It is a great pleasure to announce the first invited guest post to the Ragnarok blog. Carsten Bergmann has written about the state of Ultimate frisbee in Israel. He is originally from Gentofte but now lives in Israel with his wife and three children. Enjoy!
If you ask a person on the street in Israel if he can explain what is Ultimate frisbee 99.98% will look at you strangely and say: Frisbee – thats for the beach and the dog right?.
It is a big waste because the climate allows Ultimate on grass and sand all year round, but Ultimate frisbee is still a very small sport, which are not registered under any official sports organization. The fact that Ultimate is beginning to take off now is mainly the work of 2 very active persons who apart from numerous activities has set up a great frisbee site covering both Ultimate and freestyle activities. On the Bulaflow site referenced below you can find a great video with pictures from last years BulaFlow beach ultimate tournament.
From a time with one official Saturday pick up game 6 years ago in Tel Aviv there are now 5 active Ultimate clubs from the Negev in the south via Jerusalem to Haifa in the North who are training on a regular basis. The foundation for the clubs are app. 150 to 200 players where 85 % are on a beginners to intermediate level and by far the most are male players. There are currently only 1 team (Holylanders) who are training after a certain program working at set plays and with a large number of drills. This team plans to participate in the Wonderful Copenhagen tournament this spring and it will only be the second time an Israeli team are participating in tournaments in Europe after the same team participated in Paganello 2 years ago.
The Ultimate frisbee influence so far has mainly been from Israelis studying abroad bringing the idea back or foreign players joining the pick up game. Recently the level was given a great boost with the workshops and participation of an American all star team (Matzaballs) in the first official Israeli beach ultimate tournament – Bula Flow. It not only raised the level of the already experienced players, it also brought in a number of new players.
On grass Israel held the first official championship last year as a one day tournament with the participation of 8 teams (including some youth teams) and the plan is run the tournament every year.
On the youth side there are now a number of schools which are offering Ultimate frisbee as a option for gymnastics and this number looks to grow in the next years hopefully introducing and developing new players for the organized clubs.
Related links:
www.frisbee.co.il
www.bulaflow.com
www.matzaballsultimate.com
