Little Things From Camp Thunder

There are a couple of ultimate-related tidbits I'd like to share with you from this weekend.

Playing with the Dingoes was the most helpful experience I've had in Ultimate. My team had Matt, and Kenny from Fakulti, Denya? (don't know who he is), Tatts from Newcastle and Tim Booth from the Gong. Here are some things I learned:

• On the mark, your hips should be perpendicular to their hips. This makes break throws much harder to accomplish than what I see as the 'standard' marking position where folks tend to edge around more to the front/45 degree angle. Also, this just in from having to mark a Dingo handler: stay balanced on the mark. For shorter folks like me, keeping balance involves moving about on the mark entirely on your toes and not lunging with your arms and upper body, as this will put you off balance. The taller you get (as you get bigger/longer than the person you are marking) the more lunging you are allowed to do, as it becomes increasingly unlikely that they will be able to pivot around your body.
• The benefits of having a communicative team on defence have been expounded forever, but sometimes as a defensive player in a man on man situation, your best friend is the offensive team. Despite my best efforts on D, the Dingo I was marking was getting open (hell, I'm just happy I stopped any of his cuts) but his team weren't clearing out so his 10-15m open cut didn't get rewarded at all. Conversely, if you are on offence, you don't want this happening to you. Take a second or two before cutting to look and see where players are on the field and where they are cutting. And, importantly, look at who is cutting - a tall receiver sprinting long is probably doing just that, whereas a shorter handler type sprinting long is more likely to be cutting out and then in.
• Be wary of the up-the-line dump cut. While it is possibly one of the easiest and best ways to get into a power position, it also cuts off any other upfield opportunity and eliminates the possibility of the conventional backwards 'safe' dump. Although in a situation where the dump has cut up the line and the defence has stuck with him, a quick 180 by the offence for the safe backwards dump is a good option, too.
• Pommy: the points in the wall don't want to be cutting off the dump option - leave that to the defender on the mark - but instead they want to be cutting off the swing. As I saw it and as I played it, 'cutting off the swing' as an off-point in a sideline trap generally meant a poaching style of play quite distant from the rest of the wall, very nearly a man defence situation. 9/10 times, poaching in this manner (sticking in between the disc and the swing) stopped that throw, and handicapped the offence something fierce. There's a very easy way to get around this though, and I was annoyed when nobody on offence adjusted: when the off-point is repositioned thus, the wall is no longer as effective at containing. Crashes are far easier, and there are even (for a skilled handler) several throwing lanes that normally would be stopped by an off-point in a tight wall with no gaps suddenly made available.
• All weekend I was being consistently chumped on by taller, fitter and faster 14-16 year olds. The '10 juniors team is going to be very, very strong indeed.
  

T.

Those masters...

Just stumbled upon this:
http://www.revolutionhealth.com/healthy-living/mens-health/gym/stay-fit/exercise-aging?msc=A62902

get fit and stay fit!
depressing though, I wont always be this young and energetic :(

Camp Memories ...

Camp memories, before I forget them.

I wanted to try and mark handlers on d a bit more since I seem to know where they go a little bit more (plus they usually run less)

I was marked up against buttons probably about 20m outside of the endzone around the middle, force backhand.

No clean cuts are coming in, and I'm thinking dont get broken by buttons, dont get broken by buttons, as hard as it is to do, he breaks all day long.

Its about stall seven, when I feel this brush against my neck touching my hair coming over my right shoulder, his right hand forehand side. its too low for a hammer so I think what the hell was that.

Blade, back right corner, straight past my head over my shoulder high release.

I mean damn, thats creative handling.

Also, the 1km run and then throws was probably the second worst feeling ive ever had from fitness training. sore and wanted to throw up then had to throw test!

An Injury

beneath the Southern Cross I stand
a sprig of wattle in my hand
a native of my native land
Australia, you fucking beauty

I want to write about this weekend but whatever I write it comes out as sentimental rubbish and not some sort of half-baked instructional blogging like mine usually is. So, suffice to say, this weekend was great and today during a pommy drill (not even a game, a drill!) I was playing on-point and laid out for a pass to a crashing popper instead of just running straight in: end result I crashed into Phil (I got the D, it was most likely a foul but he didn't call it because of what happened next) and just got so winded and it was extremely painful to breathe. My ribs are okay, they're not cracked or anything, I think I just bruised my lung (if that's even possible) because breathing was the only hard thing. I had to sit the rest of the day out. Going past my resting breathing rate was v. painful.

I'll try to write something good later.

T.

The National Junior Selection CAMP!

What can I say,

That was an amazing weekend, played with the best juniors in Australia, had some excellent coaching, got to play for NSW against the rest of Australia and even had a chance to learn from the Dingoes and play with them during one of our training sessions. I got beat down by some 16 year olds, ultimate is only getting stronger and in 2 years time itll be even harder to get into the team.

The highlight of the weekend was probably the games with the Dingoes I learned so much and it was awesome playing with these people that I see as my own sporting heroes and people whose play I aspire to, it was absolutely awesome to get to play with these guys.

it was also fun having a non stop deep hucking threat.

I got to play with abra, john liddicoat (i think) oshep, and big steve from wollongong, as well as my own junior team mates. It was awesome learning from these guys and watching how they play, though the funny thing is I noticed that they are easier to mark than the juniors, they will get more open and they will burn me harder, but they are a lot more predictable to mark since they always make plays that make sense for the biggest gains, which Juniors dont do, they sort of just run around randomly, not reading the field or anything like that. The dingoes on the other hand read the field and cut to where its going to help and be the biggest threat, so as a defender if they can notice this, its easier to know where to go.

But that said, they're still Dingoes and becuase of that can do whatever they want against us.

Abra is probably the most energetic player I've seen, his ability to play with such fire and energy is amazing, he was also a good teacher showing me what to do, and keeping us fired up and ready to play some D. Oshep had a croquet for cutting people, but also is probably the best communicater I've ever had a chance to see in action, his words are invaluable to the people on his team. Steve was probably the friendliest and most enthusiastic to play with, having someone like him with a big forehand and was such a strong team player. He also helped me score some brownie points for the selectors, by passing a perfect dump throw to me off a turn for a power play set up, unfortunately I screwed up the backhand, which sadly was the only backhand i've bladed since pre-ultimate throwing.

Ken shephard also helped me have a throwing revolution, he called me over and asked me to throw a back hand. he pointed out that for some reason I always seem to double cock my backhands (rather than one cock then release) whenever I throw my backhands, which slows me down a lot. The funniest thing was how much it affected me, i struggled to make a 10m right hand backhand without the double cocking, and I had to think about it so much more to get it out, I guess its true that to unlearn is harder than learning.

The weekend was stricken with injuries and injured people, I think that we managed to reach our quota of knocking at least one person out for the weekend per game.

first game sal went out, I got some fat welt on my knee and there were a few other crashes and bangs.

Brock, and will larkin were out for the weekend, josh's shin splints became too much, max's knee hospitalised one of the dingoes.

robbie also skied tim booth, that was pretty cool. For the few people that were left playing in the last game just about every person was nursing some sort of injury, from shin splints, to ankle problems, shoulder problems and knee problems, phil had ruined fingers so couldnt play with his right hand (he was still a weapon) and tarrant was sick for the weekend.

dale got hit in the neck with a disc and was hospitalised. we all went and visited him at RNS hospital, it was good to see him and hear that he's ok.

Amazing fun weekend, I probably learned the most during the dingoes game, probably had the most fun in the NSW vs game.

I had a few moments, but not as many as I would have liked. Unfortunately with a few exceptions of some bad throwing choices, I played about as good as I can at this level of skill and fitness. So the good thing is if I don't get into thunder, which I feel unfortunately is quite a possibility (a 50 50 possiblility) I won't feel like I could have done better, I know that every person who gets in, deserves to be there.

Friskee had a good weekend, I think that Max, Tiger, Sal and Josh will get in!

So if I don't get into Thunder, at least there will still be Nationals to look forwards to!

A Plea

Dear Players of Ultimate,

If you have been fouled, picked or you notice a violation (travel, straddle, disc space, double team) please call it.

Don't be intimidated. If you don't call it, in all likelihood the offenders will continue to bend the rules. This sport is self-officiated, nobody is going (or allowed) to call it for you.

Most importantly: if you are contesting a call, please do not take eight minutes to explain your reasoning. That is what the sideline (and beers at the bar) are for. Simply state you are contesting the call, and send the disc back to the thrower.

T.

A Sad Reality

Two things have made me sad this week.

Firstly the loss of my disc, turning up to Fakulti training hoping that someone had picked it up to return it to me. Turns out some prick picked it up to keep it and not return it. Hopefully I can get a return of my disc like Brett, when we played Gong they made the mistake of using his disc for the game disc (which he lost at Share the Love) and so he was able to get his disc back.

Hopefully this can happen to me as well.

The second thing that upset me was I hurt my ankle at Fak training on Monday, I missed Kais ever important sessions of over and under running and was not able to make the Wednesday fitness sessions. I dont think anyone has ever made me work so hard or producively for my fitness.

Boo.

Juniors training camp is coming soon and I'm hinking of changing up my fitness a little bit from Jimmy's exact program, I will follow the cardio runs, but after reading
this http://functionalpathtraining.blogspot.com/2008/03/more-on-aerobic-base.html

I think I will compact my runs into a fartlek session on a soccer field and just keep that heart rate up the whole time using sprints and jogs rather than one long continuous jog. To try and
create a little more game fitness.

The reigonals party was fun, I'm going to try gatorbombs (Jimmy's suggestion for a drinking alternative when everyone is doing jager bombs) 3/4 of a glass of gatorade and drop a shot of red bull into it. I hope it tastes good. And surely the sugar and caffeine can keep me going for hours. Hell I think an even better idea would be to live off these while at the juniors camp.

Orange Eastern Regionals

I think I must be suffering PTD, I've also been finding it hard to study and think about anything that isn't Frisbee which is the only think I've thought about for the past weekend.

Phil, Max, Tiger and I drove down on the Friday arvo, had a brief stop in Katoomba stopped drivers and went all the way to Orange.

I think it was a pretty amazing weekend and its great to see Fakulbee come so far as both individual players and more importantly as a team. I remember the first game we played together at Share the Love we still didn't know eachothers names, people were calling me Mark and Mark Semfel and not meaning it as a joke (except Elsey he still does it).

First day was easy 3 days with long breaks between each one, Taipans, Fakulti and Hills. I probably enjoyed the Fakulti game the most out of all of them even though we got schooled hard. Something like 15-3 with a cool down with Kai who bought everyone Ice Cream. Was a pretty good day but things got a lot more serious on the second day. The cool down was fun when Kai pulled up Tex to show a stretch Julian called out "Make him cry!"

Taipans we played well for about 2 points until they pulled out a pommy and zowned us. I was pretty happy with my defense and cutting this game, doing a pretty good job of it. Feeling a lot lighter and fitter than the last tournament I played. Hills was an average game, I dont think we played so well and it was more their drops than our fantastic defense that won us the game.

Ali B also brought out his new cheer for us, probably the most firey cheer I've ever seen. The whole team is screaming, also came up with a stupid one with Tiger/Max and Phil where each person calls out a letter in the alphabet until we get to S (The 19th person which fit perfectly with our huge roster) and the whole team called out FakulTEE.

The second day I also discovered strapping tape for blisters, I've never used the stuff before and its amazing! So much less pain than possible before!

This day was full of fire, hucks high moods and low spirits.

Our first game of the day was against Newcastle I-beam after we all warmed up got our seven on the field and the first pull of the day started after 3 throws Newcastle calls a timeout and goes "I need to get my shoes on!" and they all got their cleats on and did some warm up. Probably the second funniest time out called I've seen during Frisbee.

I saw some amazing plays happening today as Ali B fired up the whole team with his cheers

Who wants to win this guys? Lets do it Fakulti ...
FakulWHAT? FakULTI
FakuliWHAT? FakULTI

As he started running around in our circle as the team starts yelling and cheering. I don't think I have ever been this fired up for a game in my entire life in any of the sports I've played. The intensity was amazing the it really showed with Lu-wee scoring some huge D's and scores, Yoann showing me a game I've never known he could play, Wes Dowley and Phil holding the team together and some amazing efforts from everyone on the team, huge lays and perfect throws, our drop rate was so much lower than the previous day and everyone played amazingly.

FakulBLOCK FakulD
FakulBREAK FakulFREE
FakulSCORE FakulSI

We started the game with this cheer as Brendon came and dropped a Fakulti shirt in the middle "This is what we are playing for guys," we all realised how much we needed this game, we wanted to get to Nationals.

Our game against the gong was crazy, we took the half at 8-5 with Fakulbee showing a hucking game that I've never seen before, and it worked extremely well, the whole team played the hardest D I've ever seen and the whole team had an energy we'd never seen before as we battled for the last qualifying spot to Nationals. Unfortunately Wollongong replied in kind and took the game 13-10 or so at the time cap. We weren't able to shut down the combination of Tim Booth, The Crusher and Joe the tall friendly guy with a shaven head and a huge forehand huck. Brendan played some amazing d and he is so great on the mark in our zones.

This was probably the most painful loss I've had in Frisbee for a long time and the whole team's energy was down after this one, the only hope being a wildcard entry if we won our 7/8th play off. We finally had lunch at 3pm after 3 games. I think Tim Booth at the end of this game also gave one of the best Frisbee speeches I've heard in a circle that somehow managed to dodge the cliches and hit a spot with most of the players in the circle.

The game against Manly started out slow, our whole team energy was down after the loss against the gong, the first few points went by slowly, Manly were playing a great game wanting it more than us and you could see it in their play.

FakulWHO? FakulBEE
FakulWHAT? FakulTI
FakulWHAT? FakulTI

The sidelines began roaring the players began screaming, The whole of Fak A came out to support us on the sidelines as we fired up and finally equalised with Manly after the half. The last few points of the game were a blur with harder D and offense from both teams than I can ever remember, Manly surprised me with how hard all of their players played and Fakulti showed me again what we could do and why we wanted to go to Nationals. The last point I played I can't remember feeling that good getting a score, a short cut into the front openside, as my man run to the post, a circle of death cut to the back corner and Brendon floated the disc into my hands, I have never felt that good scoring in Frisbee in my entire life it was an amazing experience to have this chance.

The whole sideline was fired up as Julian was told over and over again to get off the field with his cheers and enthusiasm, I think he is probably one of the most motivated players I've ever seen, it is clear how much he wants to play with Fakulti and how much he wants to win and get that disc. Ken pointed out he has probably the fastest closing speed of anyone on Fakulti and is a great player becuase he wants it so much.

The last point was crazy, time cap went and Wes and Neil had a chat, game to 12. 10-9 To Fakulti. The last point I don't think I've seen Manly ever play D that tight, scoring a well deserved turn over, but we got the disc back and after a bit of dump swinging, I think dowley threw to wes for the score but it went too high, Mark in an ironic fashion managed the pull the disc down over 3 Manly players to take the win for us.

We had our showers, said good byes, went to the presentation and we won Spirit! Which was a bottle of Jager and shot glasses, its a shame none of the juniors can drink.

I lamented the loss of my blue gaia disc (someone nice picked it up to return it to me or someone stole it) and we made our drive home.

Best frisbee weekend ever.

Orange Regionals

What time is it?
Sender: Tiger
+61.......
Sent:
16-Mar-2008
22:48:26

Regionals was amazing. I want to write something now but I'm too sleepy, so a full one is coming tomorrow.

Alex.

Aims for Regionals

I am going to buy an Eastern Regionals disc from Bozza.

And write:

Tiger Webb

Fakulti

T.

Somethign to look forward to...

When I get to regionals, I'm going to go and buy a disc off Bozza and then on the disc I'm going to write:

Alex Semfel
Fakulti

Fak yeah.

Another learning encounter

Last night (Wednesday night) we had the Sydney boys Worlds squad run.

It was a learning experience for me, also very painful.

1. 1km is longer on an athletics track than when marked out down in Melbourne by cones.
2. Never eat after an over full meal. I learnt this one by feeling sick when I arrived, and wanting to throw up during the warm up. I know I am unfit, but not that unfit.
3. Eating meat and dairy for 2 days will not make you feel better when you go for a run. I started eating for regionals following a plan of Monday/tuesday - meat wednesday carbo/vitamins, thurs friday carbo POWER LOADING.
4. Just becuase I've improved a lot doesn't mean my relative position to everyone else (the last one) is any better. (I still came last by a lot)
5. The NSW team is very fit.
   

I was happy with my performance and I enjoyed the sprints.

I was a bit disappointed with my own performance, and I think I made it a lot harder on myself than was neccessary due to the food i ate before hand.

I had a meal 30 mins before hand that made me sick during the warm up. I had eaten a lot of dairy and protein the past 2 days for regionals. I spoke to my athlete friend who informed me "Stay away from salts, protein and dairy, the dairy builds up mucus making it harder to breathe. ... I don't eat 2 hours before any training session and I watch what I eat the days before each session."

I guess they're things to focus on.

After the run I'm worrying more and more it will be my fitness that will not let me into the Australian Juniors Team...

I appreciate the consistency award I was given by members of the squad for shaving 12 seconds off my last time after going to the toilet.

This week I'm going to try and get some sprint training as well as the mental preparation of either getting into the team or not getting into it.

What's making the ground shudder beneath me?
THUNDER

Fire up the selection camp is on its way.

The Relative Merits Of...

...Having A Frisbee Partner!

Probably of much more import than how Australian Ultimate fares on the world stage or whether we move Nationals to October to accommodate for a much-needed 'second tier' of competition in this nation is the issue of whether or not to conduct romantic liaisons within our chosen sport.

The case for!

• They understand your obsession. Too many talks with a non-frisbee partner explaining who Tim Booth is and why getting a handblock on him is more important than your anniversaries begins to disturbingly mirror the conversations you have had with your parents in exactly the same line. Unless your name is Oedipus, this is a case for!
• Spending more time together. Tournaments - be they Nationals, Melbourne Hat or the Stampede - will require near-constant travelling and partying. Imagine if you did it all with the one you love.
• The next generation! You know, getting friends from work/uni to play hat league isn't the only way to increase the AFDA's membership numbers...
  

The case against!

• Time off. Heresy, I know, but at times the frisbee clique is exactly that - an annoying, superficial clique of cloisterly-likeminded people - and it's good to get away from that, to communicate with your partner so s/he can talk all about their group of superficial and annoying friends.
• They can support you. Team outfits are expensive, and frisbee players are irrefutably poor!

T.

Why Isn't There More Beach Ultimate?

This weekend was the 13th (roughly) annual Terrigal Towel.

I like beach ultimate. For me, the quasi-athletic (certainly youthful) player, it provides a great opportunity for everyone else to get tired quicker than I do. I don't know if it's the smaller field sizes, the reduced stall count forcing flow or the tendency for layouts, but I find beach ultimate to be easier (and more fun) to watch.

The great paradox of beach as I see it (once again please allow for limited experience on my part) is that its accessibility and fun factor stop it from ever being a serious parallel to field (perfect to play in Aussie ultimate's downtime of the general Christmas period aka our summer). I mean, Australia just won the beach world championships not two months ago. That's fairly impressive, but I was surprised on the weekend by the amount of people who didn't know that, or particularly care.

So, quasi-rant aside, here are some things I have taken from the weekend:

1. Beach ultimate is much more tiring than (and works different muscles to) field. Even at only the second day of a non-serious hat tourney, fatigue was a key factor in determining the victors of certain games.
2. Weather permitting, the long game is a much more efficient and effective way to score points than working the disc towards the endzone.
3. Smaller fields means everyone can throw long. Remember this if you are not respecting the deep cuts because the person with the disc is not a competent handler when it comes to field ultimate.
4. Break throws (high backhand, inside out flick) are some of your best friends. In field ultimate, a single broken mark will not necessarily mean the point is lost. On beach, I saw this being the case more and more often.
5. Cutting is much easier, because the sand and your foot cushion one another perfectly to create a sort of natural cleat which allows you to change direction with greater ease.
   

These five are by no means the 'key points', and there are plenty of other things I learned, but I wanted to blog about this while it was fresh in my mind.

Terrigal was a great experience and I'll recommend it to anyone who asks (and probably a fair few who don't).

T.