Long time no speak

Hello World. Its been a while like hasn't it? I've been meaning to blog for a very long time but never got round to it as usual. I've probably played at least 10 tournaments since my last blog - I feel like such an Ultimate whore and it feels so good!

Where to start? I guess I'll leave out all the Queens tournaments I played in because I plan to write a history of Queens Ultimate thus far (being the only person whose still playing for Queens since inception (had to get that in somewhere)).

I played CUBE (Caledonian Ultimate Beach Event) as a pick-up for Marco's team in April. This was my first beach tournament. I don't really know how I got myself into this, but then I don't really know how I got into Ultimate in the first place. My main memories are the fun boat journeys with Marco, terrible weather, partying hard in an Aberdeen club on the first night, not partying the second night at the Ceilidh (Scottish dance thing), playing loads of disc golf, meeting new people and winning my first tournament. I was the worst player in the best team, playing with players with years more experience than me but don't think I stuck out like a sore thumb too much.

May was a good month in that I was unanimously voted as Queens Captain for my final year at uni. I remember feeling pretty unsure about it and thinking I wasn't really ready for it. I suddenly realised the huge task Alan had taken on that year and was shit scared of failure - not just on the field, but at bringing in new freshers, and coaching. I felt like a small piece of Belfast Ultimate was now on my shoulders. The new committee of Linter the Captain, Ben the Treasurer and Poody the Secretary was born and the plans for the new next season got under way.

June which was a pretty shit month for me after breaking up with my girlfriend of 4 years, and less importantly the Summer League was shit.  I wanted to be at Tour so bad, it was a HUGE failing of BUG that we weren't at any tournaments overs May/June/July/August. I just hope we get next year sorted. Its pointless training for nothing, that's what it felt like. You need to have a tournament that isn't more than 6-8 weeks away in my opinion to train for to make it feel worthwhile. I didn't realise at the time how retarded this was but it was better than nothing I suppose.

The blog was going to end here but I just looked back at my Google Calendar there and saw I missed out the CHASE Getaway! We went camping for the weekend in Portstewart. The first night we went to the Atlantic Bar which had live music, it was pretty tame but the craic was mighty. The next day we went to the beach on one of the hottest days of the year and played some Ultimate - sooooo good. We went to the Anchor that night, followed by Shenanigans. My memories of that night are few and far between but I remember dancing on the stage with a crowd from a hen party and pouring Greamers bottle of Lemon Fanta over Windy for no reason. Kudos to John for buying cigars and then forcing me to drink more when we got back to the tents.I fucking love you boys!

The next few months got a hell of lot better, but I'll keep this to a blog and not an essay (Nuncle take note).

Hmmm this blog seems kind of shit I might edit it a bit.

Party @ Cork Open 09

Last weekend I played at Cork Open, which is in Cork, Ireland with BUG (Belfast Ultimate Giants). We were seeded 10th and came 8th. Anyway heres how the party played out through my eyes, I can't be bothered with the match reports - "In this match we played well, in this match we didn't".

Our story on the eve of an awesome day for BUG, we won all our matches and spirits could not be higher. I couldn't wait for the night ahead, but being the tactical person I am I decided to have a power nap to maximise my potential/awakeness for the rest of the evening. This worked well.

The official party theme for the tournament was "Anything".Our team theme was "Robin Hood - Men in Tights" which took ages to be decided becasue its hard to pick a costume from anything. I took the easy/money-to-burn road and bought my costume off Amazon, as well as a Legolas Bow. I tried to grow a beard but failed, so I used a marker pen to draw on a beard and a hairy chest on myself.

It was good to get all the team drinking together in the kitchen of the hostel for an hour or so before the party, these times are golden. Team bonding is essential. When we arrived at the party after a bite to eat it was pretty lame, not many people, music was dissapointing - we came too early. Things picked up quite quickly when DJ Noob decided to play Run DMC which started a dance off. I then manipulated the DJs thoughts and told him to play "90's Retro Dance" which got the whole team dancing. Most of the early part of the night was spent in a ledge type place above the stairs leading to the toilets with Marco, Pete and Mike. Here we could chat, stay cool and shout things at people. An Italian team decided to come to the party wearing "nipple hats", they got abuse for being so lame.

"Whats your costume?"

"I'm a guy with a nipple hat on my head"
"Oh"
*Walks Aways*

I'm no genius but one of the fundamentals of having a good costume is people should know instantly what your dressed up as, without having to ask: 

"Whats his name?"

"His name...is Mark Patterson"

"No Way! Surely it can't be him"

"I know, its hard to recognise him in that costume"

"What is his costume?"

"His costume is Mark Patterson wearing a black thing, with elastic bands in his hair, holding a bucket of sweets painted brown"

"Nice!"

By the time the party was pumping the place was a sauna so I decided take off the top half of my costume and just wore the sash and a waistcoat which was borrowed from my teammates mum - Sharon McFeeters. I now looked like a hairy fairy. My top half  was freed up so I could pull out some quality moves on the dance floor. I kept on the move and went outside a few times and talked to people from other teams. I like how at an Ulitmate tournamnet you can talk to anybody, most people are very friendly. I remembered asking these two girls - "Are you twins or sisters?", it turned out they were both. Anyway I didn't fade and danced till the last song, by which time I was your typical sweaty drunk guy.

The Ultimate Party-Play Trade Off

When I go to an Ultimate tournament I have the same two objectives:

• to play as well as I can
  
• to party as much as I can (using alcohal as a catalyst)

The trouble is you can't have both(or can you?), there is a trade between each of these objectives. This has been a tough lesson for me as I have had made a few mistakes in the past and I have paid the price for them. In past tournaments I have got drunk and the next day my play would be affected - the worst experience I ever had was at Copa.

It was the day before Copa Cobana 09, in Nottingham, England. Drinking had started earlier in Belfast City airport (team tradition) and continued later on when we arrived. I didn't go to bed until 4:00am. I'm not sure how much I drank, but I rememeber being very drunk - the team bantor that night was epic. The next morning I got up at 8:00am and headed to the pitch. I didn't feel bad at all. I remember feeling really "happy" and it took me a while to realise... I was still drunk. I played the first point of our first match then came off with a splitting headache which didn't go away for most of the morning.

 

I travelled a long way to play Ultimate, yet I felt like shit and didn't play many points for the first few matches. I just wanted to go back to bed (which I did in the afternoon and missed out on team bantor). This is when I realised I had to change my tactics.

A month later at Tune-Up in Stirling, Scotland, I was in quite a similar situation. At the party I had got very drunk on those "shark buckets" (3 vodka, 1 shark) and was lying in my sleeping bag falling asleep.

I knew that the next day wouldn't go so well so I had to act there and then (and act I did). Self-induced throwing up is always a laborious task, especially when your in the most boggin bathroom in the world. However I knew I would feel the benefits of it in the morning.

As I lay with my head over the toilet bowl with two fingers down my throat having a poke around, the minutes seemed like hours, not much was happening. There was frequent wretching, but no cigar! It must have taken 20 minutes or so but I finally did it! Helped by some of team who where cheering me on from the other room(I think) as I wretched, which was cool.

Next, it was time to get the water in me. So basically every time I woke up I would have a sip of water. The end result was I didn't feel too bad the next morning and felt pretty good on the field.

This is a tactic I will take with me to tournaments in the future. I'm still going to develop it at each tournament I go to. The next thing I'm going to try is drink water and alcohal at the time (or something like that), as I'll still be getting drunker but my body will stay hydrated, which is good for not getting hangovers(not that i'm an expert).

So remember, Linter says: if you get drunk at tournaments, don't forget to throw up!