Feb. 19, 2025 correction: An earlier version of this article was missing the year of the U-24 Championships that Shilts has been recruited for. The year is now clarified in the sentence: “A few weeks after she graduates, she is heading to the 2025 Under-24 World Ultimate Championships.”

When the disc is in the air, it doesn’t magnetically come to fourth-year Abbi Shilts as if it’s meant to be in her hands. The streak of white glides softly against a background of dewy grass and a cloudless blue sky, belonging to no one. 

Shilts, however, makes it hers. She jumps higher than her opponent, who is also fighting for a grip on the slippery white disc, and pulls it from its peaceful flight. Seconds later, Shilts and her opponent are on the ground, but the disc is still in Shilts’ left hand.

She made this catch in her team’s end zone, winning Shilts’ team a point against UC Santa Barbara. Later, it won her “2022 Catch of the Year,” ordaining it as the most epic, jaw-dropping catch in the entirety of ultimate frisbee for the year.

Shilts is one of the star players of UC San Diego’s Division-I women’s club frisbee team, known as Dragon Coalition or D-Co. D-Co has qualified for college nationals in three of the last four years and won the title in 2019. Their success has continued into this year; at the end of the 2024 spring season, D-Co was ranked No. 15 in the Division-I bracket. Shilts’ other accolades include winning “2022 D-I Rookie of the Year” in her freshman season and making it to the finals for the “2023 Throw of the Year,” both awarded by the ultimate media outlet Ultiworld.

Just hearing her accomplishments, Shilts may seem like a serious, strictly-business person, or at least exhausted from balancing being a computer science major and playing competitive ultimate frisbee. 

During her interview with The UCSD Guardian, however, Shilts was a smiley, a self-proclaimed “goof” who was preparing for a weekend of playing at LeiOut, a party tournament in Orange County. There are no demons behind her single-minded focus — just a desire to jump higher, run faster, and get that disc into the end zone. This passion has taken Shilts around the world: A few weeks after she graduates, she is heading to the 2025 Under-24 World Ultimate Championships, representing USA Ultimate for the second time in a row.

At the 2023 U-24 World Championships, Shilts’ tenacity was on display in humid Nottingham, England. Team USA glided through pool play, but their biggest competition was Japan, and they were now facing them in the semifinals. 

The last point before halftime began with Japanese possession, but America’s defense pushed them to the sideline, cutting off Japan’s open side and leading to an incomplete pass. With the disc in her team’s hands, Shilts headed deep for a huck, but when the disc stayed near the midline, she sprinted halfway down the field towards the open side. The handler let off a wide forehand, and Shilts dove. Her body crashed to a stop a few feet from the sideline, but with the disc in hand, she quickly got back on her feet and passed it upline. The USA mixed team won that point, that game, and ultimately, that championship.

Shilts’ success in Nottingham wasn’t just limited to winning gold. One of the most unique aspects of ultimate frisbee is that it doesn’t have referees, rather, every player has the responsibility to uphold “the spirit of the game.” Players make their own calls and solve conflicts between themselves — even on the world stage. Of the hundreds of players that try out for the U-24 USA team, the 60 or so chosen are selected for their spirit and teamwork, on top of their skill. One of Shilts’ points of pride is that at the 2023 U-24 Worlds, her team won the “Spirit of the Game” award, countering the United States’ reputation for relatively low sportsmanship in international tournaments. “Everyone was there to play for each other,” Shilts remarked.

Shilts’ career highlights don’t end there. Around the same time that Shilts was trying out for the 2023 U-24 USA team, she found a local opportunity to develop as a player: going pro. That winter, Shilts made it on Super Bloom, San Diego’s professional women’s frisbee team, as a practice player. Though Super Bloom players don’t get paid much — Shilts estimates she’s getting paid $30 for the entire year — they don’t have to pay for any of the expenses associated with the sport, like hotels and transportation. And the intensity with which they play could help take Shilts to new heights in the sport.

But you can’t climb the rungs of ultimate frisbee without losing your grip a couple times. Super Bloom’s season coincides with D-Co’s, so joining the team meant more high-level practices every week and less of a break between intense workouts.

Shilts got a lot of playtime at her D-Co tournaments, competing in three to four games in a day, 40 minutes each. Then, after two days of intense matches, she attended the four weekly practices she had for both D-Co and Super Bloom, sometimes even attending two on the same day. 

At a tournament in Stanford, Shilts sprained her ankle but kept playing. Her excuse was that the tournament was right before Week 10 of Winter Quarter, so she would have a break over the following week, Finals Week, and spring break. 

“I was like, ‘Oh my god, it’s perfect. It’ll just fix itself over these three weeks,’” Shilts said.

A minor concussion took her out for a week, and she tried to keep her shin splints under wraps. She also experienced some issues with her calf, but she stretched as best she could and kept playing. “It just was, like, unpleasant sometimes,” Shilts nonchalantly recalled.

Eventually, she had had enough. Shilts planned how to incorporate rest days and safely manage the intense schedule. She communicated with her coaches about having a healthy amount of play time, developed a training program, and learned to listen to her body when it tells her to skip a practice. After a late-night workout, she started to stay up to drain her legs before bed.

“Now, I know when my body feels this way, I need to do this in order to help it recover faster,” she said. 

Last year, Shilts became a rostered player for Super Bloom. The Super Bloom coaches were clear that D-Co and her college season should come first. When there was a tournament for both teams on the same day, Shilts admits she was tempted to go to both, but her Super Bloom coach, knowing the strain it would put on Shilts, stopped her from going to their tournament.

Shilts has been bringing that relentless drive into the 2025 ultimate season.

“I think [D-Co is] going to nationals this year. … I’m gonna fight like hell to make sure we get there,” she said.

Shilts has achieved a lot in her ultimate career, but there’s still more she wants to do: win a national tournament, make the adult national team, and win the adult world championships.

“I think the sport has been a big part of my life … and it’s something that I continue to see myself growing in,” Shilts said. “I don’t think I’m done here.”

When it comes to the mental stress of playing at the top of a sport, Shilts is unbothered. The pressure makes her play better, perhaps because she has a simple reason for why she’s doing all of this in the first place: “It’s fun.” She enjoys running around and exercising, and she loves her teammates. It’s not easy to balance being a top athlete and a student, but Shilts can’t imagine what she would want to do instead. 

“I honestly don’t know what I’d do with myself if I had more free time. I guess I’d go to the beach,” Shilts said. “But I think I’d rather play frisbee.”