hey cow!

When I started playing Ultimate back in high school, it seemed that Ultimate was a growing and thriving sport in the midwest. I played in a summer league and went to three or four tournaments a summer with an Indiana team. Years later I have returned to the midwest Ultimate scene, having experienced both the plethora of teams and tournaments on the east coast and the deficit in Japan. And I don't know what to make of it.

This weekend I played at the Hoosier Hoedown in Bloomington with a combo team that had too many people, a good sign that Ultimate in the area is booming. And yet, this centrally located tournament gathered barely enough teams to hold a tourney in the first place, and then three teams bailed at the last minute. What happened to all the Ultimate-loving players in the midwest?

Regardless of the scarcity of playing time, my future team (if I my tryout went well) made the best of it, crushing our opponents to win the tournament and still have energy for swimming, bowling, and a late late night of drinking, singing, and dancing. We even renamed ourselves, a great name of which I was reminded when Sam and I passed two farmers and a cop trying to chase down a loose cow on the highway on the way home: blue ribbon cattle - State Fair!