Two recent sciency articles related to ultimate:

Throwing Techniques for Ultimate Frisbee

A short comparison of throwing techniques based on measuring several characteristics of disc flight (speed, spin, wobble and accuracy). The study compared backhands, split-grip forehands and closed-grip forehands. The only differences they found were that split-grip forehands don’t go as fast when you’re throwing hard, and backhands have more spin when you don’t throw them hard. The participants were grouped into “elite” and “non-elite” throwers (based on their answers to a survey, I think) but the results held for both groups. The only difference between the groups was that elite throwers can throw the disc harder. It’s a pretty good study overall, though you have to take it with a grain of salt. The sample size was small (5 elite throwers, 11 non-elite throwers), the accuracy is pretty meaningless (the target was 2.5 meters from the thrower), and the setup was not game-like at all (the authors admit that their results could be affected by the throwers being careful to avoid hitting the expensive camera equipment). Despite that, it’s good to see the light of science being shined on ultimate.

Power Rankings in Ultimate

More talk about the ranking system. Being a data nerd, I love stuff like this (the winter league I run ranks teams using this power ranking algorithm, not straight results).