TliL LESBIAN BALL OF THE YEAR!
f o r ( L o s e w i(li e x q u i s i t e t a s t e
S aturday , A pril 61"
9:00 pm — 2:00 am
A lcoLol A v a ila L L
du ffel
t o min taLle rliat in a com fortaLle, intimate
su rro u n d in g witli tlie w om an of your rLoice
Diving for gold
National racquetball champion Julie Bulrice
has a couple of partners to thank
by
$50
$35
A d vance
t
ulrice initially competed in singles tourna
ments but jokingly notes she convinced
herself she was “too old and too fat” to play
the more intense opponents. “Honestly, 1 enjoy
the camaraderie of playing doubles,” she adds.
"In singles...people tend to he much more
competitive and focused. There’s much less fun
and teasing and banter— the stuff that for me is
fun on a racquetball court.”
Bulrice teamed with Shipm an in June
2000 after recovering from foot surgery that
took her out of the sport for a year. They had
met at previous tournaments in Oregon and
always had thought it would be fun to play
together.
She maintains she wasn’t sure what she was
getting into when signing up for nationals. She
and Shipman kept winning at other competi
tions, st) she simply thought it would be fun.
Bulrice credits her racquet partner as the
motivation behind their trip to the top tourna
ment in the country. “Cheryl has been playing
much longer than me,” Bulrice admits, “and
knows all of the ins and outs. I just feel like a
country bumpkin when it comes to racquetball.
I don’t feel like I really know the rules, and I’m
just a geek.”
Ignorance might have been bliss in this
case, though. “Cheryl said, ‘Let’s go to nation
als,’ and 1 was like, ‘Oh yeah, sure, OK,’ ” the
champion laughs.
Bulrice also gives Shipman credit for
refining her natural talent. “When we first
started...she definitely challenged me to
become a much better player— to play much
more aggressively and much more strategically,
and 1 started diving more,” she says.
“There’s...maybe two other women who play
in the level I play who dive. The guys dive, hut
most women don’t.”
She says support from her domestic partner,
Jan, also has contributed to her success. “I am
so lucky. I would never in my life have the
patience. I mean, she comes to all my tourna
ments and watches me play and hangs out all
day long. She’s an angel."
B
ulrice admits to having a sense of numb
ness and uncertainty about her future in
racquetball now that she and Shipman
have reached the peak of competition.
“Really, the next step for me at the level
Cheryl and I play at is to go professional. But
again, back to the age thing. At 40 years old
there aren’t a lot of professionals who are start
ing their careers," Bulrice remarks.
S o for now she is concentrating on her
work overseeing and planning the new soft
ware training for Nike employees worldwide
and is talking with other women in the rac-
quetball community about putting together a
tournament in support of breast cancer
research.
“We’d try to bring in a couple of women
pros and just make it a women’s event— try to
do some skill building and lessons and sessions,"
Bulrice exclaims. “You can do scrambles and all
kinds of stuff to just make it fun and introduce
the sport to more women to play." JH1
M elissa S ayler is the Production Assistant and
resident left-handed sports lezzic at Just Out.
I ) f London
A t (f le D o o r
LesLian
4876 NW
R ar
detliany dlvd.
P ortland, O R
R S V P R eq u ested
F or W
f orm al
D a n ce rs
(casli only)
M elissa S ayler
hen Portlander Julie Bulrice began
playing racquetball 15 years ago, she
had no idea she would end up the
2001 national women s doubles cham
pion or a national mixed doubles champ.
“It all just sort of happened, and 1 don’t
really knew how. I’ve never had a goal for
myself to get really good at racquetball—
thinking, i ’m gonna win state, I’m gonna
win regionals, and I’m gonna win
nationals,’ ” she says.
Bulrice entered the sport by random chance
in the mid-’80s. She was living in Seattle at
the time, and her ex happened to manage a
health club that was sponsoring a racquetball
tournament. “They didn’t have enough women
to play in the beginning bracket,” she explains.
The ex encouraged her to play, “and I did,
and I won.... I said to myself, ‘Well, I guess I
can do this.’ ”
That willingness to try something new ulti
mately landed Bulrice and her racquet partners,
Cheryl Shipman and Brad Hardy, gold medals
at the Ektelon/U.S. Racquetball Association’s
34th National Doubles Championships last
October in Las Vegas.
Men’s and women’s teams in the tourna
ment can chw se to play by skill or age levels.
Shipman and Bulrice won in the Women’s
Skill Division A, and Hardy and Bulrice won
in the Mixed Skill Division B.
Not only did the women, both in their 40s,
play and dominate over competitors in their
20s and 30s, but Bulrice also played with a bro
ken thumb inflicted while diving for a shot.
B
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O peratic an d Piano C oncert
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