So I'm checking out the high school girls rugby photos at DropKickPhotos (because I think it's just awesome to see young girls playing rugby! COME TO AU!) and I think this is ABSOLUTELY RIDICULOUS.

So much for standing water on the field!!

PRU U23 All-Stars 2007

Guys. Guys. Did I ever tell you how rugby is my favorite thing ever? And ruggers are my favorite people ever?

This weekend I went down to UVA in Charlottesville to play for the PRU U23 All-Star team in the MARFU tournament. For those of you to whom that means very little, basically I got to play select-side rugby with some totally awesome girls.

AU had eight girls selected (six plus one alumni plus one alternate), so we set off together in Garthie and Petrides' cars early in the morning Saturday. Once to the pitch, we engaged in (true to AU form) spooning and karaoke, before doing a walk-through with the whole team. Then we kit up and watched EPRU beat VRU2.

Once that game was over, we warmed up and prepared for our game vs. VRU1. I started at flanker, and played for a half. I was... well, not really happy with how I played. I cleaned it up somewhat before I was taken out at the 40, but still wasn't very happy with myself. The whole team was a little off, I think largely due to the fact that we didn't get any practice time together (last tryout was last Sunday, and it's logistically difficult to get girls from all over the area together for a weekday practice). The more we played, the better we look, but we basically got rolled over.

Not too disheartened, however, we all showered up at the hotel and then met at the Mellow Mushroom to fuel up for Round 2 vs. VRU2. In the evening, a bunch of us hung out and watched Free Willy 2 (that movie is surprisingly dirty, if you watch it with the right people). Afterwards, we tried to go hot-tubbing, but it being closed, a group of us ended up sitting in the "exercise room" just chatting for an hour or two before bed.

Sunday dawned bright and a little warmer than Saturday, and we rolled out of the hotel at 9am for our game playing VRU2. I didn't start (I was not surprised, considering how I'd performed the day before), but all the AU kids that hadn't started yet were in the starting lineup (even our alternate!). The game was much closer and much better played than the day before, but we still lost by two tries. I got in for the last 20 minutes and (go figure) played about ten times better than I did on Saturday.

And as Tosan said after the end of that, "Losing ain't a loss unless you don't learn from it." There's a lot I have to work on before the beginning of next season and before I go to MARFU tryouts in the spring, and a lot for the team to work on together. Definitely not a loss.

Then it was kitting down, a flurry of pictures, and back in the Garthmobile for the trip home. And my season is officially, completely over - I won't get to play rugby again until February. Depressing.

But I'll still get to play with ruggers! This weekend was an amazing experience not just for the gameplay, but for all the awesome girls I got to hang out with on and off the pitch. I'm totally looking forward to seeing them at games and tourneys and socials in the spring, and hopefully hanging with some of them before then!

I just took 2 ibuprofen.

Then, ten minutes later, totally forgetting I'd taken the ibuprofen, I took 2 dayquil.

My body is kind of spazzy and dizzy feeling, and I'm running a baby temperature.

More importantly, PRU HASN'T SENT OUT SELECTIONS YET!!!!

6:30 my ass.


ETA: THEY SENT THEM! I AM ON THE TEAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

AAAAAAAAAAHHHH PRU U23 2007!!!!!


ETA2: Okay, now that I have calmed down - I should point out my pride in AU's representin'. Out of the 22, we have SIX players (two of them ROOKIES) and ONE alumni, and one of the four alternates. That's like a quarter of the team! MAN AM I EXCITED!!!!

Oh, abusive lover

Last night I had so much trouble sleeping, as my plague-touched mind kept running through rugby scenarios (you're in a tackle, place the ball, get up off the ground, get back in the game, hit the ruck, back ten for a penalty, etc etc) and refused to settle down for some rest. Then at 7am I inexplicably woke up again, and the brain went straight back into rugby mode.

Sigh.

So I got up and did my gay class readings and found some breakfast and was internally whiny about how miserable I was (I have some sort of cold/flu/plague thing) and then packed up my shit for - another day of rugby! PRU U23 tryouts.

Three or four hours of passing drills and contact drills and scrumming and lineouts and full-on scrimmaging. I almost completely forgot about the plague and threw myself into it and I think I did okay. Wasn't my best playing ever - I couldn't hold onto the ball for love or money in one of the drills, my tackles were too high in the scrimmage, and I had some trouble locking - got folded in half by an amazing opposing prop.

Well, selections are supposed to be out by 6:30... I will sit here, plaguey and sore, and wait.

Feeling good

So life is pretty damn good right now. So what if I didn't get any of the work done today that I planned on; it was just working ahead anyways. So what if I was working ahead because I have a rugby game (OUR LAST GAME AND ONLY HOME GAME!!!!!) and PRU tryouts this weekend, and a 10-page paper due Monday. So what if I have another 10-page paper due the Monday after that, the Monday after I may be in Virginia all weekend playing rugby if I make the U23 team. So what if this is the fifth sentence in a row I began with "so".

I'm feeling good.

I'm feeling good about rugby. We had fitness testing Tuesday, and even though I'm only average on most of it (sit-ups, push-ups, other tests that Deanna pulls from lord knows where), I beat everyone in the beep test. Didn't do as well as when I took it this time last year, but that could be a number of things (it was fucking cold, it's a little awkward to keep running with the whole team watching you and no one to run against). I realized a few weeks ago that I was kind of mentally standing on my heels and not putting as much into my playing as I could be, so I stepped it up, and I think that showed at Navy on Sunday.

And I'm feeling good about Navy. We lost 0-75 but you would not have known it. We played hard and well. We came up hard on defense and it showed in the number of scrums we got for Navy knocking on the ball. We dominated in the scrum - which showed in two brilliant 5m scrums that we pushed into the try zone (no try off of it, but Coach Amy called it "the best tactical rugby I've ever seen this team play", and man was it beautiful to see those tough Navy girls bent up double and helpless as we pushed them back). And we hit hard enough that Navy got whiny and slow in the end of the second half, calling for minutes and switching players in and out. Total catharsis for last year's mess.