Living Life at 11

On the weekend I had the opportunity to attend the first home game of the Toronto Rush at Varsity Stadium. With a large crowd of 2293 it was the largest crowd at a Professional Ultimate game and amongst the largest at an Ultimate game in recent memory. I have had the opportunity to reflect upon the event as well as speak to many in the community from novice players to veterans.

Hello visitors! Ultimate Canada has announced that we’ll be streaming the 2013 Canadian High School Ultimate Championship finals on Sunday May 5th live. You can find the stream on live.iamultimate.com

In the Northern Hemisphere it’s tryout season! (I’m pretty sure you folks in the deep south are about to start your Fall and Winter training, why not come visit us up here and play a few tournaments?) I’m often asked questions about tryouts and how one should prepare for a tryout or tryouts. It’s important to understand how tryouts are run and what you can do to improve your chances.

But, if you’re intending to tryout for a team this spring: you’ve been trying out since you started playing Ultimate. I find it difficult to understand the decisions that players make in league play or during the regular season (I sometimes find my decisions difficult to understand as well). If you play with me then perhaps you now understand why I tend to question my decisions. Or if you encounter a conversation between myself and Geoff or Rahil or Greg Lang (happy birthday) or Elliot or Bryan or Alex (congrats on putting the ring on the correct finger) or really anybody that plays high level Ultimate you’ll understand why we constantly discuss game situations.

WCBU 2011 was great fun and quite a bit of work. The Blockstack.TV crew filmed and we broadcast some games from some interesting conditions. It was exciting! Those games have been a long time coming but I now have permission to release the videos and you’ll find them on YouTube in a convenient playlist. We learned from our experiences and you’ll notice that our latest videos are much better quality (HD).

It’s 2013, time has flown, and much has happened in the world of Ultimate to write about. I suspect it’s time to return and start writing things again. I’m going to go a different route though. There’s plenty of coverage of events out there and I’m more interested in writing what I’m thinking and being less diplomatic. Expect updates and new posts here over the next few days.