As the daylight disappears and temperatures drop, many of us find ourselves spending a lot more time inside. It’s a perfect time of year for video games, and thanks to Gordon Griesel, it looks as though disc golfers will have a virtual environment to keep themselves entertained.

Earlier in the year, I mentioned Gordon’s project, and my eagerness to see it become a reality. Well, Gordon has made good on his intentions, and now has an early December release date planned for Disc Flight Sim. As a way to help get people ready for the release of the full version, a free downloadable demo is available on his site, which you can find here (currently, the password for download is “demo”.)

Being busy with several things lately, in addition to the encroaching holidays, I haven’t had a chance to play with it too much, but I can say from what little I have seen, I’m very impressed and am eagerly anticipating the full release. While the graphics may not be the cutting edge stuff you see in big budget video games, the physics at work here are quite impressive. Just throwing drives with a few selected discs, the physics at work were extremely realistic. Not that there has been a lot of competition in the world of virtual disc physics, but this simulator portrays the flight of a golf disc far more authentically than anything I’ve seen before. A disc thrown flat will fly straight and then fade left predictably. A flippy disc thrown hard with a slight hyzer angle will flip up to fly straight, turn right, and then fade left. That same flippy disc though, if thrown with full hyzer, will hold its hyzer line and finish left (just like my real life botched hyzer-flip attempts!).

The game will include some pre-made courses, a full selection of discs, several different play-modes, and the ability for players to design their own courses, which they’ll be able to share with others. As an added bonus, there will be many terrains the player can download at no cost from the Disc Fight Sim site. The game is currently only for XP/Vista, and Gordon is looking at selling it around $19.95, or “for around the cost of one nice disc” as he puts it. It will be available for download or on CD, and customers will be able to pay in a variety of ways.

Excited by the prospects of the game, I contacted Gordon (who is very accessible and responsive, by the way), and asked him a few questions.
More on Disc Golf Simulator Right Around the Corner

Anybody that knows me, or has seen me posting on various disc golf forums on the net, knows that I am wholeheartedly in favor of pay-to-play courses. It’s an argument that I can delve into more drastically some other time, but for now, I just want to share an example of what pay-to-play can achieve. Chances are, if you have read any of the publications related to disc golf, you’ve probably seen at least one picture of the hole above–it’s shown up in ads and was featured on the cover of Disc Golf Magazine. It’s a great hole no doubt, but it’s only a taste of what Blue Ribbon Pines has in store.

More on Blue Ribbon Pines - Setting a Precedent for the Future

Not all that long ago, I was shooting some golf with a guy that was fairly new to the area, from Louisville, KY. He was a nice guy, and being a native of the South myself, we got along pretty well. As we were playing through my course, I told him about the struggle we were facing with the restructuring of our course and all the tiptoeing we had to do due to environmental concerns. He chuckled and said “Oh yeah, I have to remember, I’m in a blue state now.” I tried to say that it wasn’t really the state, just the city and one or two vociferous citizens. He said that where he came from, the mentality was that parks were meant to be used. Fair point.

Just last week, in preparation for the upcoming tournament that I’m running, several of us were armed with weed eaters, taking care of some long grass on a couple of the fairways. A guy who had just moved from Texas approached us; he was trying to familiarize himself with the course before the tourney, but he dropped his bag and pitched in to help us. I told him how thankful I was to have his help, lamenting the difficulty of getting people to actually show up for work parties. He seemed happy to help, but pointed out that in Texas, the cities took care of all the maintenance of the courses, that the course upkeep isn’t something that tournament directors have to worry about there.

Again, I’d like to think that maybe its just the city our course is in that is so non-supportive of disc golf, but I’m afraid it’s bigger than that. More on Why all the hate, blue state?

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of attending the 4th Annual Fernburner at Lucky Mud, an almost overwhelmingly positive experience. I say experience, because while the Fernburner is technically a tournament, it amounts to so much more. You’re can stay at the inn or camp out on the course, are fed ample amounts of great home cooked food, and have plenty of opportunity to kick back, take a deep breath and lose yourself in serenity of your surroundings. Not to mention, you’re surrounded by a group of great people who all likeminded and share a common love. Sure, the competition is there if you want it, but it just seems to be one facet of this gem.

On the Sunday following the tournament, some of who camped out had a round of casual random draw doubles. My partner was Jenn, the only woman playing in the doubles. My game was simply not there in the morning, and Jenn had to do the majority of the work for us. And you know? I’m not embarrassed to admit that. The girl has game. She’s a solid player that could give a lot of guys a run for their money, and would probably do very well in PDGA tournaments. I’d even go so far to say she’d quite possibly dominate in the WA State Series, were she to play in it. But no, she only plays one tournament a year, and that’s the Fernburner. More on If not tournaments, then what?

For some time now, mainly because of a really hectic work schedule (normally 12+hr days) I’ve been playing the same disc golf course, Bryan Park. It’s a great course set in a historic park in Richmond Va. There are some monster holes and usually a good crowd there playing. But while I enjoy playing there, it was time for a change in scenery. This past weekend, while visiting my brother Kenneth (who recently became a father) out in Nashville, I had the opportunity to play a new course. While this course didn’t receive the highest reviews, Triple Creek Park in Gallatin, TN was most definitely a challenge. More on A Change of Scenery

I was notified of this article in the Peninsula Daily News, and it was a heck of a way to get my morning started. A brief synopsis of the article: in the rural areas of the Olympic Peninsula, where the closest disc golf course is about 2 hours away, some folks are trying to get a course installed in Robin Hill Park, a 195 acre county park. The park is a multi-use park, and used by horse riders, among others. At a meeting with the city council, the equestrian group rallied in a bunch of their members to argue profusely against the installation of the course.

Now, if the disc golfers were trying to take over the park for all themselves (a 195 acre disc golf complex–oh the notion makes my mouth water), I could understand such vehement opposition. But, the fact of the matter is that the disc golfers are only trying to use 20 acres, which would be plenty of space for a high quality course in the woodsy Northwest. On top of that, the disc golfers had already taken into account the equestrian use of the park and designed their layout so that the two could coexist.

I could also understand their concern if there were “real” development going on as in with a traditional golf course, but come on, disc golf is one of the least invasive outdoor activities I can think of (arguably less so than equestrian trails). Disc golf has the advantage of being able to be in parts of land that are considered useless for other activities. And most people who are uninformed about disc golf who see a basket will wonder what in the world its supposed to be, not seeing any visible signs of its use. That just illustrates how well disc golf can blend into an existing habitat.

While I’m sure there are many fine people in the Sequim area equestrian community, the people in this article sound like petulant school children who never learned how to share. Viewing things from a different angle, I was somewhat in their shoes when the dog park was being proposed at my home course. I voiced my opinion at the city council meeting then which was I was OK with the dog park so long as it didn’t interfere with the course, or as long as suitable replacement holes were granted to us. Of course, the dog park was approved, being in part of our course, and replacement holes weren’t really taken into consideration until after the fact, and now that’s our issue we’re dealing with. Here in the case of Robin Hill Park, the disc golfers are being diplomatic enough to want to not infringe on other users, and they’re still getting resistance thrown in their face. I would like to see a time when disc golf doesn’t have to constantly take a back seat to other interests in community politics.

If you would like to voice your support for the installation of the course, please send an email to the following addresses: bgiddens@co.clallam.wa.us, jwinborn@co.clallam.wa.us, cjacobs@co.clallam.wa.us, stharinger@co.clallam.wa.us, mdoherty@co.clallam.wa.us, mchapman@co.clallam.wa.us, michael@teammcaleer.com

When I last wrote about the ongoing saga of our course, and the moving/removing/ of holes, I was prepared to go into the environmental committee meeting to accept the final judgment on the course. I believe I wrote the last installment the day before the meeting, and fully intended on giving the play by play here on the site. Well, obviously, I didn’t write anything here, and the reason for that is that there simply was nothing to write. We went to the meeting, only about half of the committee members were in attendance, and of those that were there, the official word was that there was no official word. No decisions, or discussion of any kind, apparently, had been done regarding the disc golf course, and we were told to come back next month for more information. Not exactly worthy of a blog post, in my opinion. Things are heating up again though, as the next meeting is exactly one week from today, and when I checked my email, I saw that an article had come out regarding disc golf in Lynnwood, WA. More on Saga of a Disc Golf Course Restructure - Part 6

This past Memorial Day weekend, I was able to take a road trip with a few friends northbound to Bellingham (the last major town before you reach the Canadian border here in Washington), and had the pleasure of getting to see the early stages of disc golf courses being built. Having done quite a few work parties on my home course, I know how much work it takes to simply maintain a disc golf course, but to completely build one from scratch…well, let’s just say I have nothing but respect for those that are willing to take on a project of such magnitude.

The first course we stopped at was the Northern State Recreation Area in Sedro-Woolley, WA. The site is in a 756 acre space that was once a dairy farm associated with the Northern State Hospital, a bygone mental institution. Basically, it is a lot of land that has not been used for much else besides walking trails, old farm buildings can be seen throughout the course, slowly giving way to nature. More on The Roots Grow Deep in Northern Washington

I’ve always had a good time when visiting Portland, but I think I really do have to attest that it is the best place for disc golf on the west coast.

Not only do they have a great disc golfing scene there, with events happening pretty much every day of the week, but they’ve also got some fantastic places to play. A few of the notable courses are Pier Park (my all time favorite urban course), Dabney, and the immaculate Riverbend Disc Golf Course at Milo McIver State Park (currently the top ranked course on DGCourseReview.com). Most people, I think would agree with me that those three courses are the best in the immediate Portland area. More on I have to admit, Portland’s got it going on…

Excited by the possibility of new holes, and even twenty one of them, we were eager to show the environmental committee around our proposed layout. Due to scheduling conflicts, members the committee had to come on two separate weekends. The first tour we gave went well, if a little on the wet side. We guided the members through most of the path we’d explored, trying to avoid the blackberries as much as possible. By and large, they seemed supportive of the layout, the only concern they posed was where the park’s property line stopped and private property began, and whether we were walking through somebody else’s property to get to the new holes.

The second tour, however, did not go as smoothly. In addition to the committee members that we were expecting, Robin, the environmental anti-disc golf lady, showed up to take the tour as well. Cue the ominous music (Darth Vader’s Imperial March would be a fitting piece). More on Saga of a Disc Golf Course Restructure - Part 5