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World Junior Ultimate Championships in Poland
The World Junior Ultimate Championships in Poland was a whirlwind World Flying Disc Federation event in the beautiful city of Wrocław! Not all is as it appears however: Polish pronunciation was one of our favorite challenges of the event and by the end of the week we had down the the name of the city (pronounced like "frot-suave") and the word for thank you - dziękuję (pronounced like "jun-koo-ya"...sort of).
Wrocław also happened to be the 2016 Capital of Culture which was a well-deserved title judging by the beautiful city, apparently constant events in the main square, and incredible street art all over! We were lucky to merchandise WJUC in such an amazing location!
The week-long event certainly kept our staff on our toes. Our problem-solving skills were put to the test when we had to construct racks out of metal pipes that were sturdy enough for all the sweet VC and Lookfly gear! Not to mention weather ranging from hot and humid to chilly and windy to torrential downpour; we had to be ready for anything!
Two of our favorite things from the week: starting a VC Snapchat account (Follow us! "vcultimate") and giving away Trivolle sets all week to all the junior teams. Not only are these young athletes amazing ultimate players - they're also hilarious and very good at Trivolle! Thanks to Trivolle for donating sets to these teams from all over the world, they're definitely going to good homes.
Best night of the week: trade night. A crazy downpour cut the night's activities short, but not before we got to run around in these crazy human hamster balls:
Finally, a great week in Poland was capped off with the Canada boys taking home silver and our Canada ladies winning gold in an exciting final against USA! So proud of our juniors teams.
Thanks to everyone who helped put on this amazing event - we can't wait for another opportunity to visit Poland!
World Ultimate and Guts Championships in London
U23 World Championships 2015 by London was just so fun, we couldn't stay away! This past June we returned to the same fields in St. Albans for the World Ultimate and Guts Championships 2016.
We started the week making friends with an adorable cart who we dubbed "Herbie" named after the 1960's Love Bug. Herbie did a great job helping us transport our merch to and from our tent each day, but we wore him out a bit by the end of the week! Thanks for all the hard work, Herbie!
One of the most interesting parts of the week for our staff was learning about GUTS - it's a terrifying game! We decided it's very appropriately named. The USA team was looking super fly in their full-sub VC jerseys, but as for our staff....we'll be sticking to ultimate.
Unfortunately, Thursday games were almost all cancelled due to an intense downpour with crazy flooding. Luckily, we had Adriana's nephew Otis with us for Friday to make up for lost time! Otis was a champion at giving away stickers and high fives, so we went into the finals on a high note!
A location change for the finals did add some extra complications for the last day - especially when the staff sent to pick up gear at the original site 20 minutes away forgot to bring the container key. It ended up being a pretty awesome stadium though so it was totally worth it!
Shout out to Team Canada for rocking our jerseys all week - these were some of our favorite designs ever! If you missed your chance to pick up some sweet swag, you can still order Team Canada gear here, or WUGC fully sublimated gear here. Cheerio, London - until next time!
Design
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Do's & Don'ts of Copyright Law and Fair Use
About VC
Tracie Ching: Five Years as a Design Mastermind
January 2016 marks five years of Tracie Ching designing jerseys for us! Tracie has made some amazing designs across the years, in particular the sublimated designs from our international World Flying Disc Federation tournaments. Check out her story: a glimpse at what it's like to be an artist in the ultimate community! Should we call it artimate? Probably not, but still.
What was it like when you joined VC 5 years ago? What's the story - how did you get connected with the company?
In 2011, VC hosted one of its first sublimated design contests. I didn't know it then, but the contest was one of the earlier attempts to suss out talent for VC's first design team. Funny thing is I lost that contest, but I guess VC liked my design enough to invite me back to submit something for a team. Once again, my design wasn't chosen, but I was invited to join the team regardless, which should serve as a lesson that success does not always manifest as you might think. Talent and a good work ethic can and will be rewarded!How did your history as an artist and ultimate player uniquely suit you to designing for VC?
I actually had no official design training. I went to school for fine art with a concentration in mixed media sculpture. I had a minor in printmaking but somehow never managed to touch silkscreen. But in being the "artsy" one, I was often asked to help designing jerseys for my college team, and later my league teams. It was one of my old captains who recommended I submit to the VC contest and it was at that time I had started to dabble in design. VC really helped me hone those skills so in truth we grew together.
Has the company changed a lot in 5 years? What's been the biggest change for you?I think VC has always had a reputation synonymous with quality, and that really hasn't changed. The big difference is that reputation is now international. I think VC's strong presence has been felt, and resonated, in many corners of the world. I feel grateful to be part of a company that has grown into such an excellent ambassador to the sport of ultimate frisbee.
What are a few of your favorite designs/projects you've worked on?That is really tough. Team-wise: I loved helping create Team Danmark's 2015 subs (top pictures). And the Team Canada subs from 2013 and 2015 always stand out in my mind. Special project-wise: I can't get enough of the Dia de los Muertos from our World Class Collection (pictured below).
Who in the whole world, past or present, would you most like to design a jersey for, and what would you put on it?Since starting this job I have always harbored a dream of designing gear for one of the first ultimate teams to play in the Olympics.
Good Good luck achieving that dream Tracie, we believe in you! If you'd like to see more of Tracie's art, you can check out her website or Facebook page!
Tournaments & Events
VC 2015: A Year in Review
2015 is coming to a close, but it's been a wild ride! We've had a lot of exciting news and a lot of fun events this year, and while we're thankful for all of that we're even more excited to see what 2016 brings. Check out our 2015 year in review!
We started the year with our WFDF announcement - we're the official merchandisers for the World Flying Disc Federation for 2015 and 2016!
This year our USA office out of Atlanta went to a whopping 130+ tournaments between the VC and Spin brands! Wow! In February one of the events was Trouble in Vegas where our staff were enchanted to meet this capybara, Romeo; basically a giant guinea pig. #onlyinvegas
We also had the pleasure of merchandising the first-ever USAU Beach Nationals. Virginia Beach was a great time, maybe the most fun being all our VC Funzone beach games!
In June we had a very exciting announcement: our merger with UK company Lookfly! We now officially have a VC Europe branch and some electric new plans for a Lookfly revamp.
June also gave us a fun giveaway day with the Toronto Elites club. We gave away free sublimated samples of some of our favorite designs - earned through Spikeball games and joke-telling. Everyone loves free sub jerseys!
U23 in London kicked off our summer European tour. We met a lot of amazing young players from all over the world and saw some really exciting competitive ultimate.
EUC in Copenhagen brought more great European ultimate. Since Denmark is known for their bacon, we hosted a memorable night of fun with our Beer, Bacon, and SpikeBall tournament.
EYUC was the last of our European summer tour; what a great note to end on! We saw some incredible youth players - the future of ultimate looks bright indeed!
Back on our home turf, we wrapped up the Canadian season with CUC in Winnipeg. It was lovely to be among some of our favorite Canadian teams again.
Our final destination tournament of the year was PAUC in Cancun, Mexico. Even though it was the rainy season and we had some new obstacles to overcome, these amazing positive teams made it all worthwhile!
In this next year, we're looking forward to new product development and our continued contract with WFDF. Keep an eye out for new designs for bigger, better events, like WUGC 2016 back in London. Here's to an exciting new year!
Tournaments & Events
2015 VC Ultimate Mix Championships in Japan
VC is very excited to support the upcoming 2015 VC Mixed Championships in Japan on December 19-20! Ultimate is huge in Japan, in part because of the efforts of Club Jr, who work tirelessly to organize tournaments for every division of player. The VC team has had the chance to meet with the fine folks from Club Jr - including the always smiling Satoru Ishii - for many international events. We were thrilled when the opportunity arose to partner and create the VC Mixed Championships!
There will be 17 amazing teams at the VC Mixed Championships.One of the best parts about merchandising tournaments like this is giving back to some amazing communities and exceptional ultimate players.
USA, World, and PAUC champions (and one of our favorite teams) Drag'n Thrust receiving both champion shorts and Spirit of the Game hats at the 2015 Pan American Ultimate Championships.
For the inaugural VC Mix Championships, Club Jr and VC have something special in mind!
We are so excited for this event that our founding director, Adriana Withers, and the tournament organizer, Akihiko Yoshida, each wanted to share a greeting with all the players about to participate in this event:
Dear 2015 VC Ultimate Mix Championship players,
VC Ultimate is so proud to be working with Club Jr to bring you this amazing new event. Having 17 teams in our inaugural year shows the strength of your Ultimate community and we are excited to be associated with each and every competitor. I have personally been lucky enough to meet many players from Japan at different tournaments around the world and have enjoyed the spirit, energy and impressive skill that you bring to our sport.
Japan is such a beautiful country that it is an honor to be able to draw inspiration from Japanese culture and nature for VC designs.
Your friends at VC are all wishing you the best of luck for this event and I hope you enjoy playing in the 2015 VC Ultimate Mix Championships as much as I have enjoyed working on it!
Warm regards,Adriana
Adriana WithersFounding DirectorVC Ultimate Inc.
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We're very excited to host first ever mixed tournament for college/high school players.
We're thankful to have about 300 players in this inaugural event.We expect to have 500 players within 5 years and 1,000 players in 10 years.
We appreciate generous support of VC Ultimate.We would like to invite Ms. Adriana to the event in the future.
Thank you very much.Truly Yours,
Akihiko YoshidaCLUB Jr. Inc. Founder/Owner
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Update: Year one was a smashing success! Thanks to all the organizers, volunteers, and players who made our first year so exciting!
About VC Products
Women's Cut Shorts "Make the Cut"
To note: Our "women's" shorts have since been thoughtfully re-designed to be gender-free. You can now order shorter shorts labelled as "Shorter" or "Jr", but the width/waist of the shorts is relatively the same as the Standard cut in each style.
EUC 2015: The VC Crew Takes Over Copenhagen
The European Ultimate Championships took place in Copenhagen this year much to the excitement of the VC summer Europe event staff! After wrapping up a busy and exciting week in London for U23 Worlds, our crew packed up our van full of merch and supplies and drove across Europe all the way to Denmark for this next big event.
Upon arrival, the EUC crew was already hard at work with site features such as a gigantic circus tent for the main food hall and a fascinating Pallet Palace for players to lounge on and around. Our team set up as quickly as possible with only a few days before the opener: we had a whole city to explore on our rented bicycles, after all!
The event began Monday, July 27th, and in preparation for the onslaught of first day customers, EUC was kind enough to send some staff our way to help out. They also were dressed in bright yellow VC jerseys, so of course they were lovingly referred to as our very own minions:
Unfortunately for players and staff, the weather was very unpredictable. Each day seemed to be a crazy combination of hot/cold/sunny/rainy – hard to figure out for us, but apparently fairly typical for Danish summers.
Heinrich (our little buddy from Amsterdam) getting a bit of a shower :
The highlight of the week for us was our Wednesday night Beer, Bacon, and (spike)Ball tournament! We gave away a whopping 8 kegs and 5 kg of bacon that day as players competed in a TriVolle (European Spikeball) tournament. We also may have had some wooden folding tables as casualties of the evening.
This is what happens when you make bacon in foil trays with hot coals. Heinrich also go to partake in the festivities.
We also managed to check out some pretty sweet places in Copenhagen while we were there. VC Staff Copenhagen Recommendations:
Little Mermaid Statue (although G tells us it’s much smaller than you’d think)The Red Square (in Superkilen) – full of street art, "local color" (pun intended)Copenhagen Street Food – food truck market, delicious!Christiania – for a little more adventureTivolle – for the rides, concerts, and ambiance!
We were sad to leave Copenhagen at the end of this event, especially with a super beautiful day for the finals! However, our staff had to get a move on since EYUC was a 9 hour drive away in Frankfurt and started the next morning. On to the next event!
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