Loco Chanel: How did you get involved in derby and how long have you been a member of the Burning River Roller Girls?

Ivanna Destroya: I knew Columbus, Ohio had a league, so I googled to see if Cleveland did and went to the first meet-and-greet. I've been a member of BRRG since its inception, and have been on the All-Stars since the team first formed in 2007.

Eva Lucien: I'm an original BRRG member as well and also a founding member of the All-Stars.

How would you describe the BRRG All-Star's' playing style?

I'd describe it as "well-rounded". We have a lot of great, hard-working skaters. Our team's performance is dependent upon the joint contributions of all of our members, not just a few key players.

In other words, straight up gangsta!

The BRRG All-Stars are proving to be a solid contender in the increasingly competitive North Central region, and have secured their first tournament appearance as the #10 seed at September's Brawl of America. How have you structured your season and training to become a tournament-level team this year? What are your goals for the rest of the season?

From the outset, we have not shied away from playing excellent teams. Regardless of the score differential (which, thankfully, has been getting closer to positive as time goes on!), from each game we've taken away 1 or 2 key lessons and then dedicated our practices to filling those gaps.

Some of the things we’ve been doing at practice are pushing semis up hill, bench pressing pizzas then eating them, wearing lots of rompers, skating against unicorns.... ya know, the usual. We’re also working on finding a way to teleport (cut travel expenses) and bring tails back (a new way to do whips). After we finish that we'd like to play well at the BoA and increase our NC ranking.

Qualifying for Regionals has been our top priority for the last year. We have so much respect for the North Central region, so it's a real privilege to be playing in the Brawl of America. Some of the teams that were edged out of the tournament have been key players in the development of our game, so it's a little humbling to see them not make it to Regionals this year.

Our teams had the opportunity to see each other play (or, close enough), a few months ago when we both played in Cincinnati (WCR Nadabees vs. Cincy's B-Team, BRRG vs. Cincy All-Stars) and we're thrilled to have you come out for the Second Wind’s home debut. What are your thoughts coming into this game?

I've been a long admirer of your league, and so playing in Windy City is really exciting for me! Like all of our games, we'll be hitting the track with no expectations other than skating as hard as we can. Since this is our last game before Regionals, too, we have personal goals of applying practice lessons to a real game situation, which will let us know what we skills we need to refine before Brawl of America.

The real question is—is Oprah going to be there?

Any additional thoughts on next Saturday’s game that you want to share?

I heart North Central!

I'm nearly as excited about watching the WCR-Charm City game as I am about playing the Second Wind! It's going to be an amazing night.