Some of the members of the North Shore Rollers attended the log rolling meet recently held in Onalaska, Wisconsin and they posted some good results. From left are Garrett Plummer, Lexi Plummer, MaTaya Fairbanks, Ali Duclos, Taylor Everson and Paige Everson. Photo courtesy of Andrea Everson
It was a hot day in Onalaska, Wisconsin, with temps well into the 90s, on Sunday, July 14 where the North Shore Rollers competed in the Three Rivers Roleo tournament.
The big winner of the day was Lexi Plummer who placed 1st in the U10 girls division.
Lexi looked calm and steady as she competed against a group of seven girls. Winning her first two matches put her in the finals where Lexi swept three straight falls to claim the crown. Meanwhile, Lexi’s little brother, Garrett, rolled in a round robin co-ed group and placed second.
The largest and most fierce group competing for the past several years is the U-13 girls. This is the age where the participants tend to know each other well, and most have gained a lot of skill and technique. This makes many of the matches long and very interesting. It’s like watching chess only it’s chess played with fast moving feet on a series of smaller and smaller wet logs as the competitors see who can take the best of 3-5 falls.
MaTaya Fairbanks competed in her first away tournament but has been rolling with the North Shore Rollers for two years. MaTaya had a great day of rolling, but ran into a real tough competitor, Hailey Schreiber, on her first match.
MaTaya looked solid but fell to Hailey 3-1. Still, she managed to get a fall from Hailey. Taylor Everson took her first match 3-0 to move on to meet Libby Magnone, who hails from Oconomowoc, Wis.
These two girls have rolled against each other many times before. Libby, who has one of the best amateur records ever, beat Taylor 3-0, which put Taylor in the back bracket where she rolled against her teammate MaTaya. Both kids rolled well but Taylor took the win and moved on to face Susie Priest of the Twin Cities.
Taylor was down 2-0 and came back to tie it up by taking a few chances by bobbing the log up and down. The strategy worked and Taylor tied it up on the 4 log 2-2.
At that point the girls had worked their way down to the 5-log. The way log rolling works is that competitors get one minute on the 1-log, which is the biggest log in diameter, and then 2 minutes on the smaller 2-log, 3 minutes on the 3-log and so forth. Rolling on the 5-log is a little bit like rolling on a giant toothpick. It’s often underwater because the competitors’ combined weight is too much to keep it on the surface.
Susie ultimately came away with the win over Taylor in a very long, exhausting, exciting match.
Ali Duclos was also in this division. Ali made it to the finals where she met up with Libby and Libby Magnone took the win in another great match and Ali came in second place.
Paige Everson rolled in the U17 division, which is a smaller group of girls this year. Most of these young ladies are getting ready to turn pro so they will either roll on carpet or spike logs in their matches. This was a carpet log tournament, so it was tennis shoes only.
Paige placed 4th and rolled hard at the end of a long day.
This tournament gives the kids a great sense of the big tournament coming up in August at Hayward, Wisconsin, where the Lumberjack world championships are held each year.
The kids will use the experience they gained from this tournament to correct mistakes and to gain some more fitness as they get ready to compete a few more times before worlds.
If you want to see the North Shore Rollers compete, they are on Facebook and some of their tournaments or matches are live streamed.
The kids’ next tournament is in Lacrosse, Wis. on Saturday, July 20.
Leave a Reply