I attended my first tournament of the year. I wasn't playing and I wasn't really coaching. I was more of an assistant on the sideline (a role I've never really done). I went to the UK's University Regionals in Egham. I was helping out with the Disc Doctors from Imperial - a good group of girls and guys with a passion for Ultimate that is similar to what I've experienced in Canada and the US.
Pictured Above: Pyro, Chow, and Matt of Imperial DD1 force a throw. Taken from UK University Regionals this weekend (Photo from Michael Foster).The main thing I was interested in was comparing what I know of University teams in Canada and the US. I watched about 7 games total, four of which were the Disc Doctors (DD) 1st team, one game for the DD 2nd team and a game with the top ranked team in the region - Brunell. For a quick comparison, I think Brunell (the top ranked team) would finish in the top ten (8th-10th) at Canadian University Nationals, and 6th-8th at UPA Great Lakes sectionals in Michigan.
That's just my feeling. Here are some other opinions from the weekend:
- These guys are very spirited. They play spirit games after every game, interleaving the teams in a circle. I couldn't go to the party that night, but from the pictures it looks like the party was a blast too.
- There are very few calls made in a game in comparison to North American college and Open ultimate.
- The warmup drills are very different then in North America. A lot of Seattle drills.
- Games were short with hour slots and 45 min soft cap. Games were to 11 and only finished at 11 if one team got beaten badly by the other.
- Many open teams (even at the top level) included women and there were no women's teams or division.
PJ
5 comments:
Just for clarification, what do you mean by "Seattle drills" for warm-ups?
I think he means variations on this: http://www.ultimatehandbook.com/Webpages/Intermediate/drillendzone.html
Vertical stack in the endzone with a handler in front. Cut from the back of the stack to the endzone cone, catch, dump to the handler who ran over, they swing to new handler, who repeats. Pete?
In Seattle we call that the "end zone drill".
We can it the end zone drill in the UK as well :)
Also, FYI, there are womens and mixed outdoor (and indoor) competitions that are held separately from the open competitions.
I was always told that the endzone drill (as described) was called Seattle as they were the original one's to use it. Same with German and Berkeley cuts.
PJ
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