(WHAS11) - A growing number of people in Louisville are re-discovering the roller derby, a sport from the past that has rolled into high gear. And Louisville’s team is the Derby City Roller Girls.

We spent one Saturday night watching crowds show up early for tickets, vote for the best roller girl name, and wait in line for autographs.

And the women on the skates translate the aggressiveness into full time jobs elsewhere.

They are hell on wheels.

And they will tell you that themselves.

Shannon Becca said, “It’s a full on sport. We may wear make up and skirts, but I tell you, its pretty sporty when you’re out there sweating for two hours.”

The Derby City Roller Girls, Louisville’s team since 2005, wear red.

They have names like “skate ninja” and “Smoke-a-hontas” .

Their slogan is hot chicks on hard wood.

Aged 21-45, it’s a team that may not have a winning record, but its one that has captured growing numbers of crowds in Louisville. The fans love it.

One fan said, “I want to see them throw each other off the floor and more catfights.”

Another fan said, “It’s pretty cool to see somebody go flying out of the ring.”

And fly out of the ring they go.

Who are these women that throw themselves at fast speeds into body blocks and hard crashes?

There’s Teresa Pasquini, a jammer. She comes up on the side of Nashville’s Buckhead Betty.  Another Nashville player appears out of nowhere.  Suddenly, it’s a sandwich move behind Buckhead Betty, a chop to Teresa, who goes down on her knee hard, but then is back up again.

Teresa’s skate name is “Little Bo Teeps”.

Pasquini said, “You get knocked down, you gotta get back up, that’s my number one thing when I’m having a bad day.”

When she’s off the skates, Teresa is a health care liaison for Kindred Healthcare.

She’s a favorite in the hallways at Clark Memorial hospital.

With full headdress, there’s Stephanie Lynch, aka “Smoke-a-hontas”

“Smoke-a-hontas” is a JCPS employee who helps students with disabilities transfer to adulthood.

And she’s a full time mom.

Lynch said, “I have been doing this about a year and a half and I say “Smoke-a-hontas”is getting old, my ankles are hurting, my knees sometimes hurt.”

Her husband, Matt, along with Wesley and Bern-nerd come to the bouts.

And as she’s fending off “Skinnie Minnie” from the Nashville team, you’d never know that Jane Ostentatious or Kellee Ross, is this quiet.

Each player pays fees up to six hundred dollars to play, buys their own equipment, and provides their own insurance. No one is paid. It’s a break -even operation, pardon the pun.

Sidelined in a wheelchair after a tough practice, the owner of the team, who has driven sponsors and the crowds, is bad penny or Jenny Ahlrich.

The last bout for this season was October 4^th.

The Derby City Roller Girls return in March for more action in the west wing of Freedom Hall.