In addition to the offical University sports teams, SIUC’s ultimate Frisbee team, a registered student organization, offers both travel and physical fitness to its members.

Organized ultimate Frisbee has been at SIUC since the mid-1970s, according to Ian Weidner, a 1989 graduate and ultimate Frisbee player since 1985.

However, most of the current players have been playing for a year or less, a team member said.

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We welcome any level of experience, Jen Bedell, a graduate student in biochemistry, said. If they don’t know how to throw a Frisbee, we’ll teach them.

Women and men play the sport together, but low participation by females has kept SIUC from having a separate women’s team.

We would like to start a women’s team in the fall, Bedell said.

Right now we only have three or four women that come regularly.

Tara Doran said she started playing on the team when a friend gave her an extra incentive.

A good friend said to me, If you come out to practice I’ll buy you a beer.’ So I did, Doran said.

Other players participate for different reasons, ranging from the competiveness of the game to the physical fitness that it provides.

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The sport is played with seven players on a side.

Players advance the frisbee by throwing it down the field.

Physical contact is not allowed in the sport, and fouls are called when contact occurs, allowing the team that was fouled to maintain control of the disk.

A score of one point occurs when a team advances the disk across a goal line.

Unlike other sports, ultimate Frisbee does not use referees, so players are trusted to call their own fouls.

We focus on what we call the spirit of the game, Bedell said.

The people that play are really responsible.

Bedell, a three-year ultimate Frisbee player, said most tournaments are set up for four games in one day.

In that case, games usually last an hour and a half and are finished when one team reaches 15 points.

The team travels to several tournaments during the year, with expenses covered by the money the team receives for being an RSO and by fundraisers members have during the year.

In the summer, the team participates in club tournaments, which means teams can be made up of people who are not college students.

There also is a collegiate level that runs during the spring.