Disc Golfers R Us

My typical modus operandi of thinking something to death and then taking swift action seems to have worked this time. Last summer, for my day job and also for the column on IT and higher education that I write, I decided to pay more attention to social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

I already had accounts on all three, and others, but didn't go there much. After looking at them all for a while, and getting more active on all three, I decided that I liked the tenor of Facebook the best. And, I found out that Facebook is very useful and rewarding. I can stay in touch with friends and acquaintances that I see only rarely, even as rarely as every 10 years or so.

I know that some people would say that someone you don't see for 10 years is not really a friend, but I see that differently. With Facebook, I have a stream of information about a lot of people I really like but simply don't get to see very often.

Way back before I served 2 1/2 terms on the Professional Disc Golf Association's board of directors, I ran a website that was called Disc Golfing dot Com. I used it to gather together what I could find out about disc golf on the Web, including news items, and publish it all in one place. It came to be the fourth most-visited disc golf website, after the PDGA, Disc Golf dot Com, and Brian Sullivan's DiscLife.

But when I went onto the PDGA board I killed the site. I had been, not making money, but getting some disc golf products in return for some site advertising and I felt, and still feel, that PDGA board members should not have any financial interest or even potential financial conflicts within disc golf.

So, after I left the board a year and a few months ago, I wasn't sure what to do, or when, but I knew that I would end up with another website.

About a week ago, on an email list I have managed since 2000 for aabout 3,000 college and university webmasters (The best email list on any topic anywhere on the Internet, by the way, search or UWEBD!), in response to one of the discussion threads, I posed the question: "Should we move to Google Groups or some other functionality?"

On one of the first posts, I learned of a way to fairly easily create a niche social network like Facebook or MySpace. I created one for uwebd (called CUWEBD) and saw it grow. As I learned more about the potential, I realized that I had found my new disc golf-related Web avocation.

So, late Wednesday afternoon, December XX, I created such a social network, which has come to be called Disc Golfers R Us. I played with it on Thursday and started telling people about it on Friday. As I write this, we are approaching 500 members, and they are loving the site up and making it very active. It's exciting.

At about 200 members I decided to offer a free basket to a randomly-drawn person from among the first 500 members, and I think we will award that tonight. After we do that, I am going to offer up a prize, done in the same random way, for those in the first 1,000 members. It will be a set of unthrown discs from several manufacturers. The image at left is what I will post on the Disc Golfers R Us website about it.

The Last Chance for Points Challenge

This tournament was run by TADGA, the Toledo, Ohio area disc golf club. It was called the Last Chance for Points Challenge, because it was the last, scheduled PDGA sanctioned tournament in Michigan, and the third-from-last in the United States, for 2007. "Points" are achieved in PDGA sanctioned evets by attending tournaments and beating people playing in your division.

Here's a picture taken by Mary Egbert of the Ann Arbor club, of Avery Jenkins' group. He won the Open Pro division.

Even though I was well into a bad cold, I made myself go out and play in 25-mph-wind-blown snow squalls in sub-freezing temperatures because I had discovered that I was second among all of the amateur old guys (Senior Grand Masters) in the world in points for 2007. Frank Grimes of Illinois had more. I needed 38 points to take first place, which meant that in a B-Tier event I needed to beat 5 Advanced Ams.

Well, I played terribly, placing 15th out of 20, but I did beat 5 Advanced Ams, to take the lead by 7 points.

Unfortunately, today I discovered that Frank Grimes had some unreported points and he is now at 703, 29 ahead of me.

And the price I paid was a relapse of my terrible cold. I have been so sick all week!

What a dilemma! The only sanctioned event yet this year is in Huntsville, Alabama this coming weekend. I may be there.

Update: Nope, not going. I decided to spend the money on a year's worth of hosting and premium services for a new niche social network, Disc Golfer USA.

Juliana's Quilt

This nice essay by John G. Duesler, Jr. is something that I felt was worth sharing a link to. The image at left is of a quilt Juliana gave to John's family. The following is a brief part of his essay:

And it is that prospect of shivering muscles and bones that keeps Juliana indoors during the calendar's harshest months. She is content to avoid the cold, opting instead to watch winter stare through the windows, while she sits by the crackling fireplace, her quilting needles nearby. The season cynically asks her to come out and "play," but she would prefer to sit quietly, wait it out, and work on her putting when the sun is more inviting. Juliana is a patient person during winter. It gives her time to think, to plan, to ponder all the questions she faces regarding the prospect of next year's disc golf season. She does not challenge the Iowa skies during winter. She just waits for them to pass, until the warmth and promise of spring tip-toe into the dominion she has known all her life.

A Visit to the Heritage Park Disc Golf Course in Adrian, Michigan

This afternoon, Sheila, Ben, and I drove to Adrian, Michigan (mostly on dirt roads, for fun) and played the Heritage Park disc golf course, which Ben had previously played but I had not. The first image is Ben near one of the pin placements along the Raisin River. Here's a link to the PDGA online course directory information page for this course, which includes Yahoo! and Google Maps linkage.

Actually, Sheila walked the dogs while we played. She discovered a very nice system of walking trails and may take her women's walking group there one of these weekends, since it is only 30 miles away, maybe a 40-minute easy drive. The second image is Sheila and Ben standing near the green for Hole 18. I had crossed a wet area to get an image of that interesting ice collection that is happening just downwind from a leak in some sort of plumbing situation.

The course has significant elevation change, although not much in the course of actually throwing discs. Ben and I played the long tees, even though we knew that meant he would crush me; and he did. He shot a +1 and I threw a +8 - to my credit, I was very, very tired and probably should not have been playing. My drives are really weird lately, too, I am dipping my shoulder and turning everything way over to the right.

The course is looong. It makes good use of the few woods that are available, although many holes are in wide open spaces. Three of the holes throw slightly into the woods at the end and have basket placements that are on the edge of the Raisin River. The image at left is the main course sign. This is, in fact, a nicely challenging course. There are dirt tee pads and the signage is aimed at those throwing the short tees, but it is fun to play and the open holes would be interesting in the wind. It is definitely a course that would be navigable in the absence of locals, since the signage is good enough for that. Whoever designed it did a good job; I hope he or she gets some funding for concrete tee pads.

Note: The park is near lots of gas stations, convenience stores, etc. - actually only a very short drive (less than a mile) off of M-52, just north of Adrian.

The Original Ace Race 2007

a3disc club president Bill Gilbert has a more complete list of Aces, Dots, sponsors, and Dot Pot contributors here.

Given the nice weather (cold but sunny) it was surprising that we did not have 100 disc golfers out at the Original Ace Race on Friday, November 23, yesterday, but we had a great time anyway.

We played two rounds of 24 holes, with shortened tees. There were 10 Aces and 64 "Dots" (metal hits on drives). There were enough Dot Pot prizes that each dot received the thrower's choice of two items from the Dot Pot. (Image at left.) Doug and Mary Egbert have our appreciation for having contributed 26 items to that pot!

Of the ten aces, seven were also in the optional $10 Ace Pool. The three aces not in the Ace Pool each received $125; the seven in the Ace Pool each received $205. Kirk (Luna) Haggadone hit two Aces and also had three Dots! (That's Luna holding two of his Dot Pot discs.)

As the tournament director, I want to express my appreciation to Bill Gilbert and Mark Piotrowski for their assistance in planning and executing the event. My wife, Sheila, helped me to mark the shortened tees the week before, and Mark Ellis managed the Dot Pot distribution with his usual showmanship flair.

The ability spread players out on 24 holes, which speeds play up a lot and gets us done in mid-afternooon, plus the parking and the inside space for registration, merch, and awards, makes Hudson Mills a great place for this event. Thanks, Hudson Mills!

The remainder of this post, if I ever get around to it, consists of "notes to myself," for a lessons-learned compilation (You can use the comments function to make suggestions.):

Remind players to bring in the orange tee marker flags after their last tee-off.

Pinconning Visit #2 - Blizzard Hills Disc Golf Course

Sheila and I drove up to Pinconning, Michigan Saturday - it's about 130 miles. We went to spend the day walking the property at Blizzard Hills, a marine/bar/campground that saw better days before the Pinconning River's level went down to ~2 feet and no longer allowed the 30-foot boats that used to come in from Lake Huron.

This first image is me and Doug Szyperski, son of Lorie Szyperski with whom I had previously been discussing this course. (Behind us, to the right of that gigantic oak, is the tentative pin position of Hole 18.) He spent about 5 hours with Sheila and I. Unfortunately, our goal of criss-crossing the entire property with grid marks fell victim to the fact that it is deer season and there were hunters on the majority of the property.

On the other hand, we did get to see it all, however briefly, during the hunters' lunch time. And the northeast part of the property, the piece that will be disc golf course abutting the river, wasn't being hunted. So Sheila, Doug, and I spent some time actually laying out the first cut at seven of the holes. (At the moment, they are tentatively Holes 6-9 and 16-18.) This next image is my third draft of a map outlining those seven holes.

As you can see most clearly on Holes 8 (RHBH anhyzer over the river) and 17 (hyzer over the river), this course will feature three holes (Hole 6 is somewhat similar) where a scary shot over water or swamp can get you a fairly easy duece, but a tighter-yet-safer (when it comes to lost discs and penalties) shot will get you a tough par. At the moment, plans are for Hole 18 to be a 180-200-foot ace run to a hanging basket from a magnificent oak tree. (See top image.)

I think this course is going to be pretty nice. The land on the other side gives us the opportunity for some longer holes, as well as several through a very dense, human-planted piney woods with trees every few feet, limbless until you get up to 30-40 feet in the air. Interesting. On top of these, there is a bar on the premises!

Lorie, who works with the Chamber of Commerce, and Doug, will be fund raising for the dollars needed to get the course in the ground. Everyone hopes it will be playable for a tournament during an annual Pinconning festival in June, 2008.

Bandemer Park Map

Here is a copy of part of the sign being prepared for the entrance of the disc golf course at Bandemer Park. (It can be made larger by clicking on it.)

If you haven't been to Bandemer, you may not know about the really nice shelter that is near Hole 1 and the parking lot. Note that alcohol is not permitted in any Ann Arbor park unless you have purchased the use of a pavilion, which includes that permission.

As well, it is not marked, but near the river, on the other side of the unpaved trail that goes near the tee pads for Hole 8, there is the only legal outdoor fire pit in Ann Arbor. I am told by A2 city staff that you do not even need a permit to use it. (But note the alcohol policy mentioned above.)