A new accomplishment on the PDGA Tour

It’s taken 6 seasons of playing officially sanctioned tournaments as a PDGA member, but I’ve finally succeeded in finishing a tournament dead last. Well, dead last in my division any way; there was one male in M-4 who shot worse than I did and one male who started the tourney and did not finish.

I’d like to blame the wind, but 2 other guys in my division shot under par and another shot par. The truth is that I made some poor decisions, and my mid-range game totally abandoned me.

Interestingly, on the one hole that proved to be the most challenging (and to my mind basically pointless), I shot par on the first round and a bogey on the second. Better than some others. It’s small comfort.

Ice Bowl 2009

I’ve played in a fair number of Ice Bowls, but today was the snowiest. It was also the first Ice Bowl for me in which I’ve gone absolutely bone dry in the way of prizes. Couldn’t even score a raffle win. The image below might sum up a day that was both frustrating AND fun. Of course, it’s better since it wasn’t my disc…

Some thoughts…

On playing disc golf in the dark with glow-in-the-dark discs:

• Champion/candy plastic is the only way to go. The white discs I had were still too opaque to be useful.
• Be sure the park you’re at is actually, you know, dark. Playing in the dark is challenging; constantly being blinded by night glare then having to navigate in the night is just not fun.
• Never play alone. Apart from the security concerns about roaming through woods at night (which is why the park was practically flooded with light), once your disc goes horizontal in flight, you’re not going to be able to see it no matter what lighting method you use.
• Those little LEDs sure look cool, but for the money, the glow ropes are A-OK.

On going to the zoo:

• Get the membership. Apart from admission from your local zoo, how can you go wrong getting reciprocal admission to zoos across the nation.
• Don’t go on days that are hot and crowded. The animals aren’t having fun, and neither will you.

On using MS-Word’s Indexing feature

• Ctrl-C anc Ctrl-V are your very bestest friends.
• “Mark All” is a wildly dangerous tool.
• Wow. This is cool.

On September

• Yey! It’s brewing season.
• Boo. The basement is still too warm, and I’ve still got a list of chores the length of my arm to complete the Reorganization of Chez Truffin.
• Yey! School started.
• Boo. I would never in my life want to be 16 again.

On Reading
After I started reading my third Patrick O’Brian novel since she’s been here, Stephanie asked if he was my favorite author. She didn’t appear to trust me when I said, “No.”

Glen 2008: Day 5

Back to the oars today after a late night. Coffee and good poetry soon put all to rights, and we were working through Bob’s poems. Right good ‘uns, too. Later there was an interesting poem from Allen featuring a peregrine attacking a sparrow. I must say, referring to none I shall name, that I for the life of me can’t figure why someone would spend the time and money to bring work to a workshop that they had no intention of revising once receiving critiques that clearly show weaknesses, some severe, which need attention. If you took your car to a mechanic, and he said your wheels were about to sever their connection to the vehicle, would you not take steps to correct the situation?

In the heat of the afternoon, Bob, Chris, and I headed out to the Arroyo Chamisos Disc Golf Course for what turned out to be the best disc golf experience I’ve had in New Mexico. The course meanders through a dry river bed/wash–well, and arroyo. The course designers have made good use of the scrub junipers, brush, and elevation changes to provide interesting holes. The installers and maintainers of the course have marked the course very clearly with three tee lengths. Unlike the St. John’s course, it’s always pretty easy to find where you’re headed and at what you’re shooting.

We played from the red Rec tees, which actually were a bit too short for me. I ended up with a -4 but 4 bogeys due to the winds and overthrowing some shorter baskets. (Imagine overthrowing a hole with a Roc.) I should be happy with the 8 deuces. I also ended up throwing way more “hammer” shots than I think is polite.

After dinner, Jeffrey O, Bob, Chris, and I headed into town for a “guy’s night out” only to be confounded by the lack of parking. We ended up on a patio near Bob and Chris’s room chatting until it was time for worship.

Later in the evening, I noticed Laura L-M and her friend Cullen from SFBC sitting out in the upper dorm patio area. I sauntered over and was quickly enlisted to learn a dice game called “Farkle”. It’s a nice easy dice game that is good for socializing.

Heading into the last day of the conference, I had another rich, full day.

The Great 8: Team Golf

It’s taken a few days to recover, but on Saturday, July 19, Ken and I successfully completed the disc golf iron man competition known as The Great 8. We rose a 4:30 in the A.M. to arrive at Zebulon park for the 6:15 players meeting. After picking up our players packs (a nicely stamped disc, Innova Super Shammy, and a minidisc), hearing some announcements, taking the above photo, and milling about aimlessly for a bit, we took our position at hole #5 and awaited the starting horn.

I’ll let you imagine the finer points of playing 144 holes of disc golf in under 14 hours. Here are some random observations:

• Two themes emerged on the day:
  1. What do we play? Team Golf. Throughout the day, Ken and I complemented each other’s weaknesses nicely. When I’d throw a drive into a tree, Ken’d have a nice clean shot. When Ken yanked a putt, I might put one in. Neither one of us had to carry the other for long, and both of us needed carrying at points.
  2. Long putt for two makes a tip-in for three. We quickly established a pattern of having 15-20 foot putts for 2. As long as one of us kept it close the other could run at it. We didn’t always get the deuce, but we gave ourselves chances.
• I was surprised at how NOT tired I was late in the day. It wasn’t until the 7th course that I started feeling some fatigue. I chalk this up to constant intake of water, gatorade, and Clif energy gel. Also, the drives between courses provided enough time to rest without getting stiff.
• I’m very glad I started working out at the Y. We had to sprint the last four holes, and there’s no way I could have finished without the working out. Not that I’m in the finest shape, you understand, but the cardio work made the difference.
• Positive talk will save the day. At any number of times–say when the skies opened and rained on us for four holes–it would have been easy to get negative, which would have slowed us down further. But Ken kept talking positive things (even when I knew his thoughts were quite the opposite). It’s amazing what a difference that makes.
• God bless the creators of UnderArmour.
• God bless the creators of Gold Bond Medicated Foot Powder.
• SHOCKING development of the day: I won a putting contest! While waiting for scores to be tabulated, the organizers held a “Ring of Fire” putting competition. 30 guys put at a basket simultaneously until only one person makes the putt. I won a nice Innova Starter Bag and a disc. That’ll never happen again!
• GPS units are wonderful. Ken and I were able to split the driving, and he could relax even though I didn’t know the way to the courses thanks to the nifty Garmin.

Results

• Number of Discs Lost: 3 (Ken)
• Number of Consecutive bogeys: 0
• Number of Trees Todd Hit on Tee Drives: Too numerous to count
• Number of Holes set straight through tight trees with a slight anhyzer bend: Same as number of Trees I hit
• Number of Participants: 46
• Number of Doubles Teams: 21
• Number of Intermediate Doubles Teams: 12
• Ken and Todd’s score: 402 (-35)
• Ken and Todd’s place in Intermediate Doubles: 3rd
• Number of gallons of Gatorade G2 I drank: 1
• Number of 1 liter bottles of water I drank: 8 or 9
• Pairs of socks used: 4

So there it is, we didn’t die, we finished, we placed. I call it a successful event.

The VOCH-ness monster: A Great 8 Warmup

So next week, I’m going down to Raleigh to participate in a particular form of craziness known as The Great 8. My friend Ken and I will play as a doubles team in a tournament that requires us to play 8 courses in one day. In the summer. In North Carolina.

As preparation for this, today I loaded up the car with the requisite gear, food, and water, and headed up to Temperence, MI. I then worked my way back down to Tiffin playing the various courses along the route. Four in all. Here’s some random thoughts.

Vienna Park, Temperance, MI:
I was just here a few weeks ago for a tourney, and my general feelings haven’t changed. It’s a well-developed course that’s aging fairly well. The only blemishes are some new hole configurations that aren’t so much about skill as they are being known to locals who have figured out the secret handshake. I shot the same +5 I shot at the tourney, further illustrating the uselessness of adding extra holes to a tourney.

Ottawa Park, Toledo, OH:
This was the first time I’ve played this course. It’s very short. I blew several holes by not having the shortness dialed in. The layout is sensible, decent signage. There weren’t any holes that really stood out to me. This is a course that I should easily be shooting under par. Give me another crack at it or two, and I’ll be there.

Carter Park, Bowling Green, OH:
I’ve only played this course one other time, and that was a tourney in which I injured myself. Coming back, I’d forgotten how LONG the course plays, even with the plethora of short holes in the middle. The course requires many different shots, a good test. I ran into lots of traffic here. Fortunately, everyone was nice and offered to let me play through. Guess there’s nothing else to do at BGSU right now.

Hedges-Boyer Park, Tiffin, OH:

Back on the home course for the final round of the day. I was feeling pretty good, which is a good sign. I shot an average round for me, and there were some deuces I left out there. Hole #11 was painful; I overshot the short hole, going OB and taking a circle-4 on an easy deuce.

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General observations:

• I was surprised by how I didn’t feel tired. Obviously this was only half as many courses as the Great 8 and the temps were only in the low 80s, but I still felt solid. The time between courses was just enough rest.
• While I didn’t get physically tired, the mental game is going to be hard. At both BG and Tiffin, there were holes that I bogied or didn’t deuce that were the result of pure mental failure. This area is probably going to be where having a partner will help.
• I keep dropping my back shoulder–or lifting my front shoulder–on important drives. Need to focus on driving THROUGH my body.
• Funny nature moment of the day: Hole #16 at Tiffin. My drive landed about 10 feet from a robin. As I walked up, the robin snagged a huge earthworm: it dangled all the way from its beak to the ground. The robin wanted to get away from me, but it refused to drop the worm. It would try to fly, but couldn’t. It hopped a few feet away every step I took towards my disc. Finally, it was able to duck behind a tree.

Oh, TMI alert, the new UnderArmour undies that I purchased are fantastic! Not a single chafe all day long.

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Stats for the day
Miles driven: 144.5
Hours driven: 4
Hours spent on this endeavor: 8:43
Time spent playing DG: 4:13 or so
Shots OB: 3
Discs lost: 0
Discs lodged in a tree: 1
Discs lodged in a tree by trying to get down another disc lodged in the tree: 1

Scores
Vienna 3 2 3 4 4 4 4 3 3 || 3 3 2 3 4 3 4 3 4 |||| +5
Ottawa 4 4 2 4 3 4 3 3 3 || 3 3 3 3 2 4* 3 3 3|||| +3
Carter 4 3 3 3 4 5 2 3 3 || 3 5* 4 3 3 4 4 2 3 |||| +7
H-B 3 3 2 3 4 3 3 3 3 || 3 4* 4 3 3 3 3 4 3 |||| +3

Total: +18 for 73 holes

2008 Vienna Open

So, last year I played in the Vienna Open and had a good opening round and an awful second round. Actually the scores are only 2 strokes apart, but that doesn’t really display the misery of the round.

This year, tournaments and my schedule haven’t been lining up well, but I found that I could play Vienna again. So, off I went. And…well, the same story, only worse. I shot a +5 on the first round, which I was pretty pleased with. The course has been re-configured in the past year to make it more challenging (read: they’ve grown enamored with wild, sharp-turning blind holes surrounded by man-eating brush that only a frequently-playing local has any chance of hitting). +5 put me in the money for my division, and (it turns out) shooting a 841 rated round which is above my current rating. So, I started the second round feeling pretty good…until the wheels came off. I’ll spare you the gruesome details, but the final result was a +11 round that was every bit as nasty as that sounds.

I fell from 8th to 13th and right out of the money.

Sigh.

Highlight of the day: A thumber tee-shot through the woods that hit the bottom of the basket pole and skittered about 7 feet away for an easy deuce.

Lowlight of the day: Hitting a tree three feet off the tee. 2nd shot, foot slips on rain soaked grass, drive goes to the right down a stand of trees about 20 ft perpendicular to intended flight path. 3rd shot goes deep into brush. Finish hole with a 5.

Non-golf-highlight of the day: An amateur radio club was having an event in the park. One gentleman had constructed an antenna that spanned several trees. I overheard him having a conversation with someone in Italy; the sound was as clear as any landline phone call I’ve ever heard. Comment from someone in our group: These are the guys you want to know when the world ends in an atomic war.

Little Things

Pie and coffee
This morning I sit here drinking stale coffee and eating bad pie. And I’m happy. The coffee, while stale, started out as good coffee a few days ago. And by good I mean freshly ground, properly stored, french press brewed Garuda Blend coffee from San Francisco’s Peet’s Coffee. Sure, two or three days (who can remember) sitting in the press on the counter hasn’t done it any favors, but I’m sticking by the idea that good coffee gone stale is still better than bad coffee fresh.

As for the pie, it’s not really the pie’s fault. It never really had a chance. When our friends Jack and Nancy moved to Baltimore–what? two years ago?–they gave us some gleanings from their freezer. Among the goodies was a box of frozen pie dough. It’s been sitting in the frost-free since then. I finally decided it was time to free up the space, so I thawed it out, slammed it in a pie plate, scooped in some canned pie filling (1 can blueberry, 1 can raspberry), slapped on the top layer of dough, and had done with it. And you know, for two-years-plus old dough, it came out ok. Nothing to write home about, mind you. Oh wait…

Two fingers
So yesterday, to celebrate turning in final grades, I went out to the disc golf course. I’ve been feeling that I’ve hit a plateau in regards to my distance throws. Yes, I get good spin. Sure my form is basically good. My accuracy is passable, and my consistency is ok. But, man, I just couldn’t get the disc to GO FURTHER. So, yesterday morning during my morning internet stroll, I happened across some youtube videos of folks throwing their discs FAR. I watched them. Despaired. And then caught something out the side of my ear. Someone mentioned using a two-fingered grip.

A two fingered grip? I’ve been using what’s known as the “power grip”: four fingers curled under the rim, thumb on top. It’s served me well. But this two-fingered idea intrigued me. So I decided to use the two-finger on every hole. Well, except #7 and #11, which are too short/tight for me to be messing with. I was amazed. I did nothing different on my drives except change my grip on the disk, and I was easily adding 20-30 feet. That’s almost a 10% increase just by moving two fingers. Of course my accuracy and consistency took a hit, but nothing that some dialing-in work won’t cure. I was very happy.

By the end of the round I was looking at the possibility of shooting under par for the first time on my home course, but some unlucky wind gusts took care of that perfect ending. Still, it was a good day on the course thanks to two fingers.

2008 Rock Creek Shootout

Saturday was the 2nd Rock Creek Shootout here in Tiffin, OH. Once again, Clare and his team put together a top-notch event that ran smoothly. As much as I mistrust Subway, they came through with good quality sandwhiches donated for lunch, and Ballreich’s donated potato chips that reportedly arrived still warm from thier Tiffin plant. Can’t get much fresher than that.

There were about ten fewer participants than last year, but I think we can chalk that up to the horrendous weather: temps around 38, 15-20mph wind, occasional rain/snow. Just the ticket for a miserable day. Despite that, we still had participants from Oklahoma, North Carolina, Michigan, West Virginia, and, of course, Ohio. I thought I saw a Kentucky car, but I’m not sure.
I started off the day shooting a personal best +3 in the first round. I didn’t do anything flashy, but I also didn’t have any horrific breakdowns either. The worst was hole 14 where I yanked my DX Eagle into the swollen Rock Creek. On the upside, I had a beauty of an uphill, into the wind birdie put on 14 that was entirely a result of my windblown putting session earlier in the week. At any rate, I was quite happy with my first round, and sat around during the lunch break antsy to get started.

For perhaps the first time, I found myself starting the second round on the lead card of my division. The leader was 4 strokes ahead while the other three of us were all within one. I quickly created separation between myself and the others…in the wrong direction. In the first nine holes, I shot two fives and a six. One of the fives and the six I might be able to blame on the wind and wet, but there was one five that was all on me. So, I ended up +14 on the day, dropping me from 2 to a sixth-place tie. That was enough to cash: DX Destroyer, folding stool, and a keychain. And I’m thankful.

I was also thankful to get out of that bonechilling weather and home to a hot shower! Overall it was a solid start to a new year of disc golf. Can’t wait for some better weather to toss some plastic.

2008 First Round

Well, the weather and my schedule have finally combined to produce my first opportunity since winter started to toss a disc. Ok, I suppose I should admit my lack of taste for winter golf this year. At any rate, today I sloshed through the course and had a decent rusty round. Here’s the skinny:

• Putting: I’ve some work to do to get my putting back UP to not being the strong part of my game.
• Driving: I was getting very good spin on the disc. I need to work on solidifying my release point. I never got myself in trouble, but neither did I ever really get the disc where I wanted it to go.
• Mid-range: Probably the best part of my day. Need to stay focused and not float shots.
• Overall: I shot an average +4 or 5. I’m certainly not going to complain considering I haven’t thrown in a few months. Some solid things to build on.