The B.A.D. Girl of the Month of May is one of our newer skaters, rolling out in the silver and pink of the Berkeley Resistance, Foxy Throwdown! #10 in your programs, #1 in your hearts, Foxy comes to us from colder and wetter Seattle, where she skated for Rat City. And what’s she done since she got here? Oh, only wrestled to the ground the vastly complex committee that is Bay Area Derby Girls PR. As someone said when she was nominated, Foxy is “THE BOSS. Killing it since jumping in to take over PR, flying by the seat of her pants and making awesome [stuff] happen. In addition to being very nice and a fantastic communicator.”
[Author’s note: the writer of the B.A.D. Girl of the Month posts is a member of the PR committee, and can agree wholeheartedly with those statements] But like all B.A.D. Girls, Foxy isn’t just about how she makes the league better off the track. There’s that pesky business of making her team better ON the track. She’s a fearsome presence on skates. As a teammate put it, “She’s extremely good at taking people down with her [butt]. Jammers try to hit her out of the way and basically bounce back off and end up on the ground.” She’s also “very into team camaraderie,” which is also evidenced in how well she’s fit in to the league at large. Congratulations to a warm and intelligent addition to the league, and this month’s Bad Girl of the Month, Foxy Throwdown!What’s your gubmint name (the one on your birth certificate)? It’s a secret.
How did you get your derby name? When I started playing there were no African Americans on my league. I wanted a name that did three things: represented a strong black woman, was a fun, fairly-simple-to-figure-out pun, and could be shortened into something that I wanted to be called. Foxy Throwdown is a play on Pam Grier’s Foxy Brown character from the 70s Blaxploitation movie of the same name. Fun fact: my mom went to high school with Pam Grier.
What do you do for non-derby work? I’m a UX Optimization/Marketing Copywriter.
How did you become involved with our league? How long have you been with us? I took 2014 off, had moved to the Bay Area and realized I wasn’t finished playing roller derby and also needed a way to meet people and keep active. So, here I am again. I transferred to B.A.D. after playing for six years in Seattle with the Rat City Rollergirls.
Do you have a favorite derby moment or one thing you are most proud of? The thing that I’m most proud of is that in my seventh year I’m still growing as a skater and changing with the sport. I’m learning and utilizing new skills and becoming effective in different ways. I’ve learned so much from so many great people here at B.A.D; it keeps me from thinking “How much longer can I do this?”
If you had one super power what would it be? Would you use it for good or evil? Teleportation. Hands down. Seriously, why has no one invented this yet?
Where would you love to live, if not in the Bay Area? I’ve moved so much in my life I have no desire to think about moving anytime soon.
Who’s your derby crush? My crushes change and evolve as I meet and get to know more people. I couldn’t possibly name just one person.
What’s your personal goal for 2015 (derby or otherwise)? Generally speaking 2015’s going to be a great year for me. Things have been going fairly so far; so I’m cautiously optimistic. Derby wise, I’m just hoping to grow. A lot. Ideally, by the end of the season, I want people dreading seeing me on the track because they hate skating against me. There are only a few things that please me more than an opponent telling me that they think: “Oh no; not Foxy” when they see me in the lineup.