shugg gave me a quick introduction to the glider's controls and instrumentation. With the exception of the little yellow ball, the controls are much like those on a small airplane. Instrumentation is minimal, with an altimeter, airspeed indicator, variometer (rate-of-climb indicator), and a G-meter.

To get airborne, we were hooked to the end of a line and towed down the grass runway. Designed for maximum lift and minimum drag, the glider left the ground a moment before the powered airplane. The Pawnee flies faster than the sailplane glides, thus the "sitting in the air" feeling and near-silence when we first broke loose.

The 800-pound sailplane has a 34-to-one glide ratio, meaning that if we started out at 5,280 feet we could glide gently to the ground 34 miles away. However, a glider can remain aloft by taking advantage of thermals, columns of rising air.

"If you can find lift, you can replenish the altitude you've lost," Shugg explains. "We descend at about 150-200 feet per minute, so we look for air that's rising faster than that."

The easy way to find a thermal is to look beneath cumulus clouds, the cottony clouds that form when warm, moist air rises until it hits cool air. I flew on a "blue" day, one with few clouds in the sky.

"A sunny day with some cumulus clouds is ideal - you know you'll have lift on those days," Shugg says. "On a blue day like this one, you have to look harder. You look for birds circling, or maybe another sailplane that's already found one."

We spotted another glider and a large bird circling in a thermal and joined them to spiral around the cone of rising air. The bird turned out to be a bald eagle. He tipped a wing and banked toward us, giving us a cursory once-over before drifting away in a lazy circle. I suddenly understood what it meant to soar.

After riding the thermal to 2,500 feet, we coasted away for a look at Lake George, then came back to rise again to altitude again before gliding off to circle Seville. After almost 40 minutes in the air, Shugg brought us softly back to the grass runway in Pierson.

We could have stayed up longer and gone farther - the North American distance record is more than 1,200 miles. On a good day with plenty of cumulus clouds, Shugg has glided from thermal to thermal all the way to Tampa Bay and back.

"That's a lot of fun," he says. "Once you've done something like that, you never look at the clouds the same way again."

People interested in soaring and other forms of recreational aviation can try it out with an introductory flight from Eagle Sport Aviation club. For more information, visit the club's website at eaglesport.org, or visit the club at the Pierson Municipal Airport on U.S. 17 just north of Pierson.

Someone from the club is at the airport virtually every weekend unless it's raining or too overcast, says club member Greg Shugg. Citrus Soaring Club also operates from the Pierson Municipal Airport and has glider rides available.