Hello, Festive Forest Dweller,
🏂 That time I invented a sport
You know those tiny throwaway lines in a draft that suddenly demand far more attention than they were ever supposed to get? That happened while I was editing chapter four of The Songs We Owe.
This snippet was the culprit:
A thought niggled at the back of my mind. The two of us, sitting here, waiting for a call from the hospital. “She chewed through half a plant once, when Jesper broke his ankle during a Speed Hoop Relay final. His teammate’s throw sent the ball through the hoop at an awkward angle. Jesper over-accelerated to make the catch. The tip of his hoverboard caught the wall and kicked out from under him...”
Seeing him drop like that, even knowing the warded, padded floor would catch him. “He forgot to tuck and roll.”
In the first draft, Jesper had simply broken his ankle "playing sports."
Which sounds terribly generic, doesn't it? It's fine as a placeholder, but it bothered me. I could have changed it to a hoverboard accident, since I'd already mentioned hovercarts and hoverbikes. But that's not where my brain went.
I started thinking about what kind of sport teenagers would play in this world of high-tech and magic. What if the accident happened during a competition?
Jousting came to mind, but with hoverboards instead of horses, and balls instead of lances. The problem is that jousting implies knocking down competitors, while I was imagining teammates, agility, speed, and precision.
After a lot of what-ifs, buts, and renaming to avoid trademark issues, Speed Hoop Relay was born. And then, as one does, I wrote a rulebook for it.
Which you can download here:
Speed Hoop Relay is a timed precision sport played on hoverboards in a standardised indoor court, where teams of six race through a six-minute relay run to score as many clean hoops as possible.
Played in three pairs—Starters, Followers, and Closers—the sport combines speed, aerial control, and teamwork as players throw (and catch) a tennis-sized ball through a sequence of wall-mounted hoops. Every catch changes the roles, only clean passes count, and every second matters.
(note: turns out what I thought was called jousting is really called Running at the Ring.)
✍️ What's Blaine working on?
Now that the rulebook is done, I can give Lillian and Michael's story my full attention again. But first, I'm going to enjoy this long holiday weekend by sleeping in and visiting our daughter and her new cats.
🙋🏻 Question of the week:
What is the best or funniest sports scene you've read? Feel free to email me, I love to hear what book grabbed your attention.
Until next week,
🐣 HAPPY EASTER! 🥚
Blaine
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