Congratulations to Gaby Craft for earning first place!! Brittany Daniel second, me third, and Terri Boyd Fourth! Great work ladies!
The original Fireball was the first pinball machine I ever played.
🎯 The Day
Full day of pinball, community, competition, and real-life movement that absolutely counts.
This wasn’t just finals—this was a full climb:
• Qualifying rounds
• Semifinals
• Finals
• Tiebreaker pressure
And every step of it required staying present, adjusting, and not letting one game define the next.
⚙️ Qualifying & Early Rounds
Built momentum the right way:
• Right out of the blocks, I suffered through a little frustration. Deadpool’s scoop fought me every step of the way on my first game. I managed to get little Deadpool multiball, but could not start a mode. I humbled along a bit and took a third.
• Stayed steady across the rest of my qualifying games
• Managed misses without spiraling
• Kept enough consistency to advance into semifinals
•No heroics needed yet—just solid, repeatable pinball.
🔥 Semifinals
This is where things tighten up.
Competitive group
Needed clean play to move on
Stayed composed and got through
➡️ Advanced to finals
Also—one of the coolest parts of the night:
Watching players you’ve seen grow up in the scene now competing right alongside you. That full-circle moment hits different.
🦈 Semi-finals — Game 1: JAWS (LE)
• Came out strong.
• Built into multiball
• Controlled chaos instead of chasing it
• Stayed locked in
🏁 Finished around 293M
👉 New personal high score on Jaws
That’s not luck—that’s progress showing up under pressure.
🚀 Semi-finals — Game 2: STAR WARS (Pro)
Started exactly how I wanted:
Skill shot
5 TIE fighters
Action button control
Strong setup → ~105M on Ball 1
Then it shifted:
Lost control on feeds
Couldn’t stabilize the table
Never got TIE Fighter multiball going
🏁 Finished around 167M
For context: My normal is 400M–800M
👉 This was the frustration moment
👉 I knew what needed to happen (regain control)… and couldn’t get it back in time
And that’s real. That’s tournament play.
🍔 Finals — Game 2: DINER
This is where the story flips.
Reset mentally
Played clean and patient
Took what the machine gave me
🏁 Finished 1.7M
👉 That game forced a tiebreaker
That’s composure. That’s growth.
⚔️ Tiebreaker — DEADPOOL
To determine who got a second or third place trophy.
I put up 37M fighting that confounding scoop again, the whole way.
Brittany edged it out in her third ball.
Close. Competitive. Well done Brittany.
🏆 Final Outcome
I walked away with a third place trophy, enjoyed the wonderful comradary with the other winners, and a full-body reminder of what competitive pinball really is.
📊 “Fitbit Doesn’t Understand Pinball” (But We Do)
Incidental Exercise Receipts
⏱️ ~5 hours active time
👣 7,607 steps
📏 3.38 miles
🔥 1,865 calories burned
❤️ Avg HR: 81 bpm (looks “light”… it’s not)
Because:
• Mental load is high
• Adrenaline spikes constantly
• You’re standing, shifting, bracing, resetting
👉 This is incidental exercise (NEAT) in real life
👉 This is exactly why pinball belongs in a wellness story
Still counts.
🧠 What This Tournament Shows
1. My ceiling is rising
That Jaws game proves it.
2. My recovery is improving
Star Wars didn’t end my night—Diner brought me back.
3. My baseline is strong
Even my “off” game kept you competitive.
4. I stayed in the fight
And that’s what gave me a shot at the finish.
💬 WWS Core Message
You don’t need a perfect tournament.
You need:
One strong game
One recovery game
And the ability to stay present when things go sideways
That’s how you get to finals.
That’s how you earn solid finishes.
Still counts. Always.
More WWS posts about DDPC in Arizona
Desert Dolls Pinball Collective – February Monthly
Desert Dolls Pinball Collective – March Monthly
Desert Dolls Pinball Collective – April Monthly
WWS Pinball home page
Women’s League Websites
Desert Dolls Pinball Collective