The Pickup Team (the best damn 1-8 team of the tournament)

(l to r) Claire, Freek, Fabien, Eric, Olivier, Alizé, Kris)

The Pickup team at the Costa Brava Frisbee Tournament was the most fun to play with, in my opinion. As a pickup team, it took us a while to work out how the others would play, but by the end of the tournament, we started to have the foundations of a true team. With one dedicated female (thanks Claire) in a tournament that was supposed to have 2 girls playing all the time, we were always in the hunt for more females to join our team, even for one game. The core group consisted of three French, two Spaniards, two Colombians, one American and one Belge. On top of this we had all kinds of nationalities join us for various games. Thanks to all who joined us for one game, two games, many games (special thanks to Alizé who played with us whenever her team wasn't playing!)

(Eric and Olive playing solid D)

The offense took a bit of time to warm up. Who can throw? how do those throws act in the air? all kinds of questions that took a few games to figure out. The funny thing was, we started nearly every game quite strong (except those bloody Irish, they killed us from the get-go). But once teams got to know how we played - after 15 or 20 minutes, they tended to out play us. Nearly every team commented on our strong D though. Between Olivier who measures in at 1.98 meters (nearly 6'6") and has arms that must be about 5 meters long, Eric who would dive at every pass that came near him and Freek who never stopped running, we were definitely a defensive force to be reckoned with! I really think that with a bit more practice and a bit fewer changes in the team (every game we had new players and lost old players) we would have been quite a strong team (for example we could've beat those silly Bordelais and they know it!).

We were also possibly the most relaxed team at the tournament. I am not 100% sure, but this picture of Fabien may have been taken during a game!! In any case, the beer flowed freely on the beach, the discs flew well and good times were had by all.





Thanks to everyone who played for us, and special thanks to David, Oscar, Eric, Freek, Olivier, Fabien and Claire for helping to form a team that was truly memorable to play for!