A Great Experience

From Feb. 28th-Mar. 2 I had the opportunity to travel down to Cocoa Beach, Florida to tryout for the USA Women's U20 National Rugby Team. I was one of 51 girls who got to tryout and we came from the 4 corners of the USA and everywhere in between. There were 15 girls there who had played for the national team last year when they went to England, so the competition was definently much more elevated than I've ever been around. This was a very physically demanding camp, or tryouts, we had 3-a-days where we literally woke up at 7am, breakfast at 7:30, practice from 9-11:30 or so lunch at noon, practice from 2-6:00, dinner at 7pm, practice from 7:30-9/9:30pm then lights out by 11pm. I woke up more stiff and tired every day and even for a couple of days after the tryouts. We did drills, speed testing, scrimmaging, and numerous other activites for the many coaches to get an idea of what each of us could do.
25 girls who make the better of the two teams go to South Africa, the other 25 girls are on the development team and they go to Canada...I won't find out until next week, after Easter, which team I made obviously hopefully the South Africa team but who knows. It was definently an eye-opening experience for me and especially when I came back to my BSU team...the caliber of play is completely different. But I'll let you guys know when I know which team I've made. So until then....

-Spence-