One Grand Disc Golf Tour

08-27-09

Lots happening…

Several members of the Orlando Disc Golf Club met at a little after 8am to pour 6 large trapezoidal tee pads on the T2 disc golf course at Turkey Lake.

Several members assisted with the actual pouring and spreading of the crete, then moved on to the next framed-out tee pad.  Two people hung back and screeded the crete to fill in all of the gaps and smooth it out.  After a few frames had been poured, I went around and put a ‘stippled’ surface on the tees for good traction.  After the concrete began to dry, I stippled it again at the front of the tee for extra grippiness. 

I can’t wait to unwrap our new presents!!

After a quick lunch at NYPD, which was paid for by the club (thanks guys!) I headed back out with Wade from Disc Golf Center (sponsor and host of this blah blah blah’g) and put some plastic over the pads to keep the moisture in a little longer, which will help them dry slower, hence stronger.

I went out on the course and did some trimming on some existing holes in prep for the Orlando Open.  But I also went out to do some beating on the woods for the new T2 fairway #1.  A community service helper was out there beating on stuff with a machete’ and clearing some areas that we didn’t need, or want, cleared.  So I showed him what we were trying to accomplish and he assisted for another hour or so until our hands were bright pink from pulling vines etc.

This is the kind of hole that I would prefer in the middle of the course somewhere because I KNOW that it will turn a few people away simply because it will not be easy.   That said, I’m getting more excited about what the hole has to offer in the way of challenge.

The parks guy took a big bush-hog through there the other day and completely opened up the line.  With a bit more trimming I think the flight lines will become more realistic and it should be one of the more talked about holes on the course.  I predict mostly bad-mouthing at first but it will die down as the hole matures.  (because it’s too late to expect the players to do the same)

Tomorrow:  Nothing if I can manage it.  But I will probably start following up on connections made at the FRPA convention.  Maybe a ride on my new-ish bike…weeeee!

08-26-09

A few days ago, my roomie called me and asked if I was still looking to get a bike and told me about a nice one that he found at a garage sale. (which is probably where my previous bike ended up after it was stolen)

The guy selling the bike was obviously hammered at 1pm when I showed up. After a few minutes of speaking to him and expressing an opinion or two about the world etc, he said “You’re the smartest guy I ever met”.
Few things genuinely surprise me these days, but this definitely did. All I could say in reply was “God, I hope not.”

He was asking $50 for a $350 bike but said he’d take $42.50, but if I only wanted to pay $40 I could get back in my van and go. I gave him $45 and took it straight to a bike shop for a ‘tune-up’.

Russell from Innova Champion flew down yesterday to man the booth at the Florida Recreation and Parks Association which started later that day.

Chad and I had worked diligently for several months to prepare World Champion Disc Golf Design for a presence in the booth only to find out with less than two weeks to go that, since we were not paid Innova employees, I would not be allowed to piggyback on the booth! Though it would have been fairly expensive to go ahead and get a booth, real stopper was finding liability insurance.

So we had to bust hump on completing more literature and had to pay premium prices to expedite the printing thereof. Not to mention employing the ‘fine-toothed-comb’ method on our web-site to cover everything we are about to date. World Champion Disc Golf Design is gaining a reputation for quality work and we’re…

…to reflect that on our site.

Russ called and told me that he thought he could get me in since Ryan, who manned the booth last year, couldn’t make it. I picked up our new literature and went to meet him in the lobby. The lady in charge of assigning booths, once again, denied my entry. Once Russ was there we spoke to her to make her understand that I had no intention of circumventing the rules. Russ needed assistance in the booth since Ryan couldn’t show and I had to drop off literature anyway. I explained my dilemma with insurance with my biggest apologetic puppy-dog eyes and she performed some executive gymnastics by allowing my entry…for the last time.

The FRPA convention decreases in size each year and this was no exception. That said, there were a LOT of people that I knew from previous years. Again, we made many new contacts and I think we got our message across about the advantages of having a course that is professionally designed.

One highlight was seeing John Fletcher from DeBary parks and rec (where I installed a 9-holer two years ago) Rather than tip toe around with diplomacy I told him point blank that the local players want to see the next 9 so badly that they’ve begun to run fund-raisers without him or me. He was all for it. So, now it comes down to setting up official fun-draisers at RCNP. But their financial situation is so dire that he said HE might not even be there in a year. The grass hasn’t been mowed out there for around 6 weeks and is, needless to say…very high.

I do think that this year’s FRPA convention will bring more attention to WCDGD and our dedication to improve the quality of the sport…ONE COURSE AT A TIME.

Tomorrow: Pouring 6 new Tee pads on T2. Yaaaay!!!

08-21-09

Met with the director of the City of Orlando Parks department to show him how I plan to divert the first couple of holes on T2 in order to make way for a new wedding gazebo they just put in.

We’ll be able to use the course as it currently stands for the tournament Oct 24-25 but I’ll have to move fairway #1 entirely as well as the long tee of #2 and even the long position of the original #18 right after the tournament.

The new holes were approved, however I’m breaking another of my rules by making #1 a par 4 that is more aggressive than I would like for an opening hole.
(Redesigning these holes was NOT my idea!!! I just have to make it work.)

Hole two will do something that I’ve long wanted to do and that is separate fairways for the red and blue tees. Maybe a bit too PROgressive, but it will serve more purposes than one. The area that I plan to utilize has trash that needs to be cleaned up and plenty of grapevine and potato vine that needs to be tamed. It’ll be a LOT of work. So, what else is new?

We should be pouring 6 blue tees on T2 next Thursday. Anybody reading this that wants to help, be at the park at 8am on Thursday August 27. We should be done before noon.

Saw “Inglourious Basterds” tonight. Pitt was good. Chrisopher Waltz was amazing.

Tomorrow: Daytona Ace Race and doubles

I saw a great license tag today but I couldn’t position myself to take the photo…

“VW666″ I thought “that must be the ‘beelzebug’”

08-16-09

I spent most of the morning inside catching up on emails, photos etc.

I thought my buddy Tito would be available this PM for a freestyle (jam) session. So I headed over to the field by his house. Nice grass, lousy wind (too gusty). Ran, stretched, juggled, stretched some more, then jammed some more. My buddy couldn’t make it. He has a hot girlfriend. I told him “I understand. If I had a hot girlfriend, I would have forgotten about him too.

I was running low on energy and realized I hadn’t had much food all day. Went to see the little red-headed-pig-tailed girl across the street for a couple snacks.

Came back and threw some lefty drives and sidearm air and roller shots before working on the righty 360s.
The wind was slowing so I tried another jam. Some kids walked up and asked how I did that. I put a delay on their index fingers and then tried to get them to tip one back to me. They did great and we even did a nice combo where I set one up for an under-the-leg tip, which he did…I got it back, controlled it and set the other guy up for an under-the-leg tip, which I got back again and I sealed it with a smooth back roll catch. It was a pretty cool little jam moment.

I just let them know when it was coming and set them up with an angle where a tip would probably come back to me if they tipped it near center. I was pretty excited about it. I think they were as well.

I laid down to rest and stretch and I noticed this large fly above me. It wasn’t flying in circles. Rather, it was hovering at about 12 feet above me as I lay on the grass, looking up. The fly would climb straight up to about 20 or more feet and then dip straight down to around 10 or 12 feet and then rise again. Rarely deviating from a straight up-and-down almost bungie cord-like drop line. This went on for a little over 5 minutes. He probably noticed I hadn’t used my deodorant today and was coming in for a whiff of something stanky

So many highlights to my day!!

Tomorrow: Probably a LOT of office stuff and I’ll probably do some work at one of the courses.

P.S.  For those of you who want to browse some nice pix of the WFDF overall championships… here is a link to some wonderful shots taken by Sweden’s Peter Henriksson.

Condolences go out to everyone at Innova and the SoCal disc golf community for the loss of one of the founding fathers of Innova Champion discs and a true gentleman, Tim Selinske.

We all owe him a debt of gratitude for putting such a positive spin on the world around him, thus changing the face of disc golf and so many of its players.

I never saw enough of you and would have never grown tired of your smile had I the opportunity.  Tim, this will be one eulogy where people won’t have to stand up there and lie about what a great person you were.  The real problem will be narrowing down the list of examples.

http://www.discgolfersr.us/profile/TimSelinske

08-16-09

Has it been a full day yet? What? Seven?!
Oh, well, uh, I’ve been, uh… busy. Yeah, that’s it. Busy.

I was to take my 2nd trip to Japan for Hero Disc this week but that fell through as well.

So instead…
I spent half a day having my way with a chunk of woods in order to run a new fairway #1 through it. I also had to set up a few carpet tees for the Dog Days Drive off fun-draiser for the Orlando Open.

I spent half a day kicking around details with my bud, Chad about an idea we have to make course installations far easier.

I spent an entire day working on a story about the WFDF overall tourney held in Jax last month. Still trying to track down photos from various sources.

I spent another half a day moving my roomie’s belongings around the back-yard or dragging them out front to recycle them.

Another half a day hand-delivering letters to various parks departments concerning disc golf. And more of that day requesting disc golf endorsements from parks directors who have increased their attendance and revenue streams.

Another half a day making calls and trying to set up our eminent cement pour for 6 blue tees on T2.

And a full day playing in the Dog Days Drive Off at Bill Frederick park at Turkey Lake.
We started the day playing the blue tees on T2 (except the 6 that are we framed for a pour).
The club sold sponsorship signs prior to the tourney. But the best idea so far is ‘Mulligans’.
If you wanted to buy an extra shot on a hole it is $5 per shot or 3 for $10.
There were only 16 people at the tourney who paid $20 entry. Half went to the purse, half to the fund.

There were only two divisions. Pro & Am. I won pro. (I bought 6 Mulligans for $20 and used 5 on the first 9. Ran out on hole 13 of the first round. After that, I had to just rely on throwing decent.

We ended up raising $570. Not bad at all.

Now to see if I can convince the folks up in DeBary that we can do the same thing for them…and get the next set of baskets installed.

I also found out that I probably won’t be able to attend the Florida Parks and Recreation Association convention in September. I used to piggy back on Innova’s booth but, since I’m not a paid employee, the FRPA won’t allow that. So I’ll have to pay well over $1,000 to get a booth. It’s the insurance that I’m concerned about. Pity. Chad & I worked very hard in prep for this convention.

We’ll see.

Tomorrow: more writing, photo gathering, phone calls and probably some course work and a round of doubles at a nearby course.

Go away!  I’m takin’ a day off.  Two if you even look at this blah blah blah’g the wrong way.

Hos

PS…go

08-04&05-09

I had 4 disc golf clinics each day on Tuesday and Wednesday, starting at 8:30 AM.  About 20 kids each, mostly from the Seminole Indian reservations from all over Florida.  The attitudes ran from ‘very excited’ to ‘Why are you bothering me?’

The one thing I overheard that I enjoyed the most was “I didn’t think this was going to be any fun, but I really liked it”.   I showed them a couple of basic putting stances and deliveries and a backhand and a sidearm and got them out on the course that I installed before leaving for worlds.

Wednesday afternoon, the last clinic got rained out.  So, the recreation director set up a ‘camper’s choice’ time-frame where they could choose from flag football, softball, basketball or disc golf.  Out of 80 kids, we got 20.  Not bad.  About as much as any of the other traditional games.

If the ripple effect works as it should, I hope to be installing some more courses on Seminole reservations because the kids (and counselors) really enjoyed it.

BTW, I had said that Camp Kulaqua is a Seminole camp and I was mistaken.  It is a 7th day Adventist Camp but the Seminole nation has a good relationship with this camp and comes here annually.

Tomorrow:  Home again (So that I can pay rent and do bills.  Weeeeeeee!)

08-03-09

Slept in again. I don’t really care to rave about the time I spend unconscious, but I have to say that being so was pretty great. But I couldn’t allow the day to get past me, so I threw the pillows and computer in the van, grazed at the Shoney’s breakfast bar and I-24’d it southeast through Chattanooga, where I hung a right at I-75 and stayed true thru Hotlanta until Valdosta, GA, where I veered off to play the new course at Freedom park (#1026).

FP is probably too new to receive a fair assessment but some things were obvious. I like the usage of most of the open, manicured areas. Holes #1 & 2 have nice grassy greens with some deterrents lurking nearby. I’m hoping that the wooded holes are not yet finished because they need to lose some more trees.

The course is poorly marked but the flow is relatively intuitive. “Next” arrows were painted on the ground prior to a recent small event but few have survived the foot traffic. The tees are marked with pink surveyor flags but the flags themselves have no markings. Hence, I never really knew what the distances were or if I was even on the correct hole until I was close enough to read the # on the basket. Again, it’s new and this issue is easily resolved.

Most of the fairways used the path of least resistance, but not all. Some very nice opportunities were missed but some fine options were chosen as well. The 18th fairway runs directly through a very large power tower, which has about a dozen guy-wires that drop directly in line (any line you may choose) to the basket. A bit too “lucky” to suit my taste. Overall…A decent effort for a new designer.

Another hour and a half on I-75 brought me to Camp Kulaqua, where I’ll be doing some disc golf clinics for kids, many of whom belong to Florida’s Seminole Tribe.

Tomorrow: 8:30 AM disc golf clinic followed by 3 more.
P.S. This photo has nothing to do with disc golf, other than it was taken at the Bobby Jones golf course during a tourney in Sarasota, FL.

I just like the shot. Figgered U might too.

08-02-09

Slept in till 7:30. Glorious!

Packed the Anti-Chrysler mk 3 and bade Lyn, Kelly, Golden, Crazy, Speedy & KC farewell.

Rolled 599 miles worth of pavement under my tires before stopping in Murphreesboro, TN.

The quest for edibles pushed me over the 600 mi mark.

Tomorrow. Same thing only more southerly and easterly.

PS. Yesterday’s sudden death playoff was…how do I say this?…

I no longer own the distinction of being the ONLY person to win the open pro division by way of a playoff. Congrats Avery!

Congrats go out again to Lyn & Crazy for their induction into the disc golf Hall of Fame.