London Raiders make a colourful start at Montreal OutGames
The fast-growing London Raiders club has taken five teams to the 1st OutGames in Montreal, one of two huge multi-sport competitions for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) athletes taking place in North America this summer.
The Raiders, which started as a highly recreational Sunday afternoon softball game in the mid 1990s, now have three teams playing in the Greater London Mixed League following a recruitment drive centred on this week's OutGames. The Raiders have two womens teams, two mixed teams and one mens team playing in the tournament which boasts over 12,000 participants across all sports.
The OutGames got going with a specular opening ceremony in Montreal's Olympic Stadium on Saturday night in front of a paying audience of 28,000 who came to see the typically colourful parade of athletes into the stadium, followed by appearances by K D Lang and Martina Navratilova.
The speeches were mercifully short for the athletes (who unusually had to stand in the arena for the whole ceremony) and, following welcoming addresses from the Mayor of Montreal and other political dignatories, ended with a double-act formed of gay icon and 9-times Wimbledon singles champion Navratilova and olympic gold medalist Mark Tewksbury. Tewksbury, co-president of the OutGames organising committeee, struggled with his French but made up for this shortcoming with his obvious joy at seeing five years of planning finally turn into a vibrant, loud and and very real event.
All five Raiders teams were in action on Sunday in their London Underground themed uniforms, each team named for one of the tube lines and wearing appropriately coloured jerseys. Only the womens Central Line team, led by Sue Thomson and featuring retired GB infielder Clare Butler, was able to open the tournament with a win. The red team went on to end the first of two round-robins with a 3-1 record, losing only to the Les Rafales from Montreal who conceded only two runs in their first four games. The other womens team, wearing black trim as the Northern Line, ended the first half of the group stage with four losses, but with undimmed enthusiasm.
Both mixed teams are playing in the open (ie men's) comp/rec competition after too few mixed teams entered the Games to support a separate mixed division. Perhaps not surprisingly then, both teams ended the first day without scoring a run, but came out at 8.30 am on Monday morning to face each other. Preparations for the game were extensive, though unconventional, as both teams took the field in drag - there can have been few other softball games in which an umpire has had to remove a stray bunny-tail from the first base line in between plays. The Picadilly Line team struggled with pitching in the first inning and were never able to work up enough momentum to overcome this deficit, allowing the Jubilee Line team to pick up their first win. With one game each left to play in the group stages, each team still has a chance to progress to the rec semi-finals.
The Raiders mens team, playing as the District Line, carry a 3-1 record into Wednesday with a good chance of beating Paris in their final group game to take 5th place in the other open pool. After completion of the group stage, the open tournament will split into an 8-team competitive elimination, with the bottom three in each pool playing off for the recreational medals. With the strongest teams promoted to comp, all three Raiders teams will go into the play-off with high-hopes of a top-three placing.