Golden Days Rugby Tournament 23 July

On 23 July we had our first 15s Rugby tournament in Alaska in Fairbanks. It was an absolute blast. 2 teams made the trip. The Matsu Maulers and the Anchorage Bears. The Bears are an all samoan team. It was a great day of rugby. All three matches had great highlights with solid hits, great passing and lots of hard solid running. We lost our first match to the bears, the maulers lost to the bears then we beat the maulers. I scored my third try for the season on a free kick. I tapped an went and broke 2 tackles for the try just left of the uprights. I also had a great hit but kind of felt bad about it afterwards. One of the Maulers centers, a big army infantry stud, kept running through our smaller backs all match. I was playing 8man and decided I was going to slow him down if I got the chance. Late in the second half, he got the ball off the scrum and I was chasing after him. I one of our guys tied him up, I was going to drop him with a hard hit. Sure enough, Dave tied him up and just before I laid a soild should hit, he dropped his head. I hit him on the back of his head with his head down. He screamed and dropped like a sack of potatoes, dropping the ball in the process. I thought I had broken his neck. Play just stopped around the area where he dropped. He ended up being okay but was taken out of the match on wobbly legs. It was a clean solid hit but I still felt bad about it. A few minutes later, the match was called as players started dropping like flies. I felt great, a bit tired but my legs were still working. Just a few years ago before I realized I had gout and before I started working out, I could never have played nearly 2 full matches without a sub.

Maulers ready to defend their goal from a penalty run.

Bears and Maulers in a scrum. Islander ref.

Lineout.

Come back here.

Abdel took a head to the eye in the first match and went to the hospital. I think he ended up with like 11 stitches and one hell of a shiner.

Skittles, our resident ridiculous 20 year old. It's hard to imagine that I used to be this kid a couple decades ago.

Aaron, our resident irish native. Kilts, long hair and cigars.

Here is the center that I hit a little too hard. Afterwards he told Schu, our captain, that he hasn't been hit so hard since playing superleague. I was brimming with pride.

Crazy legs Dave.