Goalball Tournament

Sorry for not posting for awhile, I have been really busy lately with finishing my homework, going to summer camps and getting ready for high school! Speaking of summer camps, this weekend I attended Camp Bloomfield for a goalball tournament. Camp Bloomfield is a summer camp founded by the Junior Blind of America. Camp Bloomfield is especially designed for kids who are visually impaired and blind. I have been coming to this camp for the past seven years. This year I have attended two sessions and last Thursday my mom received a call from the camp asking if I would like to attend another session for a goalball tournament!
It was a last minute call, they wanted me to go to camp the next day but I already had plans for Friday night. I went on a ghost hunt with my grandma! So I had to get up early to go to camp, and let me tell you it was not fun getting up early on a Saturday but it was worth it. Anyway, goalball is a sport for the visually impaired and blind. You need at least three people for this game. The court is shaped like a rectangle so one person is on the left and another person is on the right side of the court and one person is in the middle. Each player needs to wear elbow guards, knee pads, hip pads and blindfolds. The ball contains bells that make a lot of noise so you can hear the ball when it is in motion. The object of the game is to roll the ball into the other teams goal line. When the opposing team is trying to roll the ball into your goal you have to try to block with your whole body so the ball doesn't get in past the goal line. When I got there we had to start the tournament right away so I didn't even have time to practice but all the other teams had at least two hours of practice the day before. I didn't even know the people on my team and I also didn't know all the official rules, this was my first goalball tournament. My team's name was the Queen Bees. We lost the first game because we weren't used to each other and by the end of the day we were ranked last place. There were eight teams, four of them were girls and the other four were all boys teams. The boys and the girls team competed separately so our team only played against girls. The next day was the elimination games, we finally won our first game and the team we beat was eliminated. Our team was scheduled to play in the semifinals, the next team that wins would go on to being in the championship game. Before the game we started to practice because we really wanted to win and go to the championships. Even the number one ranked team came in and worked with us to improve our throwing and blocking. The score was 14 to 16, we lost but not by much. We did much better as a team and came from last place to third place in just two days. Everyone was proud of us, no one thought we would get that far but we proved them wrong. So as you can tell I had a great time and I hope I can participate in the next goalball tournament. Who knows maybe I will be on the next goalball national team and travel around the country!