The Next Generation and an Essential Steppingstone!

As we celebrate 10 years of ARK Ladies entering the DM tournaments, Coach Lucy uncovers the foundations of women’s rugby at the club. Here's the continuation of the exiting story!

I’m trying to think of the cheesiest headlines for these posts. I hope I’m succeeding!

As we are leading up to the 10-year celebrations, it is time for the next installment of the ARK Ladies’ history. Later than I had planned, but I finally got here. The Pioneers post highlighted the first women rugby players at ARK and the amazing efforts of the original Jyske Rugby Kvinder team, taking us up to around 2012. This next post talks about the next generation of players and the next generation of stubbornness. As mentioned in the first post, I (Coach Lucy) first joined ARK in 2013 so witnessed this next effort, which was essential for the first official ARK team to step onto the pitch in 2016. So let’s pick up where we left off…

Jyske Rugby Kvinder was still bringing women together across the region, proudly gracing pitches in their LOVELY Netto sponsored kits! But as rugby grew, Odder and Grenaa were growing their own women’s teams, while Aarhus still didn’t quite have the numbers to do the same. And here comes the next generation of stubbornness! Hanna Hermstad McCrae moved to Aarhus from Norway. Most of the players mentioned in the story so far were most likely recruited in a pub, but Hanna came ready. Involved with the Norwegian national team, she looked up ARK before moving because she wanted somewhere to continue playing. Just like the players of the early 2000s, she was welcomed to train with the men. Which I would say was a benefit to the men, having someone of such skill and fitness level to train with! Of course, training with the men and not having a women’s team wasn’t good enough though, so recruitment began!

Hanna convinced Anna Pacak-Vedel and Live Batangouna to give it a go, and the three of them started indoor training with ARK men in February 2012. The following months, Nanna Frikke, Sanne Knoll and Alexandra Redzkina joined them (there could have been more, but these are the ones I know of!). This was also the start of some dedicated women’s team training! Yes, the first archaeological findings of an ARK women’s training session. Hanna told me she remembers these indoor sessions as a mixture of joining in with the men’s team, but also running some sessions herself with the help from, the first dedicated ARK Ladies’ coach I can find evidence of, Rob Collie.

Hanna remembers this period mostly positively! The men’s team were, she tells me, incredibly welcoming. She and Anna went on tour with them to Germany where Hanna got some game time! Anna also got to play with the men’s Misfits team, a game that gave us one of my favourite photos of Anna…a photo of what seems to be Anna bossing around one of the men’s players. Very on brand for Anna! Unfortunately, though, there was some push back when asking for a women’s kit as the group was growing. What’s the best way to do this? Have a full, official team then buy a kit or buy a kit along with a growing, potential-official team? I can tell you what did happen, but that’s for a future post!

Tournament wise, ARK were still short on having a full team, so the solution was the same that kept women’s rugby going across the region: work together! Aarhus players joined up with Grenaa while recruitment continued. Hanna’s own playing story took an unfortunate turn sadly. She badly injured her ankle in Canada and couldn’t continue playing but remained very much part of the social aspect (I’m pretty sure I met Hanna in Anna’s student dorm while we pre-drank for a Christmas party, so can confirm this!).
The story now takes us to 2013, so I have to talk about myself a bit. Very sorry! I emailed ARK very keen to join and got a just as excited message back from Anna. I was asked straight away if I’d like to join her and Grenaa for a tournament at Speed. I absolutely loved the bright orange Grenaa shirts!! I even got to meet, although didn’t know it at the time, future ARK teammates. My first training sessions at ARK were with the men and Anna. I actually really enjoyed trying to keep up with them and replying “Hello!” to Chief as he screamed “højre” at me during touch rugby. I was all of a sudden too weak to join in though when, then coach, Quinton Greyling made everyone do his famous corner runs.

Anna is an ARK legend. She was already on the committee when I met her and eventually became chairwoman. Her love for the sport and the club is pretty inspiring and I really wanted to help in recruitment and getting a women’s team at ARK. I told her about “Taster sessions” my previous teams have done. Open sessions where anyone can join for free and we do the basic skills of rugby. So, leaflets were printed, Anna signed us up for international recruitment fairs, and the first taster session went ahead in early 2014! After this there were regular weekly trainings (my first go at coaching!), regular socials and a great team feeling! By May 2014, we had set up a Facebook event encouraging local players to come to ARK for a practice game. Around 9 girls representing ARK were joined by players from Odder and nearby for a few rounds of 7s. It happened! A women’s rugby game was played at ARK!!

In that game, 6 different countries were represented. Relying on international exchange students to build a team was great short-term, but definitely not long-term. Including myself, many players left, but trainings and recruitment continued, and the great collaboration between Odder and ARK continued for the tournaments. Anna continued to recruit, get players to tournaments with Odder and I returned in late 2015 to more women players, the term “ARK Ladies” being thrown about and that feeling that ARK is SO CLOSE to having their own team.

This period had ARK Ladies dedicated training, coaches and matches. What was achieved within this time, through grit and, yes, stubbornness, set up what would be an historic day in 2016. Anna was about to leave for a trip of a lifetime to Australia, but in true Anna style, left me with a big ARK folder of leaflets, details of signed up fairs, instructions on Rugby Denmark landscape and I promised she would return to a team and her hard work would not have been wasted. And as we are celebrating 10 years, you know we got there. Without Hanna, Anna and the women who joined them, this, as I have cheesy called it, essential steppingstone, wouldn’t have happened.

I look forward to sharing more about the last 10 years! The volunteers, the socials, the player achievements and everything great this amazing team has achieved. For now, we finish at the end of 2015, where we were finally ready to make the leap!

Rugby love xxx

15s Camp in Odense

What a weekend it was at Odense rugby club!!

On Saturday, the Denmark WXV coaches held an open training session for any women's player who wanted to come and try out some 15s rugby, and nearly 40 players did! The group included 9 ARK players who did amazing.

Then Sunday saw the first championship XV match of this year which had 5 ARK ladies signed up to take the pitch.

Unfortunately some knocks ruled a couple out, but Coach Lucy made up the numbers. Olivia played her first ever 15s game while Rikke and Stine returned to the second row!

ARK Ladies powering the 15s Team

May 30th, an incredible display of women's rugby was on show!

33 players from all over Denmark played in a 15s game against Devonport Services and against each other.

ARK had a strong showing with 7 players and coach. Lucy coached Danish Team 'A' alongside FRK's Tara, where ARK girls were joined up with players from Aalborg, CSR, CBS and Erritsø.

They went on to play some incredible rugby and win their games.

Women's rugby is strong in Denmark and it just keeps getting better and better 💚🖤🏉🇩🇰

The Pioneers of ARK Women's Team!

As we celebrate 10 years of ARK Ladies entering the DM tournaments, Coach Lucy uncovers the foundations of women’s rugby at the club. 

I first came to ARK in 2013 as an exchange student (promise this post isn’t about me. My blog post writing skills are at 0 but ones I have read like to set the scene). Just a couple of weeks after setting foot in Denmark, Anna Vedel, one of the club’s very few women players at the time, encouraged me to join her on a trip to Speed for a 7s tournament, playing with Grenaa rugby team. My first experience of women’s rugby in Denmark. Grenaa was a mix of students, mothers, women of all ages and of all backgrounds. I asked HOW did they end up playing rugby?! “A friend of a friend”, “my colleague encouraged me”, but the most popular story started with “I was sat in a pub and got talking to…”.

I’ve been witness to the growth of women’s rugby in Denmark within the past 13 years. Teams built on approaching women at pubs, relentless leafleting, posting on social media (graphic design has come a long way…just look at the examples in the photos!). And this is why I love women’s rugby. From grassroots to the national team, it’s a story of determination and absolute stubbornness! Individuals knowing how enriching being part of a rugby team is, individuals knowing their players’ full potential and the opportunities they deserve to experience. And this is where I start the story of women’s rugby at Aarhus, because it is a story of determination and absolute stubbornness!

The first women’s rugby world cup in 1991 was, did you know, an unsanctioned event. It was organised by a group of women, voluntarily, despite the IRB (now World Rugby) telling them they couldn’t do it. They stuck two fingers up at them and organised it anyway! The IRB would not recognise the 1994 tournament either but eventually did in 1998. It was in 1998 that ARK had their first female player (that I could find!), Gunvor Ryagaard Jørgensen. I can’t say the two events are linked, I just really like that world cup story. She played from 1998-2005 and was joined by Karina Clemmensen and Kelly Keenen Fjelstrup from the period 2000-2006. They played within the men’s team, the men’s 2nd team and even the U17 boys’ team. Any rugby they could possibly get. Fortunately we’ve come a long way since then as one of their memories was sharing the changing room with the men…they didn’t say this directly but I imagine it could have been a thing of nightmares! That probably sums up women’s rugby at that time though. Existing, but had to squeeze itself into spaces not designed for it…yet.

Heidi Sørensen joined ARK in 2007, she was for a long time the only adult women’s players. She played matches with the men’s 2nd team (pictured!), though always wanted something for women’s rugby. She said “I remember thinking that if women players were going to keep playing, then playing with the men was not an option, especially for the future of women’s rugby and the national teams. Girls needed to play with women players! For me it was just for fun and I liked playing but for rugby as a sport then there needed to be something just for the women.” Jyllands Posten wrote an article called “Heidi and the boys” (I’ll link it in the comments) about Heidi as the only woman on the team and her plea for women to join her! Along came Ellen Brandt. I first met Ellen at the 7s tournaments and have had the absolute honour to organise recruitment events and training games with her, and just generally have her as a friend. She has one of the biggest laughs I’ve ever witnessed, and if anyone was going to get a team going, it was the power personalities of Heidi and Ellen. With the help of others around the area, Jyske Rugby Kvinder (Jutland Women’s Rugby) was born!

Together with Stine Sigh from Odder and Elisabeth Kjeldsen from Sønderborg, Heidi and Ellen didn’t just create a team, JRK was a determined rugby project for women across Jutland. It was a combined side bringing together women from Aarhus, Odder, Hammel, Sønderborg, Grenaa and Erritsø. Most of the players trained separately at their local clubs, usually with the men’s teams (although the first Wednesday of every month there was a JRK training session!), then came together at weekends for the tournaments. No team coach, barely any resources, no proper women’s kit. Ellen told me how they would borrow whatever men’s jerseys their respective clubs weren’t using that weekend, or even borrow from other teams at the tournament, so they were never wearing the same kit! Later though came the “legendary sponsored Netto kit”, described perfectly by Ellen as “it wasn’t great, but it was ours”.

While this was happening, youth players from Aarhus and nearby were building the future generation of women’s rugby in the city. Maria Kjellerup, Anja Skaarup Gyldenløve, Helen Woldeselassie, Susan Lybech, Leonora Cluzeau, Stephanie Kjellerup, Michelle Kristensen, Maria Jensen and Ditte Overgaard made up a huge chunk of youth rugby in the area and stepped up to help JRK grow. Ellen told me that Leonora was only around 14 years old when playing, which meant her mother and a doctor needing to sign permission forms for her to play!

The story of JRK from roughly 2009-2013 is a story of commitment and community. And, not to sound too cheesy, but women’s rugby survival and growth have been thanks to these communities. These players travelled from different corners of Jutland to train, play and even take their admin duties seriously. Ellen very proudly showed me the AGM notes from 2011, location “McDonalds, Aarhus train station”. Despite having players, a sponsored kit, national team representation though, these pioneers still faced barriers and an official Aarhus Ladies team would still have to wait. The team never gave up though. JRK kept building connections across clubs, supporting new players and arranging shared trainings long enough for the foundations of ARK Ladies to emerge. Heidi said the “soul” of JRK was to give something for women’s players in the area. They did just that.

Eventually players moved cities and individual women’s teams emerged. The story of women’s rugby at Aarhus, as we know, definitely doesn’t end here though. But this story of borrowing men’s shirts and changing rooms, AGMs at McDonald’s, building teams from nothing and stubbornly refusing to let women’s rugby disappear, is the start.

The next post will be about the next group of ARK women, continuing joint initiatives across the area and again, a story of stubbornness. At this point women's rugby at ARK was still squeezing itself into a closed space, but it does get better. I really hope you enjoyed reading and please remember, when you pull on your team’s shirt, there is a whole lot of history behind it!

Rugby love xxx

10 Years of ARK Ladies

Time flies when you're having fun! We are in ARK Ladies' 10th season in the DM sevens series!! 💚🖤🏉
Can you believe it? This year marks the 10th year, ARK Ladies have been an 'official' team.

Here's a picture of the ARK team at their first tournament in Grenaa, April 2016. You'll notice current Aarhus Rugby Klub chairwoman Emma there!

That team was the start of something truly special in women's rugby at ARK. 

Our coach, Lucy Davies, shares the story of ARK women's team. Stay tuned for more!

Fun in the Sun

Saturday is a rugby day - And what a day!
ARK Park hosted the 4th leg of the DRU 7s Tournament. A day blessed with lots of sunshine, sassy tackles, and good rugby. A great thank you to everyone who showed up to support ARK Ladies as well as to enjoy a cold beer in the fantastic weather. 

During the tournament, ARK Ladies faced Rugbyklubben Speed, CSR/Nanok Rugby Club, and Aalborg Rugbyklub Lynet. 
Mixing great teamwork, hard tackles, and sassy tries, ARK Ladies ended in 5th place. 
Congratulations to our very own Linea Bendtsen who made Player of the Day and got to bring home our mascot, Bradley Coops.

The results of the day:
ARK vs Speed: 5-34
CSR vs ARK: 53-0
Aalborg vs ARK: 0-29

If you are in the Copenhagen area on September 28th, then come by Rugbyklubben Speed and support ARK Ladies for the 5th leg of the DRU 7s Tournament!

ARK Ladies on the News

Have you also spent the summer indoor pinned to the television watching the Olympics? Well of course you have!
I expect you to agree with me that the most important discipline was 7s rugby. Luckily, TV2 Østjylland thought so as well. On Monday August 19th, two of their reporters stopped by ARK Park to film and interview a few players from the women's team. 
Watch out for familiar faces next time you turn on the news.

Future Film Stars? 

Have you been to ARK Park lately? Then you might have spotted Pernille Fabricius Kovaltsenko snooping around looking for the best shot of our lovely ladies. She is currently making her final project about the women's team. 
Stay tuned for more exciting updates about her film!

Women's Tournament at ARK Park

Are you ready for it?
4th leg of the DRU 7s tournament will be held at our very own ARK Park in The City of Smiles. 
Come and support ARK Ladies as they face opponents from Aalborg, Odense, and Copenhagen. 
In return, we promise a day full of exciting matches, superb rugby, and of course lots of glitter. As usual, the bar will be open and stocked with beers, sodas, and if you are lucky, breezers ;) 

The tournament will be held on September 7th from 11 AM to 4 PM.
Find ARK Park at: Vårkjærvej 75, 8260 Viby J

Fall Season Starts August 6th

Best news this month!! 
The women's team starts the new season already on August 6th. The team's trainers, Louis and Lucy, have lots of new drills and fun exercises for the players.
Speaking of the players, they have waited all summer long to get back on the pitch to play some rugby. 

Are you interested in trying out rugby? Read more about our women's team here or come and join the first training on Tuesday, August 6th from 5.30 PM to 7 PM at Vårkjærvej 75, 8260 Viby J!