The Roller Derby

"All I want out of it," Joan Weston said, "is to make good money, get out of it in one piece, and years from now when I say I was in the Derby I want people still to know what it is. I want that."

FIVE STRIDES ON THE BANKED TRACK

CHARLIE O'CONNELL (at the bar in Duluth after the last game of his career): I get so tired with the new skaters complaining all the time. You can take any outfit and tear it apart if you really want to.

BILL GROLL: You mean any outfit, in or out of sports?

O'CONNELL: You can tear any outfit apart. So look at it this way: What does the Derby give you? Where would you be, Lou?

Lou DONOVAN: Without the Derby?

O'CONNELL: Yeah. Without the Derby. If there wasn't one.

DONOVAN: Not in boxing anymore. I had to leave there. And I couldn't be in football or anything.

O'CONNELL: SO where would you be if you weren't skating?

DONOVAN: Well, I'd just be in construction all the time.