What a Difference a Week Makes

Saturday we played in a tens tournament in Flagstaff, AZ. Tens is like regular rugby except there are only 10 players. This is supposed to open the field up a lot. But the fields were really narrow and short, so it didn't.

But let me back up a little. Friday everybody drove up to Flag. It's about a 2 hour drive. It took Joe and I about 3 hours because we got caught in traffic.

Once we got up there, we had a couple of beers with everyone and headed to bed. I had my normal sleep drama (meaning I got none). I fell asleep for an hour and then was wide awake.

Since we were sharing a room with Robbie and Steven I couldn't turn on the TV. So, I sat on the couch (it was a suite), surfed the Net and played Tennis and Jeopardy on my phone. I finally fell back to sleep around 4. But our wakeup was at 6:45. That means I got a whopping 4 hours of interrupted sleep. :-(

Fortunately, I didn't feel sleepy all day.

We played three games on Saturday. Instead of 40 minute halves, we played 15 minutes halves (thank God!). The team that took the field on Saturday was RADICALLY different than the week before. Everyone played with incredible intensity.

We hit harder. We dove for balls. We ran our asses off. And we competed against more experienced players.

I won't go through play-by-play of each game but I wanted to relate a happy story.

During the first game we were just a few meters from the try zone. Rickie threw the ball to me and I dove onto the ground behind what I thought was the try zone. It wasn't (trust me, the fields were marked oddly and it was difficult to determine the various lines on the field).

I heard people screaming, "Release the ball."

In my head I was thinking, "Why? I just scored."

But then I felt two guys trying to get over me and get to the ball. Joe came up, grabbed the ball and ran it in for a try! It's his first ever. So, it was pretty exciting for me. He didn't think it was a big deal.

Tens is a different animal than fifteens and I felt like I was out of position a lot. I also seemed to do way more tackling than I'm used to and my body is REALLY sore. I have brusies on my back, sides, arms and I think my entire left leg.

I weigh about 50 - 80 pounds less than everyone I was tackling (the smaller guys played on every team we DIDN'T play). So sometimes I couldn't bring the guy down. I could only contain them until help arrived. That's kind of frustrating.

The rest of the day was great. Everyone played so well. I could name each person on the field and write a whole post on how well they did, but I'm tired. Just know that everyone who walked onto the field played with a purpose and it showed. Many people throughout the tournament came up to us and complimented on how well we've improved since last year. That means a lot!

.... Today was the second day of the Rainbows Festival. It was nice, but I was tired. The highlight of the day was when John and Jacque brought Lilly -- our rugger baby. She's so cute!