Ultimate Frisbee - A comparison between Germany and Scotland

Table of contents

0 Introductions

1 Ultimate Frisbee
1.1 History
1.2 Rules

2 Ultimate Frisbee in Germany
2.1 Teams in Leipzig

3 Ultimate Frisbee in Scotland
3.1 Teams in Edinburgh

4 Summary

5 Appendix list
Appendix 1 – Important calls during a game
Appendix 2 – Some current and future tournaments in Germany
Appendix 3 – Some current and future tournaments in Scotland
Appendix 4 – History of the FRISBEE Disc
Appendix 5 – History of the “Saxy Divers”

6 Reference list

0 Introductions

This report is about the sport “Ultimate Frisbee” which is not known so well as for example soccer or rugby. However it is played all over the world by a lot of people, mostly students. In this essay there will be some general facts about Frisbee and a comparison between the sport in Germany and Scotland especially between my hometown Leipzig and Edinburgh.

1 Ultimate Frisbee

1.1 History

In 1968 Joel Silver, who nowadays is one of the most prolific and successful producers of motion pictures such as the “Matrix” trilogy, introduced his idea of Ultimate Frisbee to the Columbia High School student council in Maplewood New Jersey, USA.

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In the next year the first game was played between two groups of students. The first and second sets of rules were written in 1970 by Joel Silver, Buzzy Hellring and Jon Hines.

The first organised tournament, The National Collegiate Championships, was played on April 25th in 1975. Eight teams took part in a tournament in Yale. In 1983, the first true World Ultimate Championship was held in Gothenburg, Sweden. The European countries were represented by national teams.

In 1989, ultimate was shown as an exhibition sport during the World Games in Karlsruhe, West Germany. In 2001, ultimate was included as a medal sport in the World Games in Akita, Japan. Six countries were invited to compete based on their finishes in the WFDF 2000 World Ultimate Championship in Germany. Canada won the World Games gold medal with an overtime victory over the United States.

Ultimate is now played by an estimated 100,000 players in over 40 countries, with the Ultimate Players Association in the US having over 13,000 members.

The 2002 WUCC in Hawaii was the largest Ultimate meet to date, with over 2,300 players and 120 teams from 24 countries participating.

1.2 Rules

Ultimate is played between two teams of seven players. At each end of the field is an "endzone" (as in American Football). These endzones are the goal-scoring areas. A point is scored when a team completes a pass to a player in their own endzone.

illustration not visible in this excerpt

[Source: http://www.whatisultimate.com]

The main object of this sport is probably the Frisbee disc which has an interesting history, listed in Appendix 4. The following picture shows the actual patent drawing for the curve of a Frisbee disc.

illustration not visible in this excerpt

[Source:http://inventors.about.com/library/weekly/aa980218.htm]

Players are not allowed to run with the disc. If you catch the disc you must stop running and try to throw it to another player from your team. If you do not catch the disc or a defence player knocks it down then there is a possession change which is called “turnover”. There is also a possession change if a receiver is outside the playing area while catching the disc.

The team which has the defence tries to stop the team with the disc from making progress up field by marking them (as in soccer or basketball).

Ultimate is a non-contact game but if you think your defence player made a contact you can declare it as a ”foul” by keeping up your arm. Both involved player clear the situation either by accepting the foul or not-accepting. The decision determines where the disc is played on. Some other important calls during a game are listed in Appendix 1.

In this sport there is no referee even not at World Championship level. So every player should play fair to keep the “Spirit of the Game” high. Ultimate is a completely different experience to playing other sports.

2 Ultimate Frisbee in Germany

Ultimate Frisbee has been existing in Germany since 1978. In 1981 the first unofficial championship was held in Duisburg. Participating teams were from Essen (which also were host of this tournament), Hamburg, Frankfurt and Rothenburg. In the following years there was a development of more and more teams which leads to a restriction of the participating teams at the championship. In 1988 Germany was divided into a North and a South League and every year two championships were held with ten teams (six from the South League and four from the North League). In the mid nineties a system with four Leagues was created. During the years there were a lot of changes in this system but until now the German Championship is challenged in four Leagues each with seven teams.

The first umbrella organisation for this sport was founded in 1983 which is today known as “Deutscher Frisbeesport-Verband” (German Frisbee Sport Association). This organisation consists of 1,000 registered members. Nowadays Ultimate Frisbee is played in Germany by about 80 teams which mostly are university teams. Every year there are plenty of tournaments spread over the whole country. [Appendix 2] These tournaments are played in different divisions: Open, women, mixed and juniors division.

2.1 Teams in Leipzig

At the moment there are two teams in Leipzig situated: “Saxy Divers” and “Drehscheibenkombinat”.

Both teams are mixed teams which are a combination of students and non-students. Nevertheless there are different aims considering playing Ultimate Frisbee.

“Saxy Divers”, which has been existing for about 14 years, was the first Frisbee team in East Germany. It likes to play competitive, high-level Ultimate and competes regularly at the German Championship. Some players in this team are playing for the German national team. Peak levels of the club are for example the organisation of the German Championship in Leipzig in 1994 and the participation at the Club European Championship in Prague in 2000.

A more detailed history of this team is listed in Appendix 5.

“Drehscheibenkombinat” is a relatively new team with players of different skill levels. It mostly plays at fun tournaments.

3 Ultimate Frisbee in Scotland

Scotland belongs to the UK Ultimate Association (UKUA) which is the governing body for Ultimate Frisbee in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It was formed in 2002 to take over from British Ultimate Federation. The UKUA is responsible for the growth, development and promotion of Ultimate which is played in the UK since the early 1970s. Currently, there are over 200 teams in the UK, with in excess of 1,500 players registered with the association. The best known teams from Scotland are from Edinburgh, Glasgow, Aberdeen and Dundee.

As in Germany there are a lot of tournament held over the entire country. [Appendix 3]

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