About 8 years ago, my business partner and the CEO of Whirld Sports, John Heaton, wrote down his thoughts regarding concerns and suggestions he had for the sport of disc golf. Interestingly enough, the hopes and aspirations of disc golfers back then are still the same hopes and aspirations that exist today. John�s approach to the status of the sport and its growth takes an angle that we have not seen much discussion on. It focuses on the condition of our courses, so we decided to publish those thoughts in a 4 part series. I would like to invite you to take some time to read them. We are publishing them with the hope that they might stir up some discussion, and better yet, action from the disc golf community.

http://www.whirldsports.com/news

Jeff Kaufmann
Chief Operating Officer
Whirld Sports LLC

Some Thoughts on Part 1:

I complete agree with you on the course quality being a toxin. In the 70 some course i've played the majority would fit your description of a toxin. something i think you missed though is the litter and course destruction... in other words the chucker toxin. i cant tell you how often i have to yell across the course at some guy trying to rip down a tree cause its "fun" or his disc hit it...idk why. people walking through the park take notice of that and it discourages them before they even get out there to try it. i also see alot of people who know better but say nothing...they are the worst of all!

on the woman playing disc golf. i am lucky enough to be an assistant for a local high school disc golf club. we have a turnout every week of probably 80% girls. needless to say i was amazed the first day and am still amazed that even with the club growing its still mostly girls. anyway, the number one complaint is "i dont want go in there" referring to the rough. they all really enjoy playing and are actively trying to get better. but if they are complaining about the course we practice at then their not going to be happy when we start to travel. the rough is only long grass that is mated down. for my personal opinion on rough; 8-10" long grass will messing with your footing enough to have proper effect. Also, if there are more trees and low hanging branches i think it makes for a difficult and friendly rough.

course navigation in disc golf is a learned art form. it took me a couple of years and 20+ courses to be able to understand how courses are put together and being able to get a feel for the design and picking the right baskets. what i learned to do was wait for a group to get in front of me who seemed to know where they were going and do my best to follow them the first time around.

I would like to see the disc golf community as a whole start reaching their hand out to people just starting out. offer some tips or for them to play a round with you. be helpful in some way. i wasn't the nicest person to newbies my first few years... i basically ignored them and tried to move past as quickly as possible (i wasn't rude to anyone). but after playing a few times with one of our local pros during leagues and seeing how he represented the sport i really took a new approach. i truly believe that if we as a whole community start giving back a significant amount more to the public we may see the change we want.

Part 2:

That sounds alot like how the PGA treats the ball golf courses. and i would say that it would be effective. a good idea but lets be honest, they couldn't even get a rating system for courses put together. i dont think that they can manage this. you have no idea how sad that makes me.
my question(s) to you; who is qualified to make this choice? what standards do they have to meet?

Part 3:

this i dont agree with. i already feel that my pdga renewal fee isnt appropriately used. which is why some years i dont renew. i would rather see my opinion matter on how the pdga should spend its membership fees. i want to see voting for all active members on what theyd like to see the pdga focus on. personally i want EDGE to become stronger. get this sport popular within the youth, teach them proper etiquette and technique. as they grow the sport will to. id like to see local clubs put together "camps" for the local youth. EDGE would provide them with a disc for every participant and maybe a membership number?... give them the feeling of belonging right away. have the club select its players who best represent the sport and can actually teach.

also along with the membership theme. I find it really lame that for a $50 renewal fee i get a crappy sticker (i have had 3 competely fade in less than a month and one that peeled off my car after being on their for 3 days... all the other stickers put on that day are still there and unfaded), a membership card, and papers. o and i forgot i dont have to pay the pdga fee for tournaments.
Which brings me to another aspect i'd like to see changed. the partial removal of the pdga fee. based on teir, there should be a fee. For C, no fee or maybe a couple $. For B teir $5-10, and mandatory membership for A and above. I try to get people who are good and are into the sport to come play tournaments. they dont because they think it is ridiculous they have to pay a $10 fee on top of the tournament fee. the amount of unsanctioned tournaments has also severely decreased, so it makes it harder and harder to get more people involved. i have given thought to become a TD and running nothing but unsanctioned tournaments just for this reason.

Is the PDGA the right group to certify courses? Disc Golf Scene.com and DiscGolfCourseReview.com already have an impressive amount of reviews of courses created as wikis. If you set up a course rating system it should take off on it's own. In other words propose a system of rating courses that includes all of your points call it the Heaton Scale, and let the wikis have their way with it.

Is the PDGA the right group to certify courses? Maybe a new group should be founded just to certify disc golf courses? Or perhaps an independent division of the PDGA? Certainly makes the funding stream clearer and avoids "not with my money" NIMBYisms.

Every ball golf course has a Pro associated with it. Should the PDGA encourage that for disc golf? It wouldn't have to be limited to one, nor to Pros. Where I live the local club is very active caring for the course and the discouraging conditions do not occur. So every course needs an Overseer. Is there a list of that? Can courses without caretakers be adopted by a caretaker? Can a system be created to grow the caretaker into a caring club?

I wonder how much the economics of each disc golf course effects the conditions? It would be interesting to see how many different economic models there are, and if there is a correlation between economic model and course conditions.

John Heaton's ideas are interesting and seem valid. I wonder why they have generated so little response?

Saucer,

When these were first posted, they were posted in two spots on the pdga message board because we couldn't narrow it down to just one place in which it could go. There were a few comments added in that thread, so I wanted to link them for you to see. Thanks for the interest in the articles, and thank you for generating more discussion, as that was one of our main goals when we decided to post them.

http://www.pdga.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=34608

Jeff

Very interesting thoughts. I have a lot of my own and hoping I can get some of my experiences and skills involved in disc golf course design and maintenance. , I only skimmed through the letters at first, but will take the time to read them completely after I get home from my current roadtrip and post my ideas.

Part 3:


Which brings me to another aspect i'd like to see changed. the partial removal of the pdga fee. based on teir, there should be a fee. For C, no fee or maybe a couple $. For B teir $5-10, and mandatory membership for A and above. I try to get people who are good and are into the sport to come play tournaments. they dont because they think it is ridiculous they have to pay a $10 fee on top of the tournament fee. the amount of unsanctioned tournaments has also severely decreased, so it makes it harder and harder to get more people involved. i have given thought to become a TD and running nothing but unsanctioned tournaments just for this reason.

I completely agree with you on this point, I think waving C-Tier fees will help new players play in tournaments

You're mistaking C-tiers with the bottom level of competitive play. Side betting with buddies then leagues then unsanctioned events are three progressive steps before trying C-tiers and there are no fees for those first three levels.

You're mistaking C-tiers with the bottom level of competitive play. Side betting with buddies then leagues then unsanctioned events are three progressive steps before trying C-tiers and there are no fees for those first three levels.

No, I'm talking about PDGA events, which C-tier is the lowest level of play. In my experience playing in sanctioned tournaments is a better hook than playing for $5 side action against a friend. And unsanctioned tournaments are usually sloppily run and poorly rule-enforced. The problem was that I confused growing the PDGA with growing the sport.

If it's a better hook as you say then the cost bar should be raised. The player receives more benefits such as tracking and displaying player stats even if the player doesn't join and just pays the $10 fee. And hopefully the event is run better and with a more consistent approach as you suggest. Those who don't see the fee resulting in personal value are probably not tournament players so the fee becomes self selecting for those who are and those who aren't potential PDGA members.

Only a small percentage of disc golfers either are or potentially are weekend tournament players which is the player group the PDGA has mostly been serving over the years. However, the PDGA is now broadening its focus to develop programs to encourage more grassroots play. That will mean developing a different set of programs and fees to serve the interests and needs of this broader group of players. We'll see how this unfolds.

[QUOTE=cgkdisc;1447529]If it's a better hook as you say then the cost bar should be raised.


The problem is that I was only hooked once I played in a sanctioned tournament. I'm suggesting taking out or lowering the fee to attract newer players to the game. If you jack up the price, I think the newer players will back away.

Can't really be lowered since the non-member fee is properly matched with the membership fee. The cost/benefit is balanced pretty well based on the steady growth of tournament players. Understand that tournament play can't expand much faster because the capacity isn't there in terms of courses, promoters, and most importantly, weekends in the year. It doesn't do any good to double or even increase the number of tournament players by 50% overnight if they can't get in events to play. Grassroots efforts such as getting more courses is where growth can and needs to increase or tournament capacity will soon be reached (and already is) in many areas.

The problem is that I was only hooked once I played in a sanctioned tournament. I'm suggesting taking out or lowering the fee to attract newer players to the game. If you jack up the price, I think the newer players will back away.
There's a way around the non-member fee at the C-tier level, and that's to run the event as a charity event. The PDGA Competition Endowment Program (http://www.pdga.com/files/documents/CompetitionEndowmentProgramDetails.pdf) waives non-member fees for events that benefit a charity. The $2 per player fee is donated to the charity along with a minimum of 25% of the net entry.

With a reasonable entry fee (say $15-25) and the tie in to a charity, taking advantage of this program gives you a great introductory tournament for those casual players you are hoping to hook into playing tournaments.