From britdisc-owner@csv.warwick.ac.uk Thu Feb 24 08:22:54 2000 Received: (from daemon@localhost) by pansy.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.9.3+Sun/8.9.3) id IAA11582 for britdisc-outgoing; Thu, 24 Feb 2000 08:20:44 GMT Received: from daffodil.csv.warwick.ac.uk (daffodil [137.205.192.30]) by pansy.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.9.3+Sun/8.9.3) with ESMTP id IAA11575 for <britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk>; Thu, 24 Feb 2000 08:20:42 GMT Received: from web1402.mail.yahoo.com (web1402.mail.yahoo.com [128.11.23.166]) by daffodil.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.9.3/8.9.3) with SMTP id IAA12594 for <britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk>; Thu, 24 Feb 2000 08:20:42 GMT Received: (qmail 23636 invoked by uid 60001); 24 Feb 2000 08:21:11 -0000 Message-ID: <20000224082111.23635.qmail@web1402.mail.yahoo.com> Received: from [203.109.134.218] by web1402.mail.yahoo.com; Thu, 24 Feb 2000 00:21:11 PST Date: Thu, 24 Feb 2000 00:21:11 -0800 (PST) From: =?iso-8859-1?q?Colin=20Wagstaff?= <colinwagstaff@yahoo.com> Subject: Goaltimate 12/13th Feb To: britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Sender: owner-britdisc@warwick.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Well well well........Goaltimate??? Wayne asked me to give him a few thoughts on my recent experience of "The sport of the new Millenium - Goaltimate". Instead of him just forwarding this to BD i thought i would copy you all myself. Apologies to all who really don't give a f*** about anything except Ultimate and their status quo, this is written for informative purposes only and is not intended to spur off WWIII on BD. Goaltimate a new disc sport where the players are paid their travel expenses, provided with a tournament uniform, are given the incentive of prize money, are not permitted to swear (Yellow Card Offence) and have to be available for TV promotional purposes. Sounds different doesn't it? It is except for the fact the 200 or so professionals there are virtually all Ultimate specialists chipping in to try break this new disc sport to a wider market, for a fee obvioulsy. The atmosphere was very much one of a top class American Ulti Tourney, not surprising when 23 of the 24 teams represented have all played at UPA Nationals in recent years. The only exception being us (Australia), there to bring a truly international feel to the TV audience (American's really are that stupid). There was one specialist Goaltimate team from San Diego, where the game was invented and not surprisingly were the tournament winners. However, the Condors (UPA runner up in 1999 to DOG) pushed them close in a very tight final. Condors were clearly the crowd's favourite and on atleast one occaision a decision by one of the three officials may have been influenced in their favour. Most of the officials though very experienced Ulti players are new to Goaltimate too, so the official thing really was kinda strange. There would be a foul call the players would discuss it the official would butt in with their authority then the players would continue to discuss the play with the ref. It's going to take a long time to convince Ulti players that refs are possible, even if not desirable in any disc sport, or maybe that is the issue the refs simply can't have a disc sport/honour system background. I'm not saying i agree with refs out and out but i believe there is a place for them in certain areas of Ultimate and at certain levels. (That became apparent in Hawaii last w/e in our semi against a very physical team who would intentionally foul.) Any back to the Goaltimate, we did OK, many other teams had not played previously but some had been training for months for this event, obviously looking at the prize money. You play continuously in games to 5 with rolling subs which worked well and the game was free flowing, in that there were few stoppages outside of fouls unlike Ulti with the long walk back after the point has been scored. A series consists the best of 5 games and there is a time limit of two hours which can be reached. We won one game against Sub Zero from Minneapolis and one against Bigack from San Fran, but failed to score against the Hammers from Houston, even without Damien, his flight got messed up or something. Similar to many US tourneys once the pool games have been played that's it, you loose you go home or to the beach, as many teams did in the glorious Florida sunshine. I would have thought they would have wanted us to play as much as possible as they had flown us their and would want us to play hard competitive games against teams of our own standard, but nevermind it allowed us to party hard in West Palm Beach. Some teams did show up for the finals on the Sunday and that's when we got the majority of our exposure to TV interviews. We really were a pulling point for the TV audience, a team all the way from Australia, it was if we were from a different planet and it was a major thing. The field is circular, 60 yards in diameter with a 18 foot high semi circular goal and a clear line where the disc must be passed clear behind after every score, or after a turnover. The stall is 5. The scoring zone is an elipse 24 feet deep behind the goal. There's also a two point line from in front of the clear line. Most of the action takes place in front of the goal and can get very physical. In fact the whole game pretty much resembles half court basketball. Personally i did not enjoy the game as much as Ultimate but there were plenty there who commented they did. I'm not sure it will catch on but for now whilst the man with the money paying they'll go on playing. For more info look at www.goaltimate.com Seeyouse, Colin. P.S. How many, if any Brits have been to the Kaimana Klassic Tourney in Hawaii before? For anyone thinking about going the w/e of Presidents Day (US Holiday Monday) 2001 (3rd w/e in Feb??) is where it's at. This tourney is pretty awesome, you sleep on the beach and get woken at first light, have a dip in the sea before breakfast and bake in 30 degree heat all w/e. This tourney will be making it on to the World calender no doubt with may folk looking at doing that and Rimini in the same year. There could be some hot West Coast US teams on the sand this Easter......you have been warned. __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Talk to your friends online with Yahoo! Messenger. http://im.yahoo.com