One Grand Disc Golf Tour

01-25-09

Despite whatever it is in my right hip/lower back that has been bothering me for nearly 3 weeks, I decided to go ahead and play the club’s handicap.  My first drive was pretty ill-timed and it took most of the front 9 to find that timing.   Since the Turkey Lake dg complex has 4 loops of 9, we alternate each week for variety’s sake.  This morning’s handicap played the two front 9s, including the newly proposed alternate holes 457a.

By the time we got to T2’s front 9 (as our back 9 for the day) I had warmed up and went, birdie-2, eagle-2, par-3, birdie-2, birdie-4, eagle-ace, missed a 20’ putt for eagle-3, 3 putted bogey-4, birdie-2.  (From the red/short tees, of course)
The ace fund was a whopping $10. Woo Hoo!  I made more from my group on “51”.  It was my 85th ace.

Had I not whigged out my putting on #7 & 8, I probably would have won the handicap, despite a +7 handicap. (and I would have been –11 on that 9 hole loop!!) But I got 4th, two strokes off the leader.

To show you how extensive my photo collection is…A couple of weeks ago, a friend of mine name Duncan hit an ACE at the TL handicap.  I happened to have my laptop with me that day.  Before Duncan had even left the park, I had sent this photo to his email account.

A freestyler buddy who lives in town and I FINALLY got together for a jam today.  We don’t get to see each other much.  I was stunned at how well I played.  Pulling off some very nice against the spin moves and surprising myself at how well my body was allowing me to move considering all of the well-earned aches and general stiffness that comes with 50 (and years of intentional physical abuse).

Frankly, this is one jam that I’m bummed to NOT have on video.

Today, however, is a dual-Aleve day!  I’m gonna try to play a round at Barnett with my roomie and maybe Chad.

Tomorrow: To Sarasota for Dad’s Funeral

01-24-09
A lot has happened which kind of accounts for why I haven’t been writing.  That, and the summer’s major goal was reached and I was having trouble justifying putting time into the blah blah blah’g when there are so many other ways to fool myself into thinking I’ve been productive.

Firstly, it looks as if the PDGA will be doing their own magazine in 2009.  Rick Rothstein of Disc Golf World will once again play a major role.  I’ve been asked to contribute as well.

I finally got another battery for the older (white) Anti-Chrysler.  With luck I can find someone to give it a good driveway.

I worked 40 hours in 3 days at the convention center setting up BIG booths for some HUGE conventions, and worked several days subsequent to that.  Somehow, I managed to catch a ride on the losing-your-tools bus!  I left my drill at one show, my hex key set at another, and I just left my Gerber uber-machete somewhere out at Turkey Lake.

So far, in January, I’ve put in 21 hours on the disc golf courses at Turkey Lake.  The Original’s hole #7 has long been considered by many to be the worst hole of the 36 (certainly by me anyway).  I made attempts to redesign the area about 3 years ago (under the previous regime) but was shut down by who was then the self-appointed course pro, club president, and tourney director.

Rather than remove that hole and a couple others that I felt were either a waste of space or a poor use of the land we actually did use, I overlaid some alternate holes on the area, using carpet tees and different types of baskets so that people could figure out which is which.  Of course this required making temp tee signs, directional signs and a sign explaining the whole mess.

Frankly, I think the new alt holes are a far better use of the available land and I think that all 3 of the holes are better individually than what we had.  Hopefully, the club will concur.  If the locals can handle another par 4, we will remove the hardware and tees on the old course and replace the temp hardware and tees some time this year.

Also, I added a few extra pin positions on the Original’s back 9.  The short straight-forward #11 now has a slightly longer and more challenging extra permanent pin position.  And hole #16 also has another perm position that makes it a two shot, par 4 hole.  I have at my disposal several Tri-State baskets that I’ve upgraded.  When I want to experiment with a new pin position, I can easily dig a shallow hole for the smaller cement ball at the base and drop it in.  The highly visible plastic yellow chain is now on the inside (like M3 inner chains) and a set of standard chains is on the outside.  I even got some flag pins from a local golf course and bolted them in as well.  Frankly, they catch better than the archaic Mach 2s.

I finally convinced the park to start counting disc golf traffic, though we missed the most impressive numbers around the holidays when the park sees a LOT of snowbird traffic.  One December Friday saw 1986 & 87 PDGA Women’s Champ Vanessa Chambers and her family at the park and the next day the entire Fraser Family went around the courses.

I’ve been trying to scan more of my photo collection, which, if you’ve been following this blah blah blah’g or my DGW articles, you’ll know it is pretty big.  I recently stumbled upon a gift certificate for Circuit City, which is going out of business.  So I found a store that was still open and picked up a 500 gigabyte hard drive so that I could free up space on my portable hard drive which will become the primary active storage area for the collection.

My Michigander buddy, Chad, and I have been working on the Florida Disc Golf Design Group website.
(We just registered the worldchampiondiscgolfdesign.com domain)  We’re (OK, mostly Chad) is working on an order form template that will automatically calculate an estimated cost for what the customer wants.

Meanwhile, I have to sort of duplicate those efforts preparing a proposal for another course design project north of Gainesville, FL.  It will be a shorter recreational course at a Christian camp.  The manager said that some local players would be allowed to play it if they assist with the install.

I had a brutal Rolf session (extremely deep tissue work) on Dec 31.  I went out and played the next day and made some absolutely brilliant drives.  But I hadn’t been to a chiropractor in a while and torqued something in my hip.  I haven’t thrown more than a few shots since.  Mostly because I’ve been working.

My father passed away a couple of days ago after a very prolonged series of complications stemming from a weak heart.  I’ll be going to Sarasota on Monday for services and whatever else is required of me.

Thanks for checkin’ in.
Hos

01-01-09

2008 is history gang.

What a year it was.

Course installations are soaring (Use a qualified designer! Trust me…it will be worth it)
More tournaments than ever.

2008 was an interesting if not lucrative year for me.

January…With the help of some Daytona and Orlando disc golfers, we installed the first 9 holes of River City Nature Park in DeBary, FL; a compact red & white level layout. I love the fact that disc golf is the very first amenity in the park.
I also invested time at T2 and helped Jack White with a private course in Lawtey, FL, so that Jack and JT could assist with the Tee Pads at DeBary. Roughly 45.5 hours working on courses in the area.
The Orlando Disc Golf Club also started running Wednesday Night Flights (glow golf doubles)

February… Did a lot of convention work setting up LARGE booths and did a few comedy clubs. I logged only 14 documented hours on the courses due to all of the PAYING gigs. (but there were more hours)
I won my first tourney of the year, taking the Open division at the Springtime on the Suwannee (still undefeated there at 4 in a row)

March…I’m not sure of the exact date, but somewhere around this time Juliana Korver finished my long-awaited quilt. She claims that it is her most elaborate quilt to date. It is now one of my most prized possessions.
Did a few Diz gigs and took 3rd in Masters at the Melbourne A-Tier.

April… The first 6 days of April were spent doing a private party on some very nice land, Universal Studios, Giggles Comedy clubs and a show at the Polish American Club. On the drive to the Polish American Club, I swore that I wouldn’t do any “how many Polacks does it take to change a light bulb” jokes in the show. When I got to the club (I swear I’m not making this up) the lights in the entire building were not functioning!!! I laughed so hard I nearly gagged. Of course it wasn’t funny to any of them. Turns out that a dove had flown into the transformer and blown the circuit. Once the circuit was reset, I impressed TENS of people with the show. The rest had food to digest and had obviously committed their entire beings to that end…so to speak.

My dad turned 80 this month as his health continues to decline. He has already died TWICE! So much for the cliché “you only live once”.

I won Masters at the NE Coachman tourney on 4-20 over Slasor, who turned 60 that day and shot a better round than Climo to finish the tourney. Also took 4th at Tallahassee (Open).

May… Once again dodged the bullet with Jury duty, but killed the whole day nonetheless.
Another gig at Universal Studios and more at the convention center.

Another Masters win at my hometown tourney in Sarasota, and I did my annual freestyle appearance at “The Jammers” tourney at Jax beach (5th place). If you are in Florida around May, you owe it to yourself to make an effort to swing by and watch. Some phenomenal talent descends upon Jax beach each year for this event and Paul Kenny runs a wonderful show.

PK also requisitioned a quilt from JK and his arrived shortly before The Jammers. (but mine is nicer!)

Dale Schwegel of “The Ultimate Disc Golf Show” also got our foot in the door with the Florida State Park system (who claims that disc golf goes against their mission statement) by running at temp course tourney at Koreshan State Park in Estero FL. (took 3rd in Open) If you rent the Brendan Frazer DVD “Journey to the Center of the Earth”, the first featurette talks about that park and those who settled there.

June… I DNF’d out of the Jax tourney because I was kept awake all night and was just too tired to play well enough to keep my interest.
For the 2nd year in a row, I did 3 days of disc golf clinics for the Sarasota County Parks and Recreation department’s “Adventure Camp”. I also had a private show at the Smyna Yacht Club that, had I decided to video tape it, would have made an excellent resume tape. I had em from start to finish.
I had another gig at Universal and went down to south Florida to meet with Gary Auerbach to bone-up on Frisbee shows for kids by watching his “Spinning Bees” shows since he handed me 4 shows for this summer’s road trip.

July… The One Grand Disc Golf Tour was launched with an impressive fireworks display courtesy Walt Disney World. I had a gig there on the 4th of July and left for the tour immediately following the pyrotechnics.
What a month!!! I played 71 courses (ran 44 of them) with a 2nd place Masters finish trailing the incredible putting of Dan Sisk at the Brent Hambrick. An Open win at the Crawdad Cooker in E. Pennsboro, PA and a Masters win at the Indiana State Championships.

The Spinning Bees shows in New Orleans, Nether Providence Township (Philly), Round Lake, IL and Petosky, MI went as well as I could have hoped for. The kids had fun and learned a lot about Frisbee. I had a great time and made some money that would prove to be the financial boost I needed to get me through the first month of the tour with the obscene fuel prices.

August… I started off the month with a poor showing at one of the coolest courses in existence. I took 4th in Masters at the Farm Classic (Flip City dgc) in Shelby, MI due to a dry split on the exact spot where my thumb releases a putt. Needless to say, my putting wasn’t very good.
For some reason I was unknowingly placed in the “Senior” division of the Skill-shot Challenge held at the PDGAW’s Timber Ridge ski area. I won the Senior division but was told that I had a better score than the open winner.
I also won the Pro Grand Masters division at the Pro Am PDGA World Championships, somehow finding a way to beat 2-time Masters Champ and 3-time Grand Masters Champ David Greenwell. When I wasn’t playing well, I was getting lucky.

I managed to play another 47 courses (ran only 20 of those) took 2nd in the GA states (open) and had a master win back in Florida at Floral City’s Labor Day Luau.

The primary reasons for coming back to Orlando were to attend the Florida Recreation and Parks Association convention promoting the importance of professional disc golf course design at the Innova booth and to attend my youngest neice’s wedding.

September… The 2nd leg of the 1Kdgt began with a trip to the International Disc Golf Center’s A Tier event, the Augusta Classic where I tied for 4th (Open) and lost the playoff to get into the finals. My 50th birthday was that Saturday and the IDGC staff presented me with a nice cake with some cool disc golf photos sticking out of it.
I had back to back wins (open) at the SC Flying Disc Championships (golf only) and the Golden Corner Classic.
I played 49 more courses and ran 25 of those.

October… Playing for quantity rather than quality took its toll at the USDGC. My first two days were very disappointing. However on the 3rd day, (playing with my sponsor, Dave Dunipace of Innova Champion) I shot the 2nd lowest score of the day, moving me back up the ladder. As (my) luck would have it, I blew out my back on the first hole of the final round. I should have DNF’d but the USDGC is not a tourney to bail on. After the 4th hole I grabbed my back brace and gritted my teeth through the rest of the round, finishing a dismal 124th place.

Sitting at 999 courses, I limped home and didn’t play for 2 weeks. My rehab was working on the courses at Turkey Lake in prep for the Orlando Open. The club had done some work on the courses in my absence. We also got a rack of golf discs in the office at the main gate. (They sold 88 in the first 6 weeks) A mere 21 hours this month invested in the local courses.

With only a week to go before the O.O., I got out and started throwing again. My chances didn’t look very good. Had I not blown my back out, I would have played in the open division at the Orlando Open. Masters proved to be the right choice as I won it handily several strokes behind the open winner.

November…Some more Diz gigs and convention work. I had some time to think about it and had worked it out with Ben Calhoun to play our 1,000th course together. He came through Florida and we tightened up the details.
I spent more time putting in extra targets on some holes at TL so people could try some different challenges.
Brad Hammock led me by 4 strokes going into the final round of the Moccasin Lake Open A-Tier (Masters div) but we were tied going into the last hole. He put one through some trees and parked it. I went around the trees and took a bad skip into the water to settle for 2nd.
I raced back home Sunday night, reshuffled a bit and headed out to Augusta early Monday morning. Tuesday Nov 18, Ben Calhoun and I played our 1,000th course on the (not yet finished) Jim Warner memorial dgc at the International Disc Golf Center (videos are now available)
From there, I raced back to Florida to play in the Players Cup. Again, I had the 2nd best round of the day on the 2nd to last day, but failed to follow it up with another strong round finishing a relatively respectable 21st place in the all Open div tourney. With the flatter pay out, I received more for this year’s 21st place finish than last year’s 12th place finish.

December…Needing only 17 more courses to reach 200 for the year, I headed back out to the Charleston Classic (SC). As had been the case several times earlier this year, I was back by 6 strokes going into the final rounds, this time behind Mel Shuman. After the first hole of round 3, I was 7 back. At the end of round 3 I had moved to within 2. I never led the tournament at any point but tied it up with two to go. We both birdied and parred to finish.
I ended up winning in an exciting playoff on the two holes that had plagued me on Saturday. Had Mel won, it would have been his 10th in a row (Open and Masters)

I raced around Charleston playing all 5 perm courses in one day but failed to hit my mark of 200 for the year since I had to return to Orlando to work 4 nights in a row at Diz. I also worked on Christmas eve. Our family had a late Christmas on the 28th where I got a new book called “Wham-o Super Book” which is signed by the author. Thanks Mom!

I gained permission from Turkey Lake’s manager to install 3 temporary holes on “The Original” to eventually replace 3 holes that I feel are a waste of space.

All told for this year, I won 4 open tourneys, 6 Masters tourneys and a Grand Master World Title.
I look forward to the day when I can boast as many course installations.

It has been an amazing year. Thanks to everyone who had a positive influence on it. (Especially Innova and Disc Golf Center for their hefty contributions to the 1Kdgt!)

Happy New Year everyone!!
Hos-1602