Ultimate Frisbee at Nats!

[TheChiScientist]

Good question. I've been working on getting an intramural field for a couple of hours. It costs $70 though. I'm calling a frisbee/disc store tomorrow to see if they'll sponsor. Otherwise, I'm not quite sure what to do about the cost. I can't really ask teams to pay.

You can't just find an unofficial space and set up cones or something?

Well, it better be away from pedestrian pathways and away from buildings/testing buildings.

Lol. Yea. Don't want a rouge frisbee killing a teams build...

[hippo9]

I'm trying to imagine one of the top team's copter getting decimated by a frisbee right now...

[dxu46]

Good idea. It'll get some Troy kids to stop studying so they'll do worse!

[Alex-RCHS]

Hey everyone! Here's some info about the ultimate frisbee competition.

General Info: The competition is absolutely confirmed and is scheduled to take place from 12:15 to 3:15* (Colorado time, of course) on Friday, May 18 on the Intramural Fields.** If enough teams sign up, I might push the start time up to 11:45.

Team Composition: Please note that teams will be composed of 7 people. If you don’t have 7 people on your team interested in playing, then I’ll try to accomodate you anyway. If you have less than 7 people then I might split you up or combine you with another team/some extra alumni. We'll make it work. If you have more than 7 people, no worries. We might split you into 2 teams, or you can just sub some people out between halves. Again, we'll make it work. Also, I'm restricting this competition to Division C competitors and alumni only. Sorry, but I want to keep the level of competition fair for everyone.

Signing up: Here is a form to officially sign your team up to compete. Even if you've already expressed your interest to me personally, I still need you to sign up here. I need this done by Saturday, May 12 at 11:59 PM in order to have time to construct a schedule and contact all of the teams. Additionally, I reserve the right to close this form early if too many teams sign up. (I don't think I'll have to, but I'm putting it out there just in case.)

Rules: Here's a link to the rules that we'll be using.*** After considering the level of experience involved and the spirit of this competition, I've adapted the regular Ultimate rules to best fit our situation. We're going to be following the rules loosely with the main goal being to have fun. Save your competitive fire for Saturday. That said, if you have any suggestions for me, I'm always happy to hear them.

Lastly, please bear with me through this whole process. Remember that I volunteered to organize this for the benefit of competitors. Furthermore, this is in the thick of AP season, nationals studying, and college paperwork. I'm doing my best to get all the organizing done well and efficiently, so I'll appreciate your patience, cooperation, and participation in this competition.

*A note about timing: There's a "Friday Night Fiesta" from 4:00-6:00. My understanding is that it's some type of dinner. Since I want to give everyone ample time to shower (strongly encouraged, but not necessary) and change (please, at least do this) I don't want the ultimate competition to run past 3:15.
**Here's a map. I don't know which field it's on yet, but I'll let you know soon. They're pretty close together anyway.
***I may change the rules if someone points out something in there that doesn't make sense (or if I just feel like it). But I probably won't.

[Alex-RCHS]

Quoting some people to notify them about that update:

I could probably get 9 people.

At least 6 from us

Sounds like fun, I think I can get some people from my team to join in.

You can't just find an unofficial space and set up cones or something?

Unfortunately, no. I suggested this to Mr. Lovaas but he seemed to find it a bad idea. Given the size that we need (we will likely run two games at a time) and the length of time required (3 hours-ish in total). Also, there is too great a chance of us bothering competitors or pedestrians.

[SSD_scioly]

I was the one who organized last year's ultimate frisbee "tournament" at Nats (it wasn't actually a tournament but instead just playing games until everyone got tired and left), but I'm in college this year so it's nice to see someone else is continuing the tradition. If you have any questions about what happened last year let me know.

[Alex-RCHS]

I was the one who organized last year's ultimate frisbee "tournament" at Nats (it wasn't actually a tournament but instead just playing games until everyone got tired and left), but I'm in college this year so it's nice to see someone else is continuing the tradition. If you have any questions about what happened last year let me know.

Thank you, I will.

That raises a good point that I hadn’t considered. Would you all prefer if it was a real “tournament” with an eventual victor? Or would you rather teams just play each other (albeit in an organized fashion) with no teams “eliminated”? At this point, I’m strongly leaning toward the second option, but I want to choose what you all want.

[SSD_scioly]

I was the one who organized last year's ultimate frisbee "tournament" at Nats (it wasn't actually a tournament but instead just playing games until everyone got tired and left), but I'm in college this year so it's nice to see someone else is continuing the tradition. If you have any questions about what happened last year let me know.

Thank you, I will.

That raises a good point that I hadn’t considered. Would you all prefer if it was a real “tournament” with an eventual victor? Or would you rather teams just play each other (albeit in an organized fashion) with no teams “eliminated”? At this point, I’m strongly leaning toward the second option, but I want to choose what you all want.

I was originally planning for last year's event to be a "tournament" as well, but the two biggest issues which I didn't anticipate and were out of my control were
1) Some of the teams who said they would be there did not show up so there were not enough teams for the tournament format, and
2) It was way too hot and everyone got tired. Half the teams left after a couple of games because they were tired, and at that point any sense of organization or planned matches broke down, so we just started started playing random games.

Honestly you're not going to be able to predict how many teams really will show up and who will stay for how long, so I'd say your best bet would be to plan for a tournament if you want, but definitely be ready to run a non-tournament format in case things don't go exactly according to plan.

I really wonder how years before me had had an actual tournament because it really was a mess in terms of organization on the day of last year even though I had everything planned out precisely in my mind beforehand.

[John Richardsim]

I was the one who organized last year's ultimate frisbee "tournament" at Nats (it wasn't actually a tournament but instead just playing games until everyone got tired and left), but I'm in college this year so it's nice to see someone else is continuing the tradition. If you have any questions about what happened last year let me know.

Thank you, I will.

That raises a good point that I hadn’t considered. Would you all prefer if it was a real “tournament” with an eventual victor? Or would you rather teams just play each other (albeit in an organized fashion) with no teams “eliminated”? At this point, I’m strongly leaning toward the second option, but I want to choose what you all want.

I think round-robin would be better than elimination. That being said, you should still crown a victor and such, even with round-robin play.

[Alex-RCHS]

I was the one who organized last year's ultimate frisbee "tournament" at Nats (it wasn't actually a tournament but instead just playing games until everyone got tired and left), but I'm in college this year so it's nice to see someone else is continuing the tradition. If you have any questions about what happened last year let me know.

Thank you, I will.

That raises a good point that I hadn’t considered. Would you all prefer if it was a real “tournament” with an eventual victor? Or would you rather teams just play each other (albeit in an organized fashion) with no teams “eliminated”? At this point, I’m strongly leaning toward the second option, but I want to choose what you all want.

I think round-robin would be better than elimination. That being said, you should still crown a victor and such, even with round-robin play.

Thank you both for your input. That's what I think is the best option as well. It will also help in the sense that I can precisely schedule games ahead of time so teams will know exactly when they're playing.

It's a shame that some teams didn't show up last year. The good news is that Colorado should be cooler than Ohio at this time of year, so the weather will be nicer.