It was the dog days of roller derby this weekend—rabid heat and wilting hair as far as the eye could see. Friday kicked off with the debut bout of the Portland Men’s Roller Derby, who took on Eugene’s Lane County Concussion in the blistering confines of the Hangar. Both teams were peppered with a nice cross-section of skating gentlemen of a certain age, like the white-haired Merby Dick from Eugene and a host of familiar zebras from the Rose City Rollers’ ref squad. Props to Shreddy Mercury for stealing the Best Boutfit Award with his spandex tights and BVDs (ooh la la!), with PDX’s mascot coming in a close second in a Mardi Gras/voodoo outfit, accessorized with a pair of crutches.

After the jump, catch the men’s recap and Saturday’s ladies match-up between Portland and Boise.

This being my first experience with men’s roller derby, I wasn’t quite sure what to expect—what I saw was a lot of hard hits, no-so gracefully executed hip checks, less on-the-track experience, and a ton of spills. But it was exciting to see two burgeoning teams battling it out on a different level than women’s league—sometimes one forgets how much road the ladies have already traveled. Plus the dudes were hella stoked to be out there and by most accounts this was intermediate play for merby (men’s roller derby, natch).

Lane County took the immediate lead with nine points. Portland’s speedy jammer Chad Von Sausageclause answered with four points. From that point on, it was a race for Portland to catch up. Lane County topped the scoreboard for the rest of the half with just a brief lead by PDX. Halftime score: Lane County 59, Portland 55.

Both teams seemed to be experiencing some difficulty maintaining a tight pack in this close bout, reportedly a grudge match between the two teams. With 18 minutes in the game, PDX jammer Shreddy Mercury upped it for Portland, 87-81, soon to be answered by Lane County’s Cougar Bait to bring the higher score to Lane County 115, PDX 103. At this point, the mop-up crew had to wipe down the man sweat-drenched track—how dudely! Sad to say, but Eugene’s GQ was pretty badly hurt in the final minutes with a concussion (their team name might be a jinx) and a back injury—and to make his wounds all the more sting-y, in the end Lane County Concussion lost a close bout to Portland Men’s Roller Derby with a final score of 148-120.

The spud ’n’ suds lovers of Boise’s Treasure Valley Rollergirls rolled into town on Saturday to duke it out with RCR’s all-star B team, Axles of Annihilation. Ten minutes in, it became obvious it was going to be a knockdown—Axles 58, Treasure Valley 4 (ouch). The Axles shut out Boise’s jammers in defensive wall after wall, while our jammers juked and jived again and again around the ladies from Idaho. Boise’s Cherry effBomb and JillDozer were giving it their jammin’ all, while Axles’ diminutive blocker Penny Dreadful consistently kicked some defensive ass. Halftime: Axles 109, Treasure Valley 29.

It didn’t get much better for the Idahoans, with power jam after power jam perpetrated by the Axles, trapping lone members of Treasure Valley’s crew to slow the pack and score relentless points. With 13 minutes to go, the score was Axles 179, Treasure Valley 35. All the while slippery cephalopod Squid Vicious and on-fire Supa Sixpack jammed more points for RCR. Final: Axles of Annihilation 237, Treasure Valley 42. It was definitely a hot, sweaty blowout.