A special event in our Ontario 4v4 Circuit, Young at Heart hosted 12 Masters teams at a new venue, Toronto Sportsplex. This was our first tournament in our new home on Railside Road, and we were happy to see several groups take advantage of the lounge to hang around and catch up afterwards.

Following WFDF Age brackets, players must be turning 30 years old as of 2019 if they are woman-identifying, or 33 years old as of 2019 if they are man-identifying.

A testament to this youthful but experienced group, our athletic therapist reported zero injuries that day other than one player that needed help stretching. This group knows how to take care of their body!

The tournament overall had a great vibe to it. You could feel it wandering around. There were people who had retired from touring who came back to give this a go and see familiar faces – some hadn’t played a tournament in years! Some people had never played a tournament but felt this was one that catered to them. Some had never played masters, and thought it was great to not have to chase around after the 19-year old’s. Many more were simply long time members of the community enjoying the friendly competition.

Wherever you looked, everyone was having a good time and we received more positive feedback after this event than ever before. Thank you all for making this so much fun!

In total there was 12 games decided by a single point. 40% of all games played were so close, it practically came down to the initial flip. Savvy veterans know though that nothing beats winning the flip that decides jersey colour!

The day kicked off with four of the six fields with those 1-point games, including an epic battle between ReBessarion and Freight Train To Glory. The Train took the win and could not be stopped, cruising to victory in their next 4 games as well, and ending with a competitive game versus Seasoned BCP.

Speaking of Seasoned BCP, they must have Colonel Sanders recipe, as they were on fire most of the day and even posted the highest scoring game of the day with a 22-11 victory over Torontosaurus Rex. They would dominate the battle of the Grandmasters teams as well, showing domination in their game against Oldish Gambino with an 18-8 win there as well.

New Kids on the Block (NKOTB) hit the field and made waves. Largely a mixture of recently-turned-masters players out to prove they have the experience to hold their own against this pack of wily vets, and there was more than one call for ID-checks to ensure that they were master’s eligible. Well warranted as they had one of the youngest male players in the tournament. In spite of their youthful legs, they would roll to a 2-win, 3-loss record on the day, giving up their last game of the day to Oldish Gambino in a 19-18 matchup.

While many people probably went home after the tournament to rest some weary bones, Dinner At 4 had two players who would go on and play all night in Toronto Ultimate Club’s all-nighter event. Crazy kids! 😉

The highest spirit marks of the event, by a wide margin, would go to Bulldogs. Always fun, the dogs would chase a lot of plastic throughout the day, but wouldn’t come away with a win until the very last time slot of the day. That obviously didn’t stop them from showing exemplary spirit throughout the event.

Though we set the official time of games to be 30-minutes long, with the option for a mutually agreed captain’s clause to extend it, we think we’ll look to set it longer in the future. Why? Because in the first time slot only a single team opted to extend it. By the last time slot, all 6 fields kept playing at the end of regulation play. People didn’t want the fun to stop!

A huge shout out goes out to Tarrah Fairweather (Last Minute Decision) and Rebecca Kawamura (Better Late Than Never) who both worked tirelessly to pull together teams in the 11th hour and help fill up the tournament. Thank you ladies for being willing to take on the hard work of organization! And thank you to all our captains for gathering your teams.

As a result of the success of this event, we have announced two further Masters Tournaments. We hope to see many of you back again!