Latest Bout:
7/22/2023 Burning River: All Stars 209 vs Windy City: Third Coast 166
7/22/2023 Burning River: Haz-Mat Crew 99 vs South Bend 269
WFTDA International Rankings

Latest Bout:
7/22/2023 Burning River: All Stars 209 vs Windy City: Third Coast 166
7/22/2023 Burning River: Haz-Mat Crew 99 vs South Bend 269
WFTDA International Rankings

 

David Feck'em

Ref Name: David Feck’em
What do your fellow skaters call you?:
They call me everything, David (which is actually my father), Feck’em, Fecks.

Q: What prompted you to get into Derby? I first got into derby when my wife Mosh Spice started with the wRECk league. I started going as well and endured a good fall on my head the first two times. While in the ER getting my CAT scan after my second time, I determined I would go out and get my own gear. I don’t know if it was the head injury talking or not but I was bound and determined to make a referee of myself from that point on.

Q:Which ref position do you enjoy most? While I enjoy all the positions, inside pack is my favorite. That is where all the action is going on, and you get to stay with it the whole bout.

Q: First of all, congratulations on being voted the most fair ref of Season 4 by your league mates!  That’s quite an honor!  What did you think about that? It rocked, I don’t know what else to say except that I was quite suprised being a baby zebra and all at the time.

Q:Now you’ve been selected to ref the bouts at ECE and BrewHaha this year? Can you tell us more? Uh, I don’t know more yet, I signed up and they accepted me. I’m excited to go and hope I don’t get injured in the first bout. It will be a great experience to learn from some of the best refs in the country, and I hope to bring a lot back.

Q:Which BRRG bout are you looking forward to reffing the most? I look forward to them all, every bout, every scrimmage, it’s all a great time.

Q: I never envy the refs-having to make the calls in the heat of the moment. What has been the most challenging part of reffing so far? The most challenging part is trying to explain a rule in the middle of a scrimmage or a bout. I understand that skaters are running on adrenaline during a bout but so am I. As a result I can never find the right section of the rule book to explain it until I get home. It usually makes me feel like an idiot.

Q:You’re always one to follow up with a skater after a bout, to go over the calls. Would you say this is as much a learning experience for you as it is for the skater? Yes, everytime I have to go back through a rule it helps me to remember how it is broken down. Sometimes I got it right, sometimes I get it wrong. It happens…

David Feck’Em reffing HazMat against Bleeding Heartland

Q:Do you have a derby ref mentor? Oliver Pist — he is always one step ahead of things and someone I look up to for his ability to assess a situation. It’s almost like he has WFTDA May 26 programmed into his brain.

Q:What basic advice would you have for a newbie fan who is trying to understand the rules of derby? I would say read the rules, but they are pretty complicated to understand until you know the flow of the game. I always thought there should be WFTDA rules for fans that explained things easily, but that would be a lot of work and I’ve got a lot of skating to do.

Q:Do you have a favorite moment from Season 4? My favorite moment would have to have been getting to jammer ref in the finals, not necessarily because of the position but because of the confidence that others had in me by putting me in that spot for that bout.

Q:Tell our fans one fun fact about you: I’m a referee. The world is supposed to see me as cold and uncaring. Let’s not ruin it for everyone.