A group of Whitehorse women are strapping on their alter-egos with their derby skates.

Yukon Roller Girls is a grassroots organization - or an ad hoc organization - that began as a small group of women who just wanted to roller skate in an elementary school parking lot and practise some roller derby drills.

Six weeks later, those few women have become many, and the group has transformed into an organization looking for funding and a space of their own.

There are three requirements to be a roller girl. Participants must be women, 19 years of age or older, and they must have valid healthcare insurance-roller derby is a contact sport.

"Roller derby is badass, it's empowering, and you don't have to be a certain physique. You don't have to be a life-long athlete. It's, sort of, be your own hero,” said organizer Jordie Mikeli-Jones

"It's an opportunity for these women to have these alter egos. They can be the secretaries or the nurses, or have their day-in-day-out lives, but this gives them a chance to sort of get out of their shells, and every woman is looking for that.”

Each roller girl needs a handle, an identity. Jones, a blue-eyed woman in a baby-blue tank top, already has one: Code Blue.

"I chose Code Blue because my favourite colour is blue. I actually wanted to be Rainbow Fright initially,” she said, pointing to her Rainbow Bright tattoo, "but it was taken.”

Popular in the 1970s, roller derby has seen a revival in the last decade.

"I think it was something that was sort of sleeping underground,” said Mikeli-Jones about the revival of the sport.

She said it is appealing because it contains elements of punk and third-wave feminism.

"It's just a nice contact sport, so you can get some aggression out and you can also get in shape,” she added.

A roller derby game consists of two teams with five women on each team. When the women skate together as a team, they are called a pack and each individual in the pack has a role.

The pivot is in front and she sets the speed at which the pack skates. At the end of the line of skaters is the jammer, the woman who scores points. After she has gone around the track once, every set of hips the jammer passes is one point for her team.

In between these two women are three blockers. Their job is stop the opposing jammer from passing members of their team. They also get the opponents out of the way so their jammer can pass.

The Yukon Roller Girls have not yet held a game, but they have been practising drills regularly, about twice a week. They are also planning on holding a game at the end of the summer.

Recently, the roller girls have moved from practising in parking lots to drop-in at the Canada Games Centre. Last week they had 13 women in full derby gear show up.

Next Tuesday they expect between 20 and 30 women to be rolling around the rink, once they receive their skates from RollerGirl.ca, a Vancouver-based company which sells derby gear.

The Yukon Roller Girls are mostly women in their early 30s who are trying it for the first time. Jones herself put on her first pair of roller skates only five weeks ago.

She started skating with organizer Sarah Gallagher, who was looking for women to skate with to prepare for derby tryouts down south.

"I'm always trying to be healthy, stay in shape, that kind of thing, but I'm not a jock,” said Gallagher. "When I started seeing this, it was everything that I love. A third-wave feminist component, the do-it-yourself ethos, strength and beauty associated with femininity.

"And I don't want to be thinner, I want to be stronger, and that's a first for me, and probably a lot of women.”

Although the game is strictly women only, there is room for men to participate, be it scorekeeping or coaching. The roller girls are also looking for a water boy.

"I love the idea that my husband can be a cheerleader,” said Mikeli-Jones. "It's a real role-reversal, you know. And that's a part of the empowering process.”

The Yukon Roller Girls have been recruiting women through word-of-mouth as well as their Facebook group Yukon Roller Girls. Those who are interested in joining should visit the social-networking site.