FPA
 Election overview and write-ups from a
few of the candidates.
$600 grant kicks off the FPA's Lowry/Coddington
Award to promote Juniors!
Old and new jamming discs for sale - help
support the FPA.
Articles
It Ain't Right, by Jamie Chantiles
Milanese Jammin', by Rodney Sanchez
Introducing our new regular feature - Junior
Jammers, by a few Junior Competitors
Jeff O'Brien - Ironman or Nuts?, by
Randy Silvey
Instruction
Get in the flow with Mop-Ops, Vol. 1
(Advanced Players Only)
Competition
Summary and analysis from the '98 Indoor Championships, by Mike
Reid.
Thanks
to Tommy Leitner & MediaCity:
Latest
schedule
99 WFDF Worlds - Sweden
98 FPA
Worlds results
Other Results -
frisbee.com
1998 Rankings - after the FPA Worlds.
And how rankings work.
FPA Gallery
Photos from Milwaukee and
other cool, random shots.
New
Freestyle Cartoon Feature, thanks to cartoonist and jammer Clayton
Moore
Copyright Freestyle Players Association (FPA)
864 Grand Ave, Box 475, San Diego, CA 92109
Send input to FPA Executive Director Larry Imperiale (larryi@freestyledisc.org) or E-Mail the Entire
Board or individually:
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A good year to be a jammer. By Larry Imperiale, FPA Executive Director
I know it's all relative, but from my standpoint it was a great year to be a jammer
(and the US Open and other fun tourneys haven't happened yet). Here's a few of the
good things that come to mind:
- One of the best FPA World's ever (Seattle), with quality routines, great weather,
fantastic sponsors, and superb organization. Thanks to Mary and Lisa and the rest of
the Seattle gang!
- Increased Juniors involvement in freestyle.
- Freestyle is growing quickly in Europe, with several new Euro-Jammers competing in their
first FPA World's this year.
- Successful alternative format tournaments helped us learn about other judging formats,
and included the Santa Cruz beach tournament, individual freestyle in Rhode Island, SD
Beach Championships and the Indoor Championships in Jackson Hole.
- We brought freestyle to the people and played to big crowds at the Midwest Championships
(Milwaukee) and informally at the Boise Riverfest.
- Freestyle Frisbee/Flying disc got lots of media exposure with coverage on MTV, Regis and
Kathy Lee, ESPN, Microsoft's sidewalk.com, E! News Daily, and tons of coverage on local TV
and in newspapers.
- Tournament Directors that give us an opportunity to meet and jam - thanks to Mike Reid
(Jackson), Robert Allen (Boise), Peter Laubert (SD), and Steve Jennings (Midwest) for some
great FPA events. Thanks are also due to the TDs that ran other freestyle events
including Chris DePaola, Brad Keller, Skippy and Tommy, Bill Wright, Tim Mackey,
Jumpi (Italy), MWFC (VA), Mark Horn, Steve Scannell, NEFA, Wham-O, D.I.S.C.
(Masters) and others. That's a lot of events! Get a boom box and
run your own next year.
- Communication between jammers on-line was unsurpassed this year, thanks to Tom Leitner's
frisbee.com site & "Jammers."
Written communication by the FPA was not great, so we plan to improve on this for the rest
of 1998 and beyond (e-mail us address changes). And check out the new searchable flying disc schedule and enter any events that you know of.
Sure, we'd all love to have tens of thousands of dollars in prize money at tournaments
and thousands of members in the FPA. But based on the select nature of our sport, I
think we can be proud to be freestylers in 1998. The growing momentum of freestyle
in Europe and the positive energy I felt at Worlds in Seattle reconfirmed the fact the
I've chosen the right sport for me.
Bad news from Japan. On a disappointing
note, the almost final word from WFDF is that the World
Games in Akita in 2001 will not include Freestyle because only two sports are eligible,
and Ultimate and Disc Golf have stronger international competition than freestyle. |
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Uncle Jam wants you!
FPA Elections are just around the corner, and we need your help. Volunteers are
needed to run for Board positions, or just volunteer to help with some smaller task,
and of course we always need more articles, one-paragraph blurbs, and/or photos for the
Forum. Thanks to those that have already volunteered including Crissy, Dave
Lewis, Mikey, Lisa H., Toddy, Paul Kenny, Alan Caplin, Jamie, Rob Fried, and
others.
Whether you have 2 hours a week or 2 hours a year to spare, you can help the FPA.
E-mail me if you have any interest in helping
the FPA, even if it's just two hours a year. Where would we be
without Arthur C. cranking out the rankings regularly.
Here are the current elected positions available (current candidates in [] ):
Although voted on by the board only, here is the proposed judging committee (5 is
ideal, worst case we could take 7 but the extra two members just vote but don't debate):
- Proposed Director, Mikey Reid
- Toddy Brodeur (East Coast)
- Open
- Open (Ideally a European)
- Open (Ideally a Woman)
If you really want to contribute to freestyle and the FPA in a big way, then run
a tournament - it's probably the most important contribution you can make to the
sport. But if that's too much, then maybe one of these smaller tasks is better
suited for you:
- Coordinate elections. Or just volunteer and have ballots e-mailed to you this Fall and
then report results.
- Convert just one Forum On-Line from Word to a hard copy format.
- Help with mailings.
- Maintain and print the Competitor's Manual.
- Track disc sales and shipments on Excel.
- Write judging training aids.
- Contribute to the Forum.
- File legal papers with the State (CA) to maintain our non-profit status.
- Numerous other small but necessary tasks.
Please send me an e-mail if you can help in any
small or large way. It will really be appreciated.
FPA Discs for sale.
The FPA has some discs for sale, both old and new designs. Contact Amy if you are interested. We have lots of 1998 80
molds and Skystylers, plus 100 molds (94,
95, and Pyramid design) and 80 Molds (94 and 95). |
