ultimate

On the road to Nationals

Blog Yeah, kitt finished writing this at 17:09 on 27 October 2004

Today was a travel day for the trip to Florida to participate in the UPA Club Nationals. Participation here is defined as help with the scores, and update the website. Not quite the participation I would have liked, but, well, it'll be a good start.

Rather than have poor Kris get up at obnoxious-early-o-clock to take me to SFO to fly to Tampa, I stayed with Greg Wolff and his girlfriend Sunita (the amazing, beautiful, intelligent, compassionate, worldly, every-woman-would-love-to-be-her Sunita). They also had a 6:30 am flight, but because they were significantly closer to the airport, and going there anyway, I went with them. It worked out well. We all flew out of SFO, they on United, I on American with Elizabeth Murray (also of SFUL fame).

Cece, who is on Red Fish, Blue Fish with Greg and Sunita, was also on the flights Elizabeth and I were on. Cece cracks me up. I like her a lot. Elizabeth and I spent time waiting at various points with Cece. She's good company.

We arrived pretty much without incident. Waited at various points for flights and other persons driving cars. At the airport, I ran into Wade and Tyler (Kaos), Dea (Fury, and hence Heidi Binder, who remembered me from El Norte, and Sam, who is engaged to Mike Payne (Jam), who I worked with on the UPA site for voting and mail blast). I also met Erik, Vic and Jeff, who are a few of the players who will be observing at the tournament.

At the hotel, I ran into Kelly Johnson (of all people!). Her team missed Nationals by 2 points. She's here to cheer on Mark, as near as I can tell. Ran into Patrick Hard, who introduced me to Nate (who I've heard about on Brass Monkey, but apparently had confused with someone else). Also met up with Will, Sandy and Michael from the UPA (but of course!). I'll be rooming with Scobel Wiggins who takes some of the most amazing ultimate photography. I'm looking forward to meeting her.

Back in the saddle again.

Blog Written with a loving hand by kitt some time around 16:54 on 22 October 2004

Funny how life works out sometimes.

Last year, I stepped down from running SBUL, the South Bay Ultimate League, in order to start MPUL. I had hoped for (and thankfully received) higher level play with MPUL. Similar to the way SFUC is the higher level, experienced league of the City, and SFUL is the beginner friendly, less agro league, I wanted MPUL to be higher level play to SBUL's beginner friendly atmosphere.

And it was spectacularly.

Tragically, I didn't get fields for this year, and MPUL may take a hiatus for the season. If I do get fields, the motto of the season will be, "No shirts, no disc, lots of service.".

But I digress.

SBUL was supposed to be run by Troy Wu this year. For some reason, it didn't happen. Instead of fields on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday as in past years, Troy requested (and I didn't notice on the application, so I, too am at fault here) Monday, Wednesday and Friday, which SBUL received. Ooops.

And then he disappeared.

As near as I can tell, he talked to Lou. He talked to Mike Kenny. He talked a lot to Nell. But then he just disappeared. When push came to shove, the league didn't get started and Nell called Bharat in a panic asking for help. Bharat called me and dumped the task on me. So, here I am, back getting SBUL going again. Not where I wanted to be. Not at all. Lost a day dealing with SBUL last night and all of today.

I went down to San Jose Parks and Recreation, Fields Reservations today to pay for the fields. They are twice as expensive as last year, due to budget cuts and a city/state mandate for all programs to fully pay for themselves. Hal Spangenberg is pretty cool. Especially for someone that I'm sure gets a lot of crap dumped on him everyday.

So, SBUL will happen this year at least. That's one league. Now to get the other one going.

Back to the real world

Blog kitt decided around 14:51 on 12 October 2004 to publish this:

Regionals are over, it's time to head back to the real world. It's been an interesting season with Mischief. We went from barely staying together as a team to 5th at Regionals (up from a seeding of 9th), thanks largely to the Smith Brothers: Mark, Kyle and Kevin. Which is not to say the rest of the team wasn't instrumental, just that they are our stars.

I played a lot in the tournament. I pretty much played as much as I could. If I stood up and looked at Andy when he was calling players on the line, he called me in. It's an interesting position to be in: at the top of the roster. I'll admit to being at the bottom for so long, that it feels uncomfortable to be one of the players that always goes in. On the other hand, it's why I took the classes at ASA.

I left regionals sore, but not tired. It's been a LONG, long time since I've been sore at the end of a tournament. It just doesn't happen any longer because of the amount of ultimate I play. However, taking about a month off, then playing hard at Regionals, well, made me sore.

My highlight reel from Regionals:

Kris going up for the huck and skying the guy 6" taller than he.
Stopping CTR's Chuckles in an iso play, where it was she against me, and Mark intercepted the throw to her (with Rick's voice in my ears the whole time, encouraging me to stick with her).
Kevin's handblock next to the sideline
Kyle's many layout grabs

There are more. I'm sure I'll think of them.

What I need to do now is research toenail removal surgery. I keep jamming my big toe toenails and having them fall off. Better to just get rid of them then continue this cycle, I think.

Special K sprint workout

Update: changes made for the SCU women's team, with more explanations.

Derived from an article I read about the US National Women's Soccer team, the Special K workout builds sprinting stamina. It was modified by Kris for Special K, which is no longer a team. The season this was written for was a shortened season, with coed playing in July and open/women playing in fall. As of this moment, it was the last year a player could play in more than one division in a season.

For reference, a stinker is:

Sprint 50 yards out and back 3 times in a row for a total of
300 yards.  If you are feeling really ambitious, do this in
under 1 minute.  Rest one and a half minutes afterwards.

A stinkette is:

Sprint 25 yards out and back 6 times in a row for a total of 300
yards.  If you are feeling really ambitious, do this in under
1 minute 5 seconds.  Rest one and a half minutes afterwards.

And a suicide is:

Run 5 yards out and back then increase to running 10, 15,
20, and 25 yards out and back.  Rest 25 seconds afterwards.

That said, the workout is:

Ultimate Workouts  4/3/00 - 7/6/00

4/3/00 Monday
   7x20, 5x40, 3x50, 3x90

4/6/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 2 stinkettes, 3 suicides


4/10/00 Monday
   7x20, 5x40, 3x50, 3x90

4/13/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 2 stinkettes, 3 suicides


4/17/00 Monday
   7x20, 5x40, 4x50, 4x90

4/20/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 2 stinkettes, 4 suicides


4/24/00 Monday
   8x20, 6x40, 4x50, 4x90

4/27/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 2 stinkettes, 4 suicides


5/1/00 Monday
   8x20, 6x40, 4x50, 4x90

5/4/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 2 stinkettes, 4 suicides


5/8/00 Monday
   8x20, 6x40, 4x50, 4x90

5/11/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 3 stinkettes, 5 suicides


5/15/00 Monday
   9x20, 7x40, 5x50, 5x90

5/18/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 3 stinkettes, 5 suicides


5/22/00 Monday
   9x20, 7x40, 5x50, 5x90

5/25/00 Thursday
   1 stinker, 3 stinkettes, 5 suicides


5/29/00 Monday
   10x20, 8x40, 5x50, 5x90

6/1/00 Thursday
   1.5 stinkers, 3 stinkettes, 5 suicides


6/5/00 Monday
   10x20, 8x40, 6x50, 6x90

6/8/00 Thursday
   1.5 stinkers, 3 stinkettes, 5 suicides


6/12/00 Monday
   12x20, 8x40, 6x50, 6x90

6/15/00 Thursday
   1.5 stinkers, 3 stinkettes, 6 suicides


6/19/00 Monday
   14x20, 9x40, 7x50, 7x90

6/22/00 Thursday
   2 stinkers, 4 stinkettes, 6 suicides


6/26/00 Monday
   14x20, 9x40, 7x50, 7x90

6/29/00 Thursday
   2 stinkers, 4 stinkettes, 7 suicides


7/3/00 Monday
   16x20, 10x40, 8x50, 8x90

7/6/00 Thursday
   2 stinkers, 4 stinkettes, 7 suicides

I believe it is worth noting that although we do these various "workouts" on different days, the US National World Soccer team did both the weekly workouts on the same day. They are some amazing athletes, those women.

Read more about Special K sprint workout

Fish women and Heroine scrimmage

Blog kitt decided around 21:11 on 8 May 2004 to publish this:

The RFBF women joined with friends and scrimmaged Heroine this morning. I joined the Fish women, making 8 women: Kate Bergeron, Merritt, Sunita, Rebecca (and Guinness!), Ashley, Su Wu, Brynne and me.

Kate and I carpooled together. We arrived at 9:20 or so as the first two Fish women. Eventually, the other six women arrived, and we started playing at 9:50 or so.

We played three games to 7. We won all the games: 7-3, 7-5, and 3-0. I would like to say we won because Heroine was working on a new offense, and wasn't very strong offensively. However, saying that would lessen the great playing, hot defense and strong offense we had today. We did well, with fewer subs no less.

Kris has told me in the past that I'm a stronger defensive player than I am an offensive player. Given that I dropped three catches, threw away two throws, and had over a half dozen blocks today, I think I have to agree with him. Pretty much the only time my woman caught the disc was when I gave up and didn't cover her.

Kate is really great at encouraging other players. As a deep-deep, she was able to direct me as short-deep very well. When I was running down a disc, or going for a D, she was very encouraging. I like having her voice as my positive mental chatter.

The only downside was that, tragically, the Neutrogena sunblock stick I used didn't do the job. I have a nice tan now on my face. Damn it.

UPA Score Reporting

Blog Instead of being asleep at 21:14 on 6 April 2004, kitt created this:

Working on the UPA score reporting tool lately. In particular, the input of data from a small device (think cell phone or wireless PDA). Kris and I have been doing the process together. I've been filling in functionality with mock functions that return static data, while Kris comes in later and fills in the real functionality.