Hope, Spirit, and Circular Plastic

I feel God put me on this earth to share stories, and that is why this post is a long one! If you stay with me until the end, thank you. If the writing is longer than you have time for right now, thank you for visiting and sharing my little corner of the internet for however long you are here. 🙂

Onward!

My ultimate (flying disc) journey had many ups and downs. When I started playing I had no idea how much joy throwing and catching round pieces of plastic could be –including the joy of landing in the zone and scoring a point! And this joy of playing the game was just the beginning!

During my first year playing, the immense fun of the game kept me intrigued and keen. Mostly I played in social leagues and pickup games, but as soon as I’d learnt to throw a forehand better than my backhand – after nine months intensive practice! – I sought to play more competitively. Having been a soccer goalkeeper for fifteen years, I had a good understanding of defensive positioning and knew the importance of effective and timely communication.

Little did I know, wrapped up in all this was a deep enjoyment for learning, adhering to, and sharing the rules of sports! Ultimate, as a self-refereed sport, means my keenness to understand the rules, and keep up with them as they change, comes in handy. (As a relatively new sport the rules are consistently being updated to improve the game, so as a players I need to keep up!)

In the next ten years, I represented New Zealand twice, once on a men’s team and once on a mixed team, and I played many mens and many mixed tournaments throughout New Zealand. Over this time I realised I enjoyed playing mixed ultimate more. To explain one reason why:

Ultimate is a non-contact sport. What ‘non-contact’ means to players is interpreted differently, from the level you’d expect playing a game of chess, all the way up to the grappling and jostling with each other like basketball. In games and tournaments of mixed ultimate I get to play with all my friends, regardless of gender, and I also found the level of contact to be more akin to my interpretation of non-contact: making every jump, dive, and bid for a disc with the intention of avoiding any contact.

Of course, like anyone playing high level sport, at times I failed. A small number of times I unintentionally caused injury. This is not ok, but I learn. Every time I make a mistake I try to ensure I don’t make that same one again. I think this is true of most ultimate players, the intention to play safer when having erred.

So, over my eighteen years of ultimate I have won the New Zealand Men’s Ultimate national title four times. A great achievement, which involved much hard work each time. But up until this year at the New Zealand Mixed Ultimate nationals I had placed 2nd to last, 5th, 3rd twice, and 2nd. On a few of those teams I felt at times I had let myself down in terms of level of play and demeanour. Sometimes I had not listened to opposition players perspectives, and sometimes I had not listened to my own sense of justice, that a call I’d made was unfair because the outcome of a play wasn’t what I wanted it to be.

Over the past four years I have worked on being a better active listener in my life as a whole, and in particular during the intensity of a game of ultimate. I have tried to communicate effectively from the sideline to my team on the field, and encourage players from all teams, not only my own.

The most recent World Club Champs were earlier this year in July, in Cincinnati. I trialled and was selected for the mens team representing Wellington, New Zealand, and had decided they were going to be my swansong where I gave everything I had, before hanging up my cleats. At least for a while in the competitive scene. WUCC didn’t go as planned (read: Covid) so I was left feeling deflated. I wanted one more attempt at a competitive tournament, knowing this would require gym sessions, team training, and extra practice to keep my throwing sharp. Lo and behold, I was invited to play with a club which from the outside looked to value fun, inclusive, and high level ultimate. Named ‘Huripari’ (after a former team-mates bilingual dog), it seemed a great fit. After a few trainings I knew it was. Good people, good ultimate, and playing with the intention of upholding the spirit of the game at all times.

Awesomely, fittingly, perhaps better than I could have written the script, all the practice paid off! For the team and for me! I am proud of how I played, including the spirit with which I played. Playing hard and fair has allowed me to feel a greater sense of achievement, at finally winning the New Zealand Mixed Ultimate Champs, in 2022, after my ultimate playing career turned eighteen years old! Playing the best ultimate we could, with great spirit throughout the tournament, coming together as a team on and off the field, is just …

… awesome. There are no words (in English) which I feel completely capture how fulfilling it felt.

Thank you Huripari. For being an amazing team around me, and reminding me I was an integral part of the team – every player was. Thank you to Huri Puppers, our second team that trained hard with us and did themselves proud at the tournament too.

And thank you, dear reader, for being part of this ultimate journey of mine – the sport part and the life part.

Keep on keeping on being awesome.

PEACE.

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