==== Strange Blue at Trent Park 25 May 1996 ==== -- From our own correspondents - Luke and David -- Our pool: UTI Catch 22 Lurkers First Touch (London Business School) SB Chaos The pinnacle of Saturday was our game against Lurkers. In the first half, we were matching their playing but somehow never converting our play into points. Meanwhile Lurkers kept on driving it down the line to score, and they developed a lead of 8-2. Then we intensified the D, tightened up on O changed it round and got them worried, coming back with huge enthusiasm to 11-9 down. We finally lost 12-9. Lurkers went on to beat Catch and came 2nd in our group. Other outcomes were as expected -- we lost to Catch in our first wake-up game (hopefully we might meet them again and get a different result) and then we lost to UTI. We beat Chaos, who were valiantly playing as a joint team with "Pickup" and therefore played a game every hour -- ten games in one day!? We played a final walking point for the benefit of the injured masses pining for a game. It was like slow motion underwater ultimate, complete with layout Ds. Our final game was against First Touch - we expected as usual to prove that we had been seeded too low in our pool - initially though we didn't manage to sparkle, trading points. Then we got it together, tried Zone D for a point, and ended up winning something like 11-6. Highlights of the day: * Greg's numerous layout Ds. * Dave Mac's string of crucial D's against Lurkers (Luke wrote that). * James' first real layout D against Lurkers. * Ian's layout Ds in the walking point with Chaos. * Three tense (but good spirited) woz-he-in-or-woz-he-out discussions in the Lurkers game, all depending on millimetre measurement or millisecond timing -- in their end zone. * Hours and hours of sun, contrary to the forecast. * One or two fine renditions of "If I never score". * Ginny and Frans playing with us in the Touch game. * First Tournament for Mike Jones, Frans,Brandon, Theo (Luke's friend from London), and BArry, all of whom ran hard and played well including scoring points! * Chinese dinner with a violently happy sprinting tea pouring door kicking manager. * Sammy Neilson's ID-card'n'Herpes-passing game, post beer races. (Ask Natalie for a demonstration) All in all Saturday was loads of fun, the weather was fantastic, spirit was good, and we began to gel. All the tents and all the frisbees in the air made Trent Park a jolly scene. On Sunday, our first game was against Sharks, who were down to ironman six and played valiantly. We played well and won 13-3. It'll be good to play them again when they have some subs! Our next game was against Mohawks and was really tough - a strong wind making this a close and hard working and difficult game. We went down a point or two at the start but managed to pull back in ferocious long points, winning eventually by about 9-7. Hard D was the key. This win put us in the plate final! -And there, as half-expected, we met Catch 22 again for a rematch. They had gained one handler and we had lost a number of players to injury and premature departure. But we played a greatly improved game, and started out by trading points. But Catch zoned us and pulled away by a large margin. We came back by a couple of points at the end, but were too tired to reproduce Saturday's comeback. So we lost the plate and finished 10th out of 23 or 24 teams. And we won Spirit! It was a great tournament for Spirit - we had trouble choosing whom to vote for, there were so many great teams we'd played with. Other news as far as I can recollect it: there was one American team at the tournament, "Nice shirts". They played a great game and beat everyone they met - except Shotgun in the final. UTI came 3rd and GB Masters plus Duncan came 4th. Lurkers and Monks were at 5 and 6 and Village People and Skunks were at 7 and 8 though I don't recall the order.