About the Photographer

I came to the sport of Ultimate Frisbee late. In 1996, I was less than a year out of Virginia Tech when I attended a GE training program down in Atlanta and met a guy named Viv who couldn't stop talking about the sport. He was so excited he had to police himself into only saying "UF", since most everyone got tired of the words "Ultimate Frisbee". Little did I know it, but I had been hooked.

I returned to Roanoke, VA and quickly found a pickup scene that played on fields under the Roanoke Star. I joined the crew there for a round robin tourney in Fredericksburg, but wanted to play in a "real" Ultimate tourney. That's when I discovered Choptank, the predecessor to Chesapeake Open.

I picked up with Hammerhead B since I was from out of town and no one knew me. We had fun at Choptank, but even more fun when we played savage for basically eight games straight at Sectionals a few weeks later and still manage to just miss the game to go to Regionals (we had 8 players for the first game only).

After traveling the world with GE for a couple years (and playing Ultimate in Puerto Rico, Paris, and Amsterdam), I finally played college Ultimate in grad school. Afterward, I came back to the DC area and partook of all the leagues that the local club, WAFC, had to offer. I also played on several Open and Coed teams that made it to Regionals, but never the big one.

I met my future wife, Jessica, while picking up with her team at a tournament. For Christmas 2005, she got me this wonderful DSLR camera and I got hooked on photography. I had always enjoyed taking pictures with point-and-shoot cameras (I got my first photo credit in 1989, a picture of St. Basil's Cathedral in Red Square in the former Soviet Union). The evolution of the DSLR made it possible for me to take pictures that were virtually instantaneous and could freeze the action like nothing I'd seen before. It took a few years to develop my skills, but I have since wedded my love for photography and my passion for Ultimate in UltiPhotos.

I really wish I had some good photos of myself playing when I was in my athletic prime and could actually get horizontal, or sky for a catch--something to share with my family as proof that I could do it, and as a good memory of my time playing this wonderful sport I first knew of as simply "UF".

I hope that you enjoy these galleries and the Ultimate moments that I have sought to capture from league play to the most competitive tournaments. If you like a moment that I have captured, please consider purchasing a photo or two as a gift or as permanent memory of your time playing Ultimate.

Best,
Kevin Leclaire