Kelowna
bound
Hop a bus, train or plane to this May tourney!
BY TEZ LAMVOHEE & STACEY MANOIN
In the winter of 2009/10, Kelowna B.C.
saw its last snow on January 5. Combine that with the arid dry climate that is the Okanagan and increasing temps of +10 de- grees since early in February and what do you have? A great opportunity to kick off the Ultimate season in glorious style!! The Sunflicker Ultimate tournament held
in Kelowna, B.C. takes place on the May 1st/2nd weekend this year. Researched at its conception to be one of the times of the year with the least average amount of rainfall. Sunflicker is held at the beautiful revamped Mission Sports fields in the middle of town, allowing quick access to all of the city’s amenities and for those daring (or crazy!) enough, to have a dip in Lake Okanagan. This is the 7th
year for the
tournament. Thirty (30) teams, 2 divisions, 400+ players and a hell of a lot of fun! The tournament has served as our main
fundraiser to support the Kelowna Ultimate Players Society
www.kelownaUltimate. com league. In the past 2 years organisers were members of the Okanagans ‘Bush- Fire’ women’s team and the men’s ‘Sofa Kings’ who competed at CUC in Calgary and Winnipeg. This year, we will be rais- ing money to help local members attend the World Ultimate Club Championship in Prague with Vancouver’s ‘Zephyr’. Like many others, Sunflicker began as a small tournament hosting 12 teams in 2003. Bellinghams’ ‘Bezerker Piggy’ were victorious in taking the inaugural title. Since then the tournament has slowly grown into one of the biggest tournaments in Western Canada. This year, Kelowna will
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be playing host to teams from Regina, Saskatoon, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, Victoria and Prince George. In 2010, the tournament had 26 confirmed teams as of mid-march. Why do people keep coming back emailing us in January to find out when Sunflicker is on? • The ample delicious field food, much of which
is organic. There is always a mix of healthy and more treat-like food, snacks, and drinks. The fields are of high qual- ity and the facilities clean. With two disc centrals, players are well served. • The incredible camping and party site at Camp Owaissi on the West side of Kelowna on Friday and Saturday nights. Kups games, campfires, flippy cups, lake side camping, and showers are all there to enjoy on both nights with DJ JPod entertaining us on the cov- ered dance area on the Saturday night. A variety of tasty keg beverages are also included on Saturday night at the party. A BBQ with vegetarian op- tions and plenty of salads is provided on the Saturday night as well. This year’s BBQ will be held at the fields at the end of Saturday’s games. • A delicious Sunday morning pan- cake breakfast is by the Lions Rotary club to fuel our players for finals day and help recuperate self-inflicted pain.
• High calibre teams continue to play at Sunflicker as well as many spirited teams. The intro- duction of a spirit division has be- come popular and will now hopefully stay entrenched in Sunflicker, as a tournament that caters for all.
Ultimate Canada Magazine —
www.canadianultimate.com
This year, the first ever Steve Cox award will be announced. It is given to a Kelowna league player who has shown outstand- ing efforts in sportmanship, leadership and spirit of the game for the year. This award is decided upon by league members. Steve Cox is one of Kelowna Ultimate’s three founding members when about 16 people regularly showed up at the local col- lege fields with a light and a dark shirt for games of pick-up until dark. Sun, food, drinks, music, incredible
people and a little Ultimate? What more could you want for a Spring kick off? Look forward to having you out here. »U
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