If you have glanced at the New York Times, ESPN or even The Stanford Daily, you have most definitely seen sports and athletes grabbing attention in the headlines. Football. Basketball. Soccer. Andrew Luck. They have each had their share of inspirational stories and quotes plastered all over the front pages.

As you skim through those papers or begin changing the channel to catch SportsCenter, you may realize one of your favorite childhood memories has faded away to the periphery of the sports spectrum. Some people may argue that Ultimate Frisbee, an obscure yet physically demanding sport, does not receive the magnitude of recognition it deserves. I’ve come to agree.

Growing up, I never put much thought into Frisbee beyond the backyard. I’ll admit, I thought a flick of the wrist and a buddy to pass the disk around with was all it took. I never thought about Frisbee as a competitive sport. I laughed when I heard the team here at Stanford conditioned more than teams back home. Little did I know, the members of the Stanford Ultimate team have dedicated their lives and bodies to the rigors of Frisbee. I had seen it as nothing more than a cherished pastime.

Memories of tossing around a disk as a child led me to Roble Field to immerse myself into the true Frisbee culture for the first time. As a part of Stanford’s High School Summer College program, I and other students frequently have the chance to participate in pick-up games of ultimate.

I arrived at Roble for the first Tuesday night session in my jean shorts and flip-flops, prepared for some old-fashioned, relatively stationary fun. As I looked around, I saw nothing less than athletic apparel and a couple pairs of cleats. Needless to say, I felt a little unprepared. I had officially experienced an ultimate culture shock.

Although I was a little underdressed for the occasion, I picked up a Frisbee and gave it a toss. When I turned around, the rest of the group was already splitting up into teams and began running up and down the length of the grass field. As a favor to my delegated team, I sat the first half out.

I finally had the concepts and rules of the game explained to me as I sat impressed on the sidelines. What I took from the brief conversation changed what I saw before me—a combination of three of the most common sports: football, basketball and soccer had been combined to create an ultimate sport, one that required the fundamental skills of each.

I gave the game a try in the second half. I loved it. I wondered to myself why a physically demanding and unique sport such as ultimate doesn’t have a professional team or fans lined up to buy tickets at games, just like the three other sports it evolved from.

As I learned more about the technicalities, the answer became simple: ultimate simply lacks the capacity to gain fan support in the same ways that the majority of other commonplace sports do. The excitement and physical action aren’t lacking in ultimate, and they aren’t responsible for its low-profile fan base. It has more to do, perhaps, with human infatuation.

It’s a difficult game for bystanders, because the players have a partial role as referees. In other words, they can help call their own shots. The lack of such a simple aspect of other popular sports can cause the viewer to be disappointed. This unofficial side of ultimate may be the cause of little publicity for the sport, but its relaxed touch can be entrancing, too. I experienced this exact feeling at my first and only pro ultimate game held in San Francisco a few weeks ago.

Although ultimate often struggles for fan and media support, there is definitely room for growth. The game is all about having a good time and getting some fresh air. It certainly caught my attention, and I know ultimate has a bright future.

Rachel Wolfard hopes to become the first-ever ultimate referee when the sport gets more popular acclaim. Help her invent new hand signals at wolfard “at” stanford.edu.