DeadTox42 at Potlatch

July 2, 2007

I spent the weekend in Redmond, WA, 15 miles northeast of Seattle, for a very fun and famous frisbee tournament called Potlatch. This was the 17th year of the tournament, focusing on the Northwest Coastal Native theme of giving, emphasizing spirit and friendship. There are usually close to 80 teams, with folks from all over the country competing.

Will and I haven't been for the past couple years, but had a good reason to go this year. About six months ago, Jamie Kelly, a good friend, wonderful person and husband to Steph Chow, passed away as a result of a car accident. So Steph put together a team of good friends and folks who've played with Jamie (specifically on their league team ReTox) to represent Jamie's superfun and kickass frisbee attitude. It was awesome to have a change to play with some of these folks, particularly with Steph, who is also working through an amazing recovering from ACL reconstruction surgery.

So, Will and I flew up to Seattle on Friday night and drove to Redmond. Potlatch is also famously fun because folks camp right at the fields. Well, Will and I opted to stay in a hotel this year (best decision ever!), as the thought of carrying camping gear on the plane was completely unappealing.

We showed up on Saturday morning for our games, we were slated to play four games. We got to a late start due to some of the Vancouver folks experiencing delays at the border. Our team name was DeadTox42 and the team's theme on Saturday was "zombies" so we took advantage of Steph's fake blood red makeup to help with the theme...






A great part of Potlatch is the theme of giving. Our team presented Jamie Kelly playing cards, beer from R&B Brewing Co. in Vancouver (where Jamie had worked part-time), and a frisbee from UltiVillage (Rob, the founder of UltiVillage, played on our team).

It was hilarious playing with this team, great plays and good times were had by all. By the end of the day, we had a 3-1 record, which was nice considering we didn't have a ton of folks. The fake red blood got everywhere.

On Saturday night, the Potlatch party was held at the nearby Red Hook Brewery. Potlatch is also famous for the massive salmon dinner that they serve up. There was also lots of free beer from Red Hook...






On Sunday, we had a first-round bye, so it was nice not having to play until 11 am. On Sunday, Steph had brought shirts for us to play in to represent JK well.








We lost our quarterfinal game, so we went into the consolation side of the A Pool. Regardless, it was great playing with these folks. Will and I don't play much frisbee outside of playing with our club team, Brass Monkey, so it was really fun to play with other folks that we normally would not play with. We were honored to represent JK and we'd be psyched to play with these folks again.

Go 42!