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Even without games, an ultimate team is still a team

Even without games, an ultimate team is still a team

Rohre Titcomb

With the Ultimate world on hold due to COVID-19, Five Ultimate co-founder, Seattle Cascades co-owner, and USNT coach Rohre Titcomb has been thinking a lot about her teams — and leaning on them to get through this difficult time. Keep reading for Rohre's thoughts on what it really means to be part of a team.

Ultimate has been a consistent thread in my life since I was 8 years old. It was always there for me. At first, it was pickup in Seattle and the inaugural Spring Reign, and then it was throwing between AP US History and Geometry classes at boarding school. Then, it was bleeding green for Dartmouth, proudly helping us earn our first-ever quarterfinals appearance at College Nationals — back then, Dartmouth used to be fighting just to make Nationals. Then it was commuting from Maine to Boston to play my first club season with Brutesquad. In 2010, after a cross-country return home, I found my heart with Seattle Riot, where I’ve played, captained or coached since

The corresponding life milestones that others (read: non-ultimate fanatics) might be looking at would be graduations and first loves and first jobs and life moves. But to us ultimate players, the cadence of our lives is measured in tournaments played, throws mastered, new teammates found, personal bests in the gym, and roster spots earned. Club or college or high school seasons mark the years, as do friendships forged on tracks, tournament victories, ACL tears (three for me), and for the lucky who earn it, medals and championships, too. Each group we work with is something unique and special and inimitable: a team.

Us ultimate players, we’re measuring our lives in teams. And in seasons with those teams. 

There is something special about being on a team. You go from being an individual to being a teammate. When you sweat or bleed or puke or suffer alongside someone in pursuit of a goal greater than the both of you, there is a bond formed that is unlike any other. The connections between teammates are unique and unlike any other. The best teams embrace differences, viewing them as opportunities to bring out the best in everyone. They strive to maximize the superpower of every individual involved, and they work relentlessly, unified, toward a common goal. In that pursuit, each individual finds a way to contribute to the success, and they get the gratification associated with the work they put in. Being a great teammate, that means something.

My favorite part of the Team USA application this year was, “who is your favorite teammate, and why?” Reading all the responses brought so much joy, and said so much about the applicant. Each person’s answer spoke to their values, to their aspirations, to what truly matters to them. There are many ways to be a great teammate, and teams help us discover the best in ourselves, as well as giving us an opportunity to work on our growth. 

Teams provide structure and meaning and depth to our lives. But at its core, what is a team? What makes a group of people a team? Without a season, without practices or games, is a team still a team? 

Throughout the last month, I have been musing on this. With both the WUL and AUDL seasons postponed and WUGC canceled/delayed (which of the two it is, we still don’t know), I’ve seen all my coaching commitments and the ultimate community put into a state of flux. My teams, stripped of their immediate competitive context, have looked to me, to our leadership, and to each other, to wonder what's next.

In each conversation, I’ve come back to the fact that a team is not just about the ultimate we play on a field. I have been reminded constantly that a team is much more than the medals it tries to earn. It’s the sum of all the relationships formed between all individuals. It’s the sum of each step sprinted, burpee jumped, and disc thrown. It’s the cumulative hours of warmups completed, songs sung-along to in the car, film watched to scout, and so much more. 

Right now, this week, the Cascades open players are shining a light and lifting me up. A few weeks ago, we proclaimed, yes, we are a team, and will continue to be one. Sure, we’re building relationships differently, virtually, than we might otherwise. For example, we have a Slack channel (#plantsclub) where we post pictures of our plants and give advice when needed. We run practices where we watch film or discuss our mental toughness goals and how to stay accountable to maintaining our fitness. We lift, we watch film, we run stairs, and together, collectively, we yearn for the day we get to put our cleats on again. Only time will tell how we look when we take the field, but my challenge to our players was this: let’s be the most fit, most-tight-knit AUDL team out there. This, we can control.  

This does not come without its challenges. But like every other season, like every other competitive context, I keep going back to focusing on the controllables. (Is it an understatement and probably insensitive to compare COVID-19 to forehand-defeating wind at regionals? Yes. But the fundamental response I have as an athlete is the same: focus on controllables.)

My controllables? My hydration, my sleep, my consumption of news, my nutrition, my workout routine, my posture at my desk, who I reach out to, my Facetime dates, what film I watch. The focus on those controllables is what gets me through these dark times. 

I awaken each day with fear a-plenty, but thanks to ultimate, most days I can focus on what is within my control. And in doing so, I find a lift in my heart thanks to the resiliency our sport taught me. 

I hope you too can find that lift through this community, and through this incredible sport. 

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COVID-19 and Five Ultimate: Our response to Coronavirus

COVID-19 and Five Ultimate: Our response to Coronavirus
As major sports institution-partners, like USA Ultimate and the American Ultimate Disc League, continue to release announcements regarding cancellations and postponements, all of our brands are working diligently to ensure that you have what you need to be ready to hit the fields when it is safe to do so once again. Stay healthy. Look out for each other. Continue reading

A Guide To The Post Game Cheer

A Guide To The Post Game Cheer

The post-game tradition can be quite a tricky skill to master. Most team's scramble to come up with something more creative than the generic "Good Game [Team Name]", but end up spit-balling ridiculously bad ideas for 10 minutes until settling on terrible wordplay before the other team carts off to their next game.

If this sounds like you, here's a guide to save you from that distress.

Draw UP a Limerick

Consider where the team is from, what the "mascot" is, or something special about their uniforms/costumes. From there, plug in some ultimate terms or specific situations that happened during the game to come up with a totally original and awesome cheer. For a little more help, here's a list of words that rhyme with popular ultimate terms:

  • Bid - did, kid, hid, slid, squid, eyelid, Madrid, grandkid
  • Layout - when in doubt, pout, about, sprout, shout
  • Huck - duck, buck, chuck, shuck, stuck, truck, schmuck, luck, suck, puck, cluck, thunderstruck
  • Flick - brick, chick, quick, thick, trick, stick, Nick, slick, tick, kick, lunatic
  • Mark - bark, hark, Clark, dark, shark, spark, stark, park, aardvark, monarch, Bismarck
  • Block - shock, croc, dock, jock, rock, flock, hawk, sock, stalk, walk, talk, mock, lock, knock, Bangkok, chalk, Sherlock, wedlock, smock, Johann Sebastian Bach
  • Score - store, door, for, snore, pour, four, bore, roar, floor, wore, tore, Al Gore, chore, war, shore, adore, before, indoor, boar, albacore, matador, labrador, herbivore
  • Dump - bump, grump, chump, slump, stump, thump, rump, pump, hump, jump, Donald Trump, Heffalump, bungee jump
  • Dance - prance, trance, ants, pants, plants, chance, France, romance, perchance

Write An Original Song

Come up with a song on your drive down that you can sing to all your opponents by adapting a few words for each team. It's easiest and best received when it's a parody of a popular song, but if you're inspired, feel free to come up with your own tune too! Be careful not to come up with a cheer for yourselves! While it's fun to chant on the sideline, presenting your opponents with a self-congratulatory cheer about how great you are, isn't very SOTG-y.

 

Fill-In-The-Blank

Before your tournament, put together a list of original go-to cheers to have in your back pocket. Add an action or dance at the end of your cheer specific to the team to give it some extra umph! But please, come up with something original! Avoid these generic clichéd cheers at all cost:

  • Peanut butter, peanut butter. Crunch, crunch, crunch. We enjoyed playing you a bunch, bunch, bunch. Go [team name]!
  • 2, 4, 6, 8, who do we appreciate? [Team name]
  • Toothpaste, toothpaste. We like Crest. We think your team is the best. Go [team name]!

You can do better.

Rely on Puns (if all else fails)

Here in ultimate land, we love our puns. Five has worked with dozens of teams that manage to fit ultimate terms like "disc" or "huck" into their team name, where the Pun Police would insist they do not belong. To name a few:

  • Bidness Time
  • Discie Chicks
  • Game of Throws
  • Hammer Time
  • Hucking Fooligans
  • Love Handlers
  • Mighty Hucks
  • Princess Layout
  • RiDISCulous
  • Ultimato

Heck, there are teams with names that are puns on other team names (Dragon Trust, Ironsighed)! If ultimate were a religion, puns would be the gospel.

Embrace your natural tendency as an ultimate player to pun it up! Just don't waste too much time trying to force a pun if one doesn't crop up naturally.

Conclusion

Whatever you decide on, make sure your whole team knows what you're doing, perform with confidence, and proceed to dance aggressively. No matter how bad your cheer was, a dance party will always send your opponents off with good vibes!

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What is Spot Sublimation Printing?

What is Spot Sublimation Printing?
If you’re looking for more design flexibility than screen printing for your jerseys but lower costs and shorter turnaround time than full sublimation, spot sublimation may be the best choice for your custom team gear. Continue reading

How To Set Goals For Tournaments

How To Set Goals For Tournaments
Setting progressive tournament goals allows players to more clearly see their progress both individually and as a team. This is what the experts have to say about how to make the best out of a tournament. Continue reading

3 Things Everyone Should Know About Screen Printing

3 Things Everyone Should Know About Screen Printing

So you’ve done your research, and opted for screen printing your custom ultimate gear over sublimation. Maybe you’re on a tight timeline or a tight budget.  Maybe you just like the pared-down look of screen printing compared to the razzle-dazzle of a full sub.

Regardless, there are a few things every captain should know before she starts designing her screen printed ultimate uniform. In this post, we'll address a couple of classic questions, such as: 

  • What exactly is a screen?

  • How does it affect your budget?

  • Why are we asking rhetorical questions, when we could just straight to the point? 

All great questions. Let's get to it! Or, just follow click here start your team order!

1. One screen = one color in one location

Here’s a visualization of how we print a single screen on a jersey:

If you choose Five to customize your uniforms, each screen will cost you $4 for the first color and $2 per additional color. Pitt’s classic logo is made up of three screens, as you can see below:

Three screens at $4+$2+$2 means that Pitt’s logo costs them $8 per jersey. If they had decided to get just one of the three elements pictured above, they would have saved $4 per jersey!

Hokay. We’ve covered color, now we need to talk location.

Ready? A screen’s maximum size (for a Five Ultimate jersey at least) is 12.5 x 16 inches. Any logo or logos within that area can be completed in one screen, provided that they only use one color of ink. That means that each of the designs below cost $3, despite the difference in size and complexity of the design!

If you want to add a screen outside of that area (like the sleeve, hip, or above the neck in the back), you’ll have to add another $3 per jersey.

2. You can save money by using fewer screens

Each screen costs $3, and now that you know exactly what a screen is, you have all the necessary tools to come up with a custom jersey design that is both awesome and cost-effective! If you'd rather leave the designing to the experts, simply ask us to help you save money by keeping the number of screens down. We never charge for art assistance, so you should always take advantage of our (free) expertise!

3. A note about hidden fees

When we create a screen, we’re physically burning your design into a sheet of silk, then spread ink over the area.

That piece of silk is permanently marked with your design, and most printing companies hold on to their screens forever. Creating and storing an ever-increasing number of screens results in a pretty significant cost, and that's part of the reason why some companies will charge you fees for creating or setting up the screen.

Five never charges hidden fees for set-ups, screen changes, or color changes, but we do require that you order a minimum quantity of 15 items for new designs and 10 items for reprints. The reprint costs a little less because the screen is already made. That’s why the minimum order is lower!

As you can probably imagine, customizing the screen is the most expensive part of this process. This is why screens for player names, which have to be custom-made for each and every player, are more expensive than logo screens, which can be used across the entire team's jerseys!  

Ready to get your team hooked up with new gear?

Hit us up to get started on your custom team order!

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