The 17th Mid-Atlantic AM Championship has been sanctioned by the PDGA as a B-tier event and will be held July 23 - 24, 2011 at Seneca Creek State Park DGC in beautiful Gaithersburg, MD. This is the event where the Advanced AM Player is revered and celebrated!

The format will be the same one used every year. Two 18-hole rounds per day. Advanced and Masters will play Short Tees to A-pins, Long Tees to A-pins on Saturday. Long Tees to B-pins, Short Tees to C-pins on Sunday. Intermediate divisions play all 4 rounds from the Short Tees. NO 27-hole rounds. After years of having the same entry fee, I had to raise prices by $5. Last year, 2 days of lunch, drinks, and ice cost $533! Advanced & Masters: $45. Intermediate and Ladies: $30. Non-PDGA (or non-current) members must add $10.

Click HERE (http://home.comcast.net/~jmerhi/2011_MAACflier-email.pdf) for the tournament flier.

Like the last 2 years, I have petitioned the PDGA for a waiver to force Pro players with a rating under 970 to play in a mandatory Trophy Only category. Trophy Only will be available for a nominal fee of $15 (which barely covers your lunch + PDGA dues). IMHO, this has been a great success in that it practically eliminates sandbagging. Now, the <970 Pro player who would never even consider playing this event CAN play in it guilt free. He is not competing for the AM prizes, just the PDGA points. I encourage Pro players with a rating <970 who love playing Seneca to COME OUT for the MAAC. It's only going to cost you $15, you get to play 4 rounds of tournament golf, and your results will get turned into the PDGA + lunch! If there's a downside to this deal, it's hard for me to see it. All previous Advanced AM "winners" /OR/ non-first placers who received a disc golf basket get to play for FREE (I'll cover your $3 fee) but must play Trophy Only.

On-line registration should be available by today (7/07/2011). I have set it up and OK'd the proof, so I'm just waiting for the icon appear indicating that online registration is available. On-line registration ROCKS, however, snail mail registration is always available (see the flier) as will day-of-event signups. There will NEVER be a late fee for this event.

Hole Sponsorship is only $25 and all proceeds will go directly toward FEEDING the field, i.e. lunch, sodas, ice, etc. The goal is to have a cook out like previous years. If you could sponsor a hole, please do! (I need 20 sponsors @ $25 to break even on lunch). Also, if you could sponsor a grill, that would be AWESOME. Make no mistake, the cook out lunch is a HUGE endeavor. My extreme gratitude goes out to guys like JG, Teddy G, Dan Becker, Sean Burkett, Steve Simpson, Keith Palmer, Jake Bolinger, Tom Kim, Tom Transtrum, Ray Jones, Bill Underwood, Brad Beeson, Jim Vilkaitis, and everyone else who helps run lunch and provide drinks (esp during last year's 100 degree heat). I'm prayin' you're there for me this year too. Lunch is a *****, but it's genuinely gratifying to feed the masses.

INNOVA pro portable basket goes to highest finishing non-Trophy-only men's Advanced player! Fat prize payout for everyone else.

FFI, please contact John Merhi. Use the flier or the PDGA schedule for my contact info. THANKS!

online registration is now up for the 17th Mid-Atlantic AM Championship

Remember, this tournament will always have day-of-event registrations and will NEVER EVER CHARGE A LATE FEE. I have a wife and family too and I know decisions are sometimes made at the last minute. I appreciate the fact that you're coming to play and the last thing I'm going to do is PENALIZE you.

how many people have signed up for the event?

So far I've got 31 people signed up. 17 Advanced, 10 Intermediate, 3 Masters, and 1 Lady. There are two "pros playing am", but both are in a Trophy Only division and are not eligible for prizes. They can't take the basket and the best part is... they're both classy guys and they DON'T WANT TO TAKE THE BASKET. They just want to play 4 tournie rounds at Seneca.

Very few of the Seneca locals have signed up because they all know they can sign up Saturday morning. This tournament doesn't fill and there is never a late fee for showing up on Saturday morning.

Things are going well. Innova Champion sent all the discs, golf bags, and Pro Portable basket. Someone in the advanced division is going home with a sweet basket!

I WILL BE PURCHASING AN ALCOHOL PERMIT. We will be able to drink beers openly this weekend.

A buddy of mine came through with a 15 x 20 tent so we have shelter. I've got the grills lined up so we're going to do the picnic lunch again. Probability of showers is still low (< 30%) but the temperature will be high on Saturday, probably breaking 100. We'll be prepared with plenty of ice and drinks... but when it's that hot, you still need to bring PLENTY OF WATER.

I'm really hoping to see Delaware people this year. 10-15 years ago, we had tons of Delaware guys coming to this event... not so much in the past few years. C'mon Delaware! Show MD and VA that you're a player too!

I also hope to get some Coduras guys and Whispering Falls guys. Even though you're in PA, you're only 1 hour from Seneca. C'mon Pennsylvania! Show MD and VA that you're a player too!

Last couple of thoughts for the event this weekend:

Alcohol permit has been purchased. We can openly drink beers. :)

The Park cut the grass to a Country Club standard. The course looks GREAT. :)

There are plenty of spots available. Registration closes at 9:45 am tomorrow morning. No late fees for Saturday morning sign-ups.

It would be awesome to see a bunch of PA, NJ, and DE disc golfers at this event.

Thank You to all the sponsors who've chipped in and all the volunteers who have helped this week and will help all weekend.

Scores?

Bueller?

Results are up, sorry for the delay. Despite things going really well this year, my arse got kicked from the heat and stress. I apologize for disappearing over the past week, but for mental health reasons, I had to. I'm very busy both at work and at home and then I got a Summer cold that just kicked my arse... blah, blah, blah. Still, I should have gotten to this earlier than I did.

There are many people that help run this event and need to be called out. Biggest thanks has to go to Wayne Nordberg, who ABSOLUTELY HOOKED ME UP. Wayne brought a beautiful custom tent and a car battery plus fan. The fan was SO clutch, it really made being inside the tent bearable. Brad Beeson was my logistical coordinator and lunch would not have happened without him schlepping grills (plural) to and from. For the second year in a row, Dan Becker drove down from Fredneck just to man a grill in 100 degree temps. Can't thank you enough Dan. Many thanks to SeanB who moved baskets all week and ALL WEEKEND. Props to Erik Smith and Jake Bolinger for also moving baskets. Jake also checked/repaired every inch of OB line from the Long tee of 3 to the B-pin of 14. SeanB helped setup the CTP and Phillip from Atlanta and Nate G helped run it. Phillip's mom Sandie cooked for us on Sunday and guarded the tents both days during the morning Costco/Giant runs. Mark Stiles ran to the Giant for me when I was out of time. Last but not least, my "cards" guys that do the cards every year... Steve Simpson, Tom Transtrum, Bill Underwood, and Tom Kim. Thank you Tom for going out to get gallons of water late Sunday. I hope I didn't forget anybody!

This year went well and after last year, I'm pretty elated. Hopefully next year, there won't be a conflict with Paw Paw or 100 degree temps and we'll get back to a 65 person field. Some interesting things to note: For the first time that I can remember, EVERY PERSON returned on Sunday. In fact, EVERY PERSON played all 4 rounds. That's amazing, and I do believe it's because of the chili dogs. Doug Marinovich shot a 14 down Short to A. Kaaaaaaaaaaa POW! And Bryan Hoffman, the nicest kid to ever play in the wrong division, shot a WHOPPING 58 Short to C, beating the entire field. Bryan, is it safe to say this was your last event as an Intermediate? We went through 17 gallons of water on Saturday, 15 gallons on Sunday and 14 tons of ice.

Two things I really liked this year.... Brad Beeson bringing a Norwegian flag and Bobby Hermann's tribute to Joe Pohl.

I had good sponsorship and those who supported this event should be mentioned. Bobby Hermann provided all the KILLER prizes for the Ring of Fire and the CTP. Innova Champion is a 17 year sponsor of this event. Rich Myers, Mark Stiles, SeanB, Jon McCauley, Kelly Dunnavant, Doug Marinovich, Steve Ritenour, Jeff Spector, Steve Simpson, Brady Smith, Chet Butler, and Terry Mahan all helped with buying lunch. So did all the people who slid me 5s throughout the weekend. THANK YOU SPONSORS!!!

Lastly, the evidence continues to show the Trophy Only waiver for Pros Playing AM is clearly warranted. Two years ago my Trophy Only winners in Advanced and Masters ran away with it. Same thing this year. Dennis Moore won a basket by shooting a very respectable 232, but Doug crushed him by 14 strokes and pretty much had this event won after his 1st round 14 down. Shark beat Hawk by 6 strokes... not a crushing, but enough to support my point. Both Shark and Doug led their respective divisions the entire weekend (as one might expect a Pro to do in an all AM event). Since they didn't take prizes from the true AMs, it's all good! The word "bagger" was not spoken at all this weekend, thanks to the Trophy Only waiver the PDGA grants this event.

As for the scores, they are preliminary results... I was not prompted to enter distances or anything like that so the round ratings are fiction. I will get the official results in before the 8/30/2011 ratings update.

Thanks for your patience, thanks for your help, thanks for your sponsorship. Already looking forward to the 18th. If you want to see pics or read more about this event, go to the MD board at:

http://www.md-discgolf.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=3412

As for the scores, they are preliminary results... I was not prompted to enter distances or anything like that so the round ratings are fiction. I will get the official results in before the 8/30/2011 ratings update.

John,

PDGA ratings have absolutely nothing to do with hole distances. They are derived solely from the exisiting player ratings of the competitors in the tournament, and the scores they shot during the tournament.

The reason that the unofficial ratings are off is likely because you have the results (http://www.pdga.com/tournament_results/72634) entered as if all competitors played all four rounds on the same layout. Obviously, all divisions played different basket locations and most divisions used different tees throughout the tournament.

All you need to do is to create the layouts and then assign them. In the main admin menu, underneath Rating Course Layouts, click on the Add Layout button. Once you have created all your layouts which were played (and with the correct total par) click on Ratings and assign them to your different divisions.

You'll now have accurate unofficial round ratings and total +/-par for each division. :cool:

Lag is the man!