Matteo talks about the evolution of his mindset as he grew his Freestyle skills, going from just having fun to focusing on competing.
Matteo shares his memories of the 2009 World Title he won with Tommy Leitner in Berlin and lessons learned (video below).
Then, remarkably, he defended his title, by winning Open Pairs again in 2010 with Arthur Coddington in Seattle (video below).
Although Matteo still tries to Freestyle, he now prefers playing with dogs vs. humans. His passion for Disc Dog has resulted in more World Championships. Seriously, he must be the only person to accomplish this, so cool! (video below)
Hear Matteo talk about his wonderful canine partnerships, their well-rounded lives, and how his experience competing is one of the main things that has transferred from Freestyle to Disc Dog.
Hear how doing the Podcast for almost a year has impacted both Jake & Randy.
The addiction to Freestyle Frisbee, or ZZZs disease, as Deaton calls it, is known to be incurable. Yet sometimes it goes dormant for long spans of time. In our interview with Arthur Coddington and Dave Lewis, we learned that they had each taken an extended break from Freestyle Frisbee before meeting and going on to be the dominant team that they were.
My story is a little different. From the moment I caught ZZZs disease, I have never gone into remission. I was forced into a 1 year break from Freestyle due to a knee injury. The whole time I was feeling pangs of withdrawal. Still, though, I did take a break and enjoyed Freestyle all the more when I came back.
In this weeks poll, let’s find out how many of you have taken a break from Freestyle Frisbee. Extra credit if you tell us why you took the break in the comments below. This weeks question:
What is the Longest Break You’ve Taken from Freestyle Frisbee?
Lane (noun)
A term to describe an area in the jam that is a player’s specific space. When players are more stationary, as when jamming in a circle, a lane is a circle around each player. As players begin to move together as a team, as when jamming in a line, the lane extends forward of direction of movement. Where the is no wind, as when jamming in doors, lanes move freely about as the direction of play moves. When there is wind, lanes almost always move into the wind because players will tend to face the wind as they play.
Reading lanes is as much about reading the nose of the disc as it is about reading a players intentions. For example if a player is not intending to move then it could be argued that their lane no longer extends up wind. Likewise, if a player intends to chase the disc no matter where it goes, it could be argued that their lane is the whole field when they have the disc.
With that said, it is generally accepted that one’s lane extends in a straight line, into the wind, similar to the way a swimming lane extends in a swimming pool. When all players work under this assumption, it is much easier for the group to perform spontaneous cooperative tricks.
Example: “Sorry, you’d have caught that if I didn’t poach your lane.”
Arthur and Dave were one of the most dominate teams from 1996 to 2004.
Join us behind the curtain as they share how they each got started in 1979; Arthur on the east coast, Dave on the west coast.
Hear how they both left the sport for many years, came back to it in 1992, and met for the first time in Frazier Park in Santa Monica. If you haven’t played there, put it on your list!
Dave shared his freestyle philosophy with Arthur and it resonated. They began playing together initially as practice partners and friends.
Arthur shares some of their practice strategies, and how it helped push each of them to play to their full potential.
Jake shares how he and Matt adopted this strategy themselves and how it changed their mindsets, resulting in a better game.
Stay tuned for what Randy mysteriously referred to as “Patreon”.
Frisbee shows are a big part of the Freestyle Frisbee culture. It makes perfect sense. Freestyle Frisbee is an art form that consists of creative body movements with a flying disc. Doing a Frisbee demo or show can be a vehicle to share one’s art to bring joy and inspiration to others. Shows and demos can also be a way to turn the passion of Freestyle Frisbee into a living wage. In many of our podcast episodes and in The Harlem Globetrotter Tour Story we’ve discovered that demos and shows are a part of the history of the game.
My personal Frisbee story includes demos and shows as well. My first demo was with my brother Matt and our good friend Scott Weaver. Scott got us the gig at a local elementary school. Matt and I were very new Freestyler’s but Scott made it it easy. He did all the talking. Matt and I played a little catch and then we did a short jam. As Matt and I attempted to pull off our most heinous moves, Scott told the kids how amazing our tricks were. Though my personal assessment was that I was a beginner, the kids thought we were amazing. We then finished the demo with a tutorial. Many of the kids learned to throw and catch and a couple could almost nail delay. The best part was how much fun the kids had with us. I felt privileged to share something I loved with an such appreciative audience.
Since then, I’ve done many more shows to kids and adults. Though I’m not actively looking for shows to do, I certainly would jump at an opportunity that presented itself.
So now it’s your turn. Let us know if you’ve ever done a Frisbee demo or show and if you’re interested in doing more. Bonus points if you share a story about one of your shows in the comments below.
The inverted (nail) delay/hold is one of the “control” moves that many freestylers incorporate in their routines and jamming. There are many ways to get into an inverted delay, and one way that is additionally difficult is to add an Against “push” of the disc from a center delay (what’s also called an Against Crank) to an invert holding delay. The way to do this is to establish a center delay (either clock or counter spin), then lower the disc to about waist-level of your body. Then, walk around the disc while still maintaining the center delay. (Imagine that your body moves around the disc more than the disc is moving) By walking around the disc, you’ll naturally lower the disc even more in order to keep delaying the disc under your arm and then your hand will be now “inverted.” It may take some slight hand movements with your inverted hand to delay the disc in the center again, but with practice – this can be done. The faster that you can move your body around the disc from the first center delay to the inverted hold at the end can make this a bit easier; but, just like every other freestyle move, timing is important. With a bit of practice walking around the disc, you’ll eventually be able to get the timing down to move both your body and the disc in order to get this move completed even faster.
To bring in the new year right, this past weekend was filled with many hours of jamming. Saturday was the most heinous day of them all. James Wiseman was in town and at one point he and I were playing one on one. It seemed like the we could do no wrong. We were flowing with both spins, turns overs, rolls, and setting each other for huge spinning catches. The pace was high and it only took a couple songs before we started to waver, but boy was it satisfying.
The following jam days just never measured up for me. Many perfect sets hit my hand but didn’t stay in, resulting in the dredded drop. As I watched my own catch percentage drop I saw others in the jam maintain their levels. Libby, a new jammer on the Portland scene, even seemed to increase her catching as the weekend progressed.
Before I pose this question, let’s define catch percentage. It’s the number of catches divided by the number combos in which either a catch was attempted or a drop was caused. Example:
If I go for a gitis from Lori’s set, and catch it, I’m 1 for 1 (100%).
Later Matt sets me and I drop a flamingosis; now I’m 1 for 2 (50%).
A little later I try a spinning pull and drop it; now I’m 1 for 3 (33%).
Just to be clear, I don’t actually count every catch / drop / combo in a jam. For me, this is really just more of a gut feel. If you do count, let me know in the comments. So with that, this week’s poll:
At the 1974 Jersey Jam, John Kirkland and Victor Malafronte announced that they had been hired to do a Frisbee exhibition as part of the entertainment show the Harlem Globetrotters presented during each game of their nationwide basketball series.
I had the particularly good fortune to attend the Harlem Globe Trotter game held in Rochester NY, circa February 1975. There is no way I can describe how exhilarating or fabulous their performance was. I’ll start by saying that it made the basketball game itself sort of ho-hum. Don’t forget, in 1974, few if anyone one in the crowd had ever seen a Frisbee performance of any kind. The substance of John and Victor’s show was all new to the vast majority of the spectators; they were ripe for a brand new experience. They went absolutely wild with everything that those guys did. On that particular night, John and Victory did an amazingly flawless show. But it wasn’t your normal competition routine in any sense of the word. It was designed to entertain, and it was choreographed to the hilt to do just that. They had a professional announcer narrating along with a pre-made tape of appropriate music and sound effects for the specific moves being done, and everything was perfectly timed.
The opening consisted of Kirkland standing unseen behind the baskets at one end of the court, stepping into view upon cue from the loudly playing tape being used for the occasion. He launched a huge anhyzer throw way up and out over the crowd, skimming high over the uppermost level of arena seats. It floated gracefully down on a perfect line toward the other basket. A hidden Malafronte magically appeared from behind the basket at the last second and successfully snagged the throw with a leaping trap catch between the knees. Just the accuracy and trajectory of the throw alone, along with the announcer’s hype, got the crowd going, but when Victor jumped out and closed with the perfect leaping trap catch between the knees, the crowd went absolutely wild. It set them up to anticipate more, and they weren’t disappointed. The guys continued with a few more high curving flights terminated with behind the head and behind the back trick catches, each one delighting the crowd as well as the first one did. The guys then settled in to a smooth and flawless quick catch and trick throw sequence that would have been competitive in any modern-day competition. They followed that sequence up with a short skit mimicking a gunslinger dual in which they used Frisbees as bullets and guts type throws as their guns, wowing the crowd with their ability to catch each other’s blazingly fast throws. After the skit, they did multiple disc throwing, juggling three discs between them.
From the very first introductory anhyzer throw to the end of the three-disc juggling sequence, John and Victor did not drop or bobble the disc at any time during the show!
Upon completion of their multiple disc routine, the guys gathered at mid-court as if to they were ready to take a bow in complete of their program, but the announcer stalled them by asking if they could throw the Frisbee into the basket from the foul line. They made a show of cockiness mimicking a “Sure, no sweat” attitude. As Malafronte lined up at the foul line and aimed at the basket with an overhead hammer throw stance, Kirkland tapped him on the shoulder and pointed to the other basket way across the full court. Malafronte mimed a “What, are you crazy” type of response, and then with a shrug of his shoulders took aim at the far basket anyway. The crowd got into it and Malafronte milked the situation with perfect timing. He threw the prettiest hammer throw you ever wanted to see. The disc swished smack dab right through the center of the hoop as clean as it could be done. Kirkland and Malafronte wisely chose that moment to take their bows and walked off the court to a wild standing ovation crowd. The rest of the night was truly boring by comparison.
Previously at the October Jersey Jam, neither Kirkland nor Malafronte had showed anywhere near the type of pizzazz that they displayed at that Globetrotter game halftime performance. The Globetrotter tour certainly showed what practice, hard work and choreography can produce. I have been told by John Kirkland that the flawless success I saw that night was typical of every exhibition they performed with the Globetrotters that year, and that they had only three for four drops or bobbles during the whole series! Regardless of how accurate that statistic might be, the performance that I saw that night was absolutely flawless. The 1974-74 Kirkland-Malafronte Globetrotter tour strongly foreshadowed the freestyle development that was to come about in subsequent years.
Graf is straight to the point about the possibility of prize money. Randy and Jake don’t let him off the hook so easily though, but for him, friendship and respect are the biggest prizes.
The discussion get’s interesting as they start to brainstorm.
The topic of routine lengths come up again and a thought provoking dialogue takes place.
The World Kitchen Freestyle Championships is something the FPA should seriously consider. Thanks Randy!
Happy New Year everyone!
What kind of frisbee skills do you want to work on in 2018? How good are your Egg Rolls, oops, I mean Leg Rolls? And your Monkey Dance Roll?
