Ultimate in Japan

Ultimate is a sport that mixes different sports together such as basketball and football. In Ultimate, the players have to use the flying disc instead of a ball. Ultimate sport was invented by Jared Kass and Joel Silver, who as a student at Columbia High School, New Jersey, USA organized the first ultimate games between the student council and the student newspaper in 1967-8.

History

Frisbee was introduced to Japan in 1969. Japan Flying Disk Athletic (JFA) was established in 1975 in Nagoya, and started meeting in 1976. In 1984, JFA changed to JFDA and this last one affiliated with World Flying Disk Federation (WFDF), which started to take part of the World Ultimate Meet. Today, the number of Ultimate players in Japan is more than 3,000. In 1992, the 6th world Ultimate championship tournament was held in Utsunomiya and the final match was broadcast by NHK-BS in real time. In 1995, GAIS accepted WFDF as an official member. In addition, Ultimate was adopted by sports class which the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology and other groups held and NHK broadcast ultimate in the program, "television-sports class". As a result, many people recognized Ultimate. More than 150 educational facilities adopted Ultimate as physical education. In 1996, at the Japan Flying Disk Athletic meet, players were able to get the cup of the Minister of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. JFDA dispatched players to the world meet and also held meets in cooperation with USA and Taiwan. In 2001 August, "World games", which was held in Akita Prefecture, adopted Ultimate as the official event. In this meet, the Japan team clinched 3rd place in Ultimate. In 2012, the world Ultimate meet was held in Sakai city for he first time in 20 years and 1,392 players took part in this meet. In 2013, IOC permitted WFDF as a semi-official association and took a step toward becoming an Olympic event. Tanaka, who is a Japanese player and a member of Japanese Ultimate team Buzz Bullets, went to Taiwan and teach ultimate to many people to spread Ultimate. As of 2014 July 20, the number of member nations and areas of WDFD is 57. But this number of member nations and areas does not reach the standard of official event that IOC judges as an Olympic event. From then on, Ultimate has been spreading to all over the world.[1]

National Championships

Although in 2013, four official national championships of Ultimate took place, in 2014, two new ones were added.

Japanese National Team

The Japanese National team has a long and storied history placing 1st at the world championships many times. As of January 18, 2015 the World Flying Disc Association has the Japanese team ranked: 5th in Men's Ultimate, 1st in Women's and 3rd in Mixed.[2]

References