2018 Am Worlds Field Events wrapped up on Sunday afternoon.

Well, here we are again, back in North Carolina for yet another PDGA Major. Charlotte has a long history of successfully hosting some of the largest and most complicated disc golf events in the sport’s short history and with an ever-growing abundance of courses that vary in both length and difficulty, awarding the the 2018 PDGA Amateur Disc Golf World Championships (Am Worlds) to this amazing city was a no-brainer.

Despite the junior divisions now having their own, separate world championships, Am Worlds remains one of the most complex disc golf events of the year. Nine amateur divisions comprised of nearly 700 competitors have made the trek to Charlotte, coming in from 14 different countries. To accommodate such a range of players, ten different courses are being used throughout the week, several of which have multiple layouts.

The work to set up and run Am Worlds begins well over a year before the event begins. On this week’s PDGA Radio podcast, Tournament Director Robert Leonard spoke in depth with hosts Steve Hill and Sara Lamberson about the logistics of running a world championship all while living two and a half hours away in Raleigh and being a new dad.

“Recently, probably 30-50 [hours],” said Leonard when asked how many extra hours he is putting into being the TD each week. “If I had to guess, I’m getting close to 2000 hours put into this.” Make sure to subscribe to PDGA Radio on iTunes, Stitcher, and Google Play  to catch the full interview later this week.

The Course Schedule alone is a great example of just how much work goes into the planning and organizing stages of Am Worlds.

The Advanced division (MA1) makes up 40% of the entire Am Worlds field, maxed out at 288 players and split into four different pools, meaning they’ll face The Great Shuffle after Wednesday’s round results come in. The same can be said about the Amateur Masters 40+ and Amateur Masters 50+ divisions, each of which are split into two pools and will face a shuffle as well.

With Mixed Doubles and Field Events already in the books, only one day of practice remains. The main event kicks off bright and early on Tuesday morning as 11 of the 12 divisions tee off for their opening round spread out across the greater Charlotte area. With help from volunteers, caddies, and event staff, live scores for many of the divisions will be happening concurrently all week long at pdgalive.com.

2018 AM Worlds Mixed Doubles Champions Ryan Wert (left) and Deann Donaldson (center) during their second round at Robbins Park. Photo by Bob Carey.