The Intentional Disc Golfer
Unleash your disc golf potential with The Intentional Disc Golfer podcast! Join us as we dive deep into the physical and mental aspects of this incredible sport, helping you become the player you've always dreamed of being. We're here to elevate your game, share expert insights, and inspire intentional growth on and off the course. Support our mission by becoming a part of our avid listener community. Together, let's take your disc golf journey to new heights! Email us at theintentionaldiscgolfer@gmail.com to support or be featured on our show. Let's tee off towards greatness!
The Intentional Disc Golfer
Find Your Line: Pro Insights for Tournament Success (Live Recording)
Ever wondered how the pros prepare for a tournament? In this special live panel discussion, we go deep with five DGPT professionals as they reveal their personal strategies for tournament success at the Cascade Challenge.
Holland Handley, Eric Oakley, Casey White, James Proctor, and Robert Burridge share their approaches to everything from physical recovery between events to mental preparation for technical wooded courses. Their insights expose the reality of life on tour – the grind of travel, the decisions about practice intensity, and the personalized routines that help them perform at their peak.
The conversation takes fascinating turns as the pros discuss course management philosophy, with a particularly illuminating exchange about playing to your strengths rather than forcing textbook shots. "Boring golf is scoring golf," Holland notes, emphasizing the value of consistency over flashy play. Meanwhile, James reveals his surprisingly minimalist practice approach: "When I can step away from disc golf and do some other things unrelated to the sport, I think that helps me stay balanced."
The panel also dives into disc selection strategy, putting techniques, mental game approaches, and even shares stories about their most treasured lost discs. Whether you're a competitive player looking to improve your tournament game or simply fascinated by the inner workings of professional disc golf, this episode offers rare insight into the minds of those competing at the highest level of the sport.
Disc Golf Changes Lives <3
To support this podcast or arrange for an interview please contact us at theintentionaldiscgolfer@gmail.com
Welcome to the Intentional Disc Golfer Podcast, the show dedicated to helping you elevate your disc golf game with purpose and strategy. Whether you're stepping up to the tee for the first time or you're a seasoned pro chasing that perfect round, this podcast is your guide to playing smarter, training better and building confidence on the course. We are, brandon and jenny saprinsky, passionate disc golfers, here to explore everything from technique, course management, mental focus and gear selection. Grab your favorite disc, settle in and let's take your game to the next level, intentionally, intentionally.
Speaker 3:And thank you for tuning in to this episode of the Intentional Disc Golfer Podcast. I am one of your hosts. My name is Brandon.
Speaker 2:And.
Speaker 3:I'm Jenny and we would like to welcome you to this very exciting episode. We have never done this before. We got a live discussion panel with what we got five DGPT pros here to talk about how to get ready for a tournament. Let's give it up, all right. And first of all, we'd like to thank the fans. You guys are the reason that we can keep doing this, that we can do what we do. So thank you, and if you would like to support the show, please like, subscribe, follow, tell all of your friends. We have all the social medias. We got TikTok Twitter. I think we got a YouTube. We used to have YouTube. We got.
Speaker 3:Facebook Instagram. What else we got it's called X now X.
Speaker 2:It's X, oh yeah X. What else we got? It's called X now X. It's X, oh yeah X.
Speaker 3:That's right. That's right. And if you'd like to get a hold of us directly, you can email us at theintentionaldiscgolfer at gmailcom All one word at theintentionaldiscgolfer or theintentionaldiscgolfer at gmailcom. You also can text us directly. We receive fan mail through text message off our website. So if you go and click on the button up in the left hand corner there, you can send us a fan mail directly. And the reason that we are here tonight we are doing a fundraiser for Mindful Flight and we got Jenny here. She's going to tell us a little bit about Mindful Flight.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So as my journey with disc golf has grown and I have learned about how much healing has happened, I've been working with some of my students and noticing that if they're dysregulated, I can give them a disc. I can say go, throw into the basket until you can get three in a row and when they get three in a row they can come talk to me. So I'm focusing on figuring out the social, emotional learning aspects of disc golf and how we can help more kids through disc golf.
Speaker 3:All right, that's excellent. So before we get started and we introduce our panel of pros, we do need to take a break and hear from our sponsors. Let's do this.
Speaker 2:Big news. Disc Golf fans, treasures of the Forest, just dropped something special their Mile Marker 63 Mini. These unique pieces were crafted from materials collected with the help of Simon Lizotte Straight from the course he designed. That means you're not just getting a mini, you're holding a help of Simon Lizotte Straight from the course he designed. That means you're not just getting a mini, you're holding a piece of disc golf history. Stop by, say hi, grab your mile marker 63 mini before they're gone.
Speaker 3:And yo. We actually have the special privilege of having Matt Syme, matt Syme, matt Syme. Yes, matt Syme, he's sitting here with us. The creator, founder of Treasures of the Forest, correct, correct?
Speaker 2:Give him a round of applause.
Speaker 4:Thanks for having me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you're very welcome, Very, very welcome. All right, and then for our next one. We got.
Speaker 2:All right, let's talk about a brand that's bringing some serious fun and personality to disc golf Salty Unicorns Apparel. That's right, Salty Unicorns Apparel. They started because disc golf fashion was seriously lacking in style, especially for women. What began as a simple search for better apparel turned into something bigger, and in just a few weeks they were outfitting own Scoggins, and now they've got Jessica Oleski, Lucas Carmichael and Trinity Bryant rocking their gear too. Salty Unicorns is different because they actually prioritize women's apparel, something most brands don't. And they're not stopping there. Pretty soon, they're launching their own Salty Unicorn bags, bringing that same energy and creativity to the gear you carry. So if you want to stand out on the course and support a brand that's shaking things up, check out Salty Unicorns apparel, because disc golf should be fun, and so should what you wear. Find them online, follow them on social media and bring some color to your game.
Speaker 3:Them on social media and bring some color to your game. Use the code SALTY10 for a 10% discount. All right, and we're going to have Jenny lead us off introducing our first professional Now.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh gosh, All right. One of the most powerful and fearless competitors in the FPO division. With a background in Ultimate Frisbee and a passion for pushing boundaries, she's brought an explosive style and relentless drive to the disc golf course. Her distance is undeniable, her mindset is sharp and her presence on the pro tour just keeps growing stronger. Get ready for Holland Handley. All right, our next guest Today is a rising horse on the disc golf scene, known for his smooth mechanics, fierce competitiveness and mental game. Well beyond his years, he's battled on the biggest stages, turned heads with clutch performances and continues to prove. He belongs among the sports elite, From junior champion to pro tour contender. His journey is just getting started.
Speaker 2:Stick around for Robert Burridge A fan favorite with a clean forehand, powerful backhand and a game that continues to evolve with every season, bursting onto the scene with highlight reel moments and a breakout forerun alongside some of Disc Vault's biggest names. He's proven he can hang with the best Humble driven and always up for a challenge. Don't forget about that. Star Wars. How about Casey Weitz?
Speaker 1:Five technically, unless you count these as individual or like each letter as individual, like one, two, three, and you count these as individual or like each letter as individual Like one, two, three, four five, all right.
Speaker 2:So someone returning to the Intentional Disc Golfer podcast, he brings unmatched energy, passion and personality to the disc golf scene. Known for his dynamic shot selection, creative play style and dedication to the sports community, he's not just a competitor, he's an ambassador, whether he's hyping up a crowd, running clinics or grinding on tour.
Speaker 2:He does it all with heart. Known as the man of the people. Mr Eric Oakley All right. A calm competitor with smooth power and precision. With a background in education, he has earned respect on and off the course through consistent play and sportsmanship. Here to welcome James Proctor, let's get started.
Speaker 3:All right everyone. I hope you guys enjoyed the introductions. I worked really hard on that.
Speaker 2:I want to say I never thought I would be speaking over Star Wars music.
Speaker 3:That is now a new life goal achieved. You can check that box, casey, you get to do an intro to some Star. Wars, I know right.
Speaker 3:Tonight's discussion is about how to get ready for a tournament. Not only that, but also give these guys a chance to share some of their disc golf stories, how they came to disc golf, what they've been doing in disc golf, and just have some fun. What do you guys think let's do it? Yeah, all right, let's jump off to the left of me here. We'll start with Robert Burrage. Robert Burrage, what's your disc golf story?
Speaker 6:uh, it's long. I guess I started with ultimate way back. Uh, both my parents played ultimate frisbee professionally and so just from there, I've had a frisbee in my hand my my whole life. So gotta gotta start there. And then, you know, my dad got me into it when I was 13 14, and just gotten better since then. Really really got into it during COVID, while I was in college. And here we are after college just trying to get better.
Speaker 2:I want to say Jace, calling you out, I hope you're listening. I said I hope you're listening, college is good. Started when he was young.
Speaker 6:College is good.
Speaker 3:Alright, let's bounce over here to Eric Oakley. What's your disc golf story, eric?
Speaker 2:Yeah, a mouthful.
Speaker 3:Well, I picked up the game.
Speaker 1:About 20 plus years ago, a good friend of mine Just said hey, do you want to go play disc golf? So I was about 14, 15 years old and, yeah, kind of stayed in my life ever since and about 10 years ago I had the opportunity to take the leap and go on tour. I'd never played an amateur event, so I was always playing in pro and I always something I wanted to do, so just went for it. I'm lucky to be here ten years later still doing it and feeling like my game is still improving, even at this long. So understand that time is on your side more than more than anything. I'm turning 37 and half a month, so I'm 36 and 11 months, or however we do it.
Speaker 3:Happy early birthday.
Speaker 1:Thank you, thank you. So, yeah, time is of the essence and you can keep improving as long as you go, as long as you do the right thing.
Speaker 3:Isn't this also the 10th year of the Pro Tour?
Speaker 7:I was on the tour the first year You've been in it since the first year Yep Holy cow.
Speaker 1:Played in a couple of events the first year. Yep Holy cow Been in a couple events the first year. It was really cool, great opportunity. Just felt awesome to kind of see it also grow to be as big as it is, and big thanks to Pro Tour for kind of giving us an avenue to make this more a reality, because I might have had to stop a few years back, but there's a lot of great things that have come of that, so big thanks to them.
Speaker 3:Heck, yeah, heck yeah. Well, they're kind of the reason. You guys are all here and all of you were just gracious enough to accept our invites. Yeah, thank you to you guys. Honestly Appreciate you, man Holland, how about you? Let's jump over there?
Speaker 9:Yeah, I mean I've been playing disc golf most of the people up here but I found it a little bit later, in 2019. Actually, my boyfriend found it, I think, just a Jomez video and it was. You know, we were looking for some something to do outside, because we were both working the nine-to-five thing and needed something to get us outdoors and we just got hooked. Got hooked, I got obsessed in the way that I do sometimes about things and started getting pretty good at it and kind of had the opportunity around the end of 2021. We were living in California at the time, trying to move back to Texas, and it was kind of at this moment of you know, go jump on tour for a bit or go get a job, and went and bought a trailer, decided to do it for a year just to see how it went, and now we're here, year number four on tour, tour.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you were talking about how hooked you get with disc golf. I was talking to a lady that just came in here before we started and I'm like look, if you start playing, you're gonna get hooked.
Speaker 9:Yeah, it's weird, how that happens.
Speaker 3:It's infectious. All right, let's jump back over here. Mr Proctor, what is your disc golf story?
Speaker 10:My story starts probably in the year 2000 or 2001. I was five or six at the time and there was a course by my house and my dad and I would see it just driving around. We didn't know what it was, so we went out there with kind of a big whammo beach frisbee and tossed it around and somebody showed us and gave us some discs and you know, it was always kind of a hobby. I was more focused on baseball and basketball as a kid and then when I actually won, I guess, my first pro tournament right after I graduated high school, I beat Derek Billings and then I went to college in Reno, started playing all around the Tahoe courses and got pretty good when I was in college and then, yeah, been playing ever since.
Speaker 3:Very cool now. Am I right in hearing that you were a teacher before you became a pro disc?
Speaker 10:player, yeah, I mean. So after after college, I was teaching full-time and then playing. You know, during my summer and winter breaks I felt like I had the best of both worlds. I got to do something that I loved, and then I also got to play disc golf. I didn't really see a reason why I should change that. At the time, covid doing what it did for the sport and the pro tour and the contracts, and I kind of had a conversation with my wife and I said you know, if I want to tour full time, now seems like a good time to do it. So I think the second half of the 2022 season after the school year ended, then I started touring full-time.
Speaker 3:Jenny, here is a principal certified administrator.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm on the dark side now. Common thread Pushing papers a little bit. Oh yeah, more working with kids and pushing papers. But yeah, that's good.
Speaker 3:All right, Casey, what about your disc golf story? What do you got? I mean, in what. We got time.
Speaker 1:Have fun. My dad and I loved playing catch with a frisbee and after many months and years of us just playing catch in the yard, he finally had enough daylight to go to dick's sporting goods first and, uh, run to our local course that we didn't know was on the side of a cliff in the forest and we got lost our first time ever. We were told very, very good directions and we just took the wrong turn on our way into the course and ended up in the middle of the course, backtracked to hole 10. And just played the back nine. But it was like the greatest nine holes of golf I had ever played.
Speaker 1:I was a ball golfer, so, um, then we were lucky enough to run into somebody on the first hole when we were on 18 that had like eight discs and we were just like like whoa, like you know what's, what's this guy got going on. He told, told us about league and tournaments. We had no idea. We were out there with a beast, each just chucking it, and we got hooked immediately, got my buddy and his dad hooked on it as well, and then we lent our discs to them and they misplaced them, never saw them again. So we didn't play again for a year and a half. And then my local pro shop opened up at the same course, hawk's Nest, and I had bought my dad a starter set. Well, I didn't buy it, but I got my dad for father's day a starter set.
Speaker 1:Let me guess a firebird, a shark and an aviar leopard shark okay, leopard shark, okay, leopard shark and then, uh, when the store opened up, we had somebody that could recommend me uh, a build your own starter pack. I. I got a Starlight Valkyrie, an X-Buzz and a Soft Magnet and every round we played with the one beast each. We just played match play and I could never beat him. And as soon as I got three discs, like a mid-range driver putter, he never beat me again, unless we played with one disc, like my dad beat me like a couple years ago because we played a one disc round. My dad beat me like a couple years ago. We played a one-disc round.
Speaker 3:All right, here's a good question what's your dad rated?
Speaker 1:He does not have a rating. He actually just got his PDJ number for Christmas. Oh, there you go. Yeah, my stepmom gifted him and my younger brother their PDJ number for Christmas and basically it's just like now. They have no excuse to not play tournaments. So we'll see how it goes.
Speaker 1:Obviously, I don't spend that much at home, much time at home and, uh, it takes a little bit of a nudge to get them on the course, but once they get going, that's all they think about, like you know, like the rest of us. But yeah, anyway, just like pretty natural progression, as natural as it could get. I just, every single day, I was doing exactly what I wanted to do, which was throwing discs in the backyard at a basket, and little did I know. I was practicing and training every single day. And next thing, I know I'm going to the junior world championship and taking third place. And trajectory was just on and on from there, started making money, graduated high school, basically dove all in as soon as COVID happened. What year was the Junior Worlds? 2017. Yeah, I was born in 2000.
Speaker 10:That's crazy, that's crazy yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, all right, let's bounce back over here. Matt now you're on the Pro Tour, but in a bit of a different capacity. Talk about what your disc golf story. I'm assuming you're a disc golfer absolutely all right, so let's what's your disc golf story?
Speaker 4:I'll say, yeah, uh, different than all of these stories, my first introduction to disc golf was in 1999. One of my camp counselors was a professional disc golfer. John Drummond is a disc craft. I think he's still sponsored by disc craft. But when I met him back then I was blown away. Like you're a professional frisbee thrower? Yeah, yeah, I throw frisbees with my dad. Like like casey said, I, I throw frisbees. I play catch with my dad all day long, like we do that we throw as far away as we can for the record, it never got old yeah, it's like just saying that, but I didn't even know what disc golf was until I met John Drummond at camp in 99.
Speaker 4:And I was blown away that people could make a living throwing Frisbees Like what, what. And even at that point I had no idea. As I made my way through the progression and I learned about disc golf in, say, 2007, we started throwing things at things. We throw the rock at that thing, we throw the golf ball at that thing, we throw the fr the rock at that thing, we throw the golf ball at that thing, we throw the frisbee at that thing and we throw the frisbee at that thing and we keep throwing frisbees at that thing and we learn that this is a sport. This is that sport that I heard about in 99, that John Drummond told me about. We're throwing frisbees at things that John Drummond told me about. We were throwing frisbees at things and I could never imagine that I could make a living out of it. I make wood turnings, I make a little mini out of the wood that I find or things that I found, I don't know well, so treasure the forest.
Speaker 3:You go around and you take, you collect things from different courses, right, and then you put them into epoxy molds and then make minis out of them. And I remember the first time that I saw one of these things was at ladies in the lake, when jenny had the most epic, freaking win I think I've ever seen in disc golf, and she's actually got it sitting right here awesome, you remember this one.
Speaker 4:I remember making that mini. I I do yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we had a conversation over at Shelton about it.
Speaker 3:yeah, that's very cool. Sweet. Oh, come up to see yeah, so yeah.
Speaker 2:What's the story here? Where's the other mic? Where's the other mic? Oh, you can just put mine on.
Speaker 3:Where's the other mic? There you go.
Speaker 11:Tell us, you got a you can just put mine on.
Speaker 2:There's the other mic, there you go Introduce yourself. Who are you? Hi, I'm you turn it on. Go Go, hello yeah.
Speaker 12:Okay, so I'm Shantae, Matt's girlfriend and business manager of Treasures of the Forest, that particular mini. Matt asked me to make the letters out of vinyl. I tried four different ways to get these letters to come out, and each different way took over an hour and he needed three of them by five o'clock when I gave up at ten o'clock at night. So what I ended up doing is pulled the letters out of the vinyl and then used a marker like a paint marker, and it ended up looking so cool that it actually launched me into start painting minis.
Speaker 12:I love it so that project was one of the worst days of Treasures in the Forest of my life.
Speaker 2:Well, I'm sorry to hear it's one of your worst days, because it was one of my best days when they were done.
Speaker 12:It was epically worth it, but it was the most frustrating day. But when it turned out like that, it's better than anything. Vinyl would have been.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's amazing.
Speaker 3:Alright, so the subject of conversation today is how to prepare for a tournament. So, shelton Springs some of you have played it before, some of you have not. Shelton Springs, right, great course, glad to have you guys here.
Speaker 2:And thank you to Mason County Disc Golf for all the hard work that you guys are putting in to make that happen.
Speaker 3:And so it's a newer course on the tour and it's a little bit of a different flavor, because we've seen some tour on coverage and whatnot and it's a lot of ball, golf courses, parks and things like that. This is probably one of the only primarily wooded courses you guys have on tour. How do you guys come into town so fresh and prepare for that?
Speaker 9:Helps when we have an off week.
Speaker 3:Yeah, get some extra rounds in.
Speaker 9:Or less. Extra rounds and rest mostly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, scheduling is one of the kind of more crazy parts of our tour because you have the pro tour, who needs to be profitable and they need to run events week after week after week. But at the same time we sometimes feel obligated to play week after week after week and that's not realistic for the human body to do what they're asking us, especially when we don't have the travel that we would like. As far as getting to place to place quickly like plane would be awesome. We don't make that much money to do that. Nobody's doing that. We don't have trainers, we don't have these things to help us recover. We're not. The finances aren't there to meet what the tour is sometimes asking. So having any off week at any point in the season is immense for the players and I think what you're going to see is you're going to start to see better golf from the field the more we get our scheduling down. So I just attack onto that and go into a little soapbox. Yeah, more rest is good.
Speaker 3:More rest is good. So, you're talking from a health standpoint. You work so hard and you're go, go, go, go and your body breaks down after a while. So having that off week is nice, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 1:I will say that the tour might say things as well. You don't have to play every week. Well, you then stop making the points in the tournament finals and all these things and have to have qualifications at all these events that that lead to potential bigger things. For us, any weekend could be our weekend. That can break us out. Why would we not bet on ourselves? But also, we're gonna advocate and ask for those things. So please listen to us, and we understand you need to make money, but let's figure out a better way that doesn't harm our bodies and shorten our careers. I'm lucky to be at 10 years into my career, but I am also worried that there are going to be players who only get a shortened career because of how taxing the tour can be fair enough, I somebody was saying something over here I mean yeah to play devil's advocate.
Speaker 1:I mean, I just took a crazy disc golf road trip on my way up the coast, but, like the off week, still very thankful because I got to take my time traveling through one of my favorite parts of the country. And there's nothing more that makes me scream than when I see the schedule come out in j or August and it's OTB open and Portland open back-to-back weekends. I'm like you've got to be kidding me.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like bro it's only a 12-hour drive, yeah, but like what I'm just supposed to skip.
Speaker 1:Lake Tahoe and I'm supposed to skip the Redwoods and I'm supposed to skip the Oregon coast and all these things every year. I'm supposed to skip those every year, like I want. The time and I took, uh, our dog, tato and I we went on a crazy trip. We played seven courses in seven days, or seven courses in eight days, something like that, and uh, it was pretty awesome. I mean, I had to take one day off because after 27 holes at whistler's bend my elbow was demanding it, but it wasn't a part of the plan.
Speaker 6:I mean tacking on to that. Then you also get a mental rest from the pro tour.
Speaker 1:Oh for sure, you feed the soul you feed the soul.
Speaker 6:Yeah, you play the fun courses and you're sitting there like I don't care how I shoot, I'm just going to go out and throw.
Speaker 1:Every single disc in my bag is not in my bag for this tournament.
Speaker 6:Every single disc I threw for that entire week, I am not throwing this weekend so that's another break where we talk about mental break, where it's a physical break of an off week. But if you don't feel like you need that, you get the mental break of not going. I just I need to throw five on every hole to know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, every time you feed the body or you feed the soul, and when you take all your start, when you take your starting lineup out, you take away all expectations and it's just for the love of the game. And I think me more than anybody can vouch for that being way more important than a competitive edge. But your body being healthy is number one, because I couldn't do either of those things if my body wasn't healthy. Yeah, for sure?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to say actually for us as amateurs, this last weekend and this weekend we have off. So I understand that too. You know, this last weekend and this weekend we have off so I understand that too.
Speaker 3:You know that time off is important well that we're getting old yeah for the oldest maybe perfect awesome, thank you. Thank you, rj, so I'll More money without physical demanding, and we love your content creation.
Speaker 4:Thank you for that, Mark. Awesome Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 3:RJ, so I'll hop back over to Holland real quick. So when you guys are out there on the grind, what are some of the tips and tricks you do to take care of your body and to recuperate in such a quick time, because the turnaround has to be grueling.
Speaker 9:Yeah, definitely, it's kind of a constant balance between doing enough work to be skills wise, prepared for the next tournament.
Speaker 9:So having your skills being sharp, knowing the course well enough to be able to play well, but also being recovered and being in the right state of mind going into the tournament, because your mood, you know, if you're grumpy and frustrated and burnt out going to a tournament, versus excited and just wanting to see the flight of a disc, you know going in is going to have a huge impact, and how that is not only on one given week but over the course of an entire month, over the course of the entire season.
Speaker 9:And so for me, you know, it's kind of having a loose structure that I stick with week to week. So I have kind of the minimum amount of work that I need to do on average to be prepared, and then that includes, you know, practice rounds, a little bit of field work and I'm also working out so some strength training in with that, and then whatever time is left is kind of open-ended to like. Do I feel like I need more practice and would benefit from that, or would I benefit from doing something fun, fun? Would I benefit from just kind of vegging out and watching Netflix all day and kind of letting everything recuperate, and so it's just kind of that on repeat gotcha.
Speaker 3:What about James over here? What do you do? What do you do? You got any tips or tricks to help recuperate?
Speaker 10:I mean, I think I'm in the minority as far as I feel like a majority of the tour is young and excited and they want to go play golf every day. You know, when I have an off week, sometimes you know I'll fly home and I don't even bring my disc golf bag and I'll just not play for five days. Thanks for hauling that, eric. He really appreciates it. You know, when you like for me I feel I've been playing for so long. I don't I'm not necessarily working on my putt week to week or working on, you know, my backhand. There might be one angle or one shot that I might try to dial in if it was off the week before. But you know, when I'm getting to a course most of the courses we've played before if for some reason I'm getting to a course and we haven't played there yet, or if I'm not just not comfortable on that course, you know I'll throw one or two shots and try to figure it out. But after that I'm really only throwing one disc per hole. I just try to, you know, limit my throws.
Speaker 10:And you know I'm a big fan of taking off days. When I can, I'll like play two practice rounds then I. Then I won't throw the next day before the tournament or you know, however, I can fit an off day in the four-day events. That's not really possible. But yeah, I think you know I've I've been around the block when it comes to playing tournaments and playing events and throwing, and so I mean, I was never one of those guys that was like I got hooked and I played every day for three years, like that was never me. And so you know, when I can kind of step away from disc golf and do some other things unrelated to the sport, I think that helps me kind of stay balanced and stay, you know, like Holland said, excited to play the event when it's time.
Speaker 2:I'm not going to lie. As someone who's gotten really into disc golf, it's nice to have a weekend off to actually like be with the kids, do the laundry. You know, we built a chicken coop.
Speaker 10:We've got nine chickens now, so we wouldn't have been able to do that if we were working as hard as you guys are, and then next week you'll be itching to play again and you'll be really excited.
Speaker 3:oh yeah, oh yeah apparently, when we're not disc golfing, we have lives it's weird by the way, james, you don't need to work on your putt.
Speaker 1:Appreciate you, that's really good.
Speaker 3:It feels pretty good yeah it sounds like you would actually prefer if you didn't you could ask yes, say he got.
Speaker 10:He got a little annoyed because he uh, I mean annoyed because I went from first round of Florida up until maybe four days before Champions Cup without I wasn't allowed to throw without throwing, without putting, and we got out of the car and I hit back-to-back 40-footers and Yese goes. That's it, I'm done practice putting. You either know how to putt or you don't, but it's useless.
Speaker 1:Hey, I'm a huge advocate of that mantra right there. You either know how to do it or you don't, but it's it's useless. Hey, I'm a huge advocate of that mantra right there. You either know how to do it or you don't. Yeah, I, I won my best putting rounds of the year. I think I threw four practice putts on the green. I swear to god yeah fair enough all right.
Speaker 3:So let's bounce back over here. How about, eric, when you walk onto a course like this, like how do you take it apart what? What are you seeing? What are you thinking? What's your process like?
Speaker 1:I mean really trying to dial in the shots that I want to be throwing as much as I possibly can, like leaning on maybe certain discs. If I can lean on throwing more dynasties and things like that all over the course, both forehand and backhand, I feel like I'm hitting my gaps, covering enough distance and staying in the fairways really easily. But if the course is asking for maybe a little more distance then it's like, okay, maybe I need to start thinking about bumping up in discs. So I'm always trying to dial in and picking my best shot, even if it might be slightly harder.
Speaker 1:On the hole where it might call for a backhand turnover and I'm like I don't feel very comfortable in those.
Speaker 1:I'll still try and force the forehand and figure it out with my style. So leaning on my strengths as much as I can. And then, if it's not there, then maybe I spend a couple extra reps on that tee pad to make sure I dial in exactly where I want to be, lining up, how I want to throw it, and then work on getting that conviction off the T-pad of how I'm gonna feel about it every single time. So, yeah, start with that Finding my best shots. If they're available, lean on them and allow that to kind of build your focus forward, because I think that that going to put you in the right head space if you're able to play your skills on a course and that's the beauty of disc golf in that way is I don't have to throw the same shot that anyone else does. I might be the only person who throws a forehand on this hole If I birdie it or if I get three bars on it and I don't bogey it and other people do it's like I might take strokes.
Speaker 3:That seems good to me, so let's figure it out for our own specialty?
Speaker 9:How about Holland? How do you take apart a course like this? Yeah, I agree with a lot of what Eric just said. You know it's having an understanding of what are my most comfortable shots and then I try to break down on the course to stick to those as much as possible and you know, sometimes that means I'm happy with par. Just I'm trying to understand what is a good score on different holes, given my strengths and the way I want to tackle it. What is a good score over the weekend, and not just you know how, not necessarily taking on a lot of risk without there being a lot of reward. So really I'm just trying to make it as boring as possible, frankly.
Speaker 3:Boring golf is scoring golf, type of thing.
Speaker 9:Exactly like you know, some people will be throwing these really cool. You know turnovers. But if I can accomplish it with just a power sidearm, I'm going to do that. And then I do like to have some options, especially if I'm throwing, like maybe more technical forehand or something like that, some days that's not quite in the slot. I like to have a backup plan on certain holes so I have room if one shot's feeling bad on a particular day, I can still feel confident going into holes. But yeah, just like Eric said, you make the course fit to your strengths, because that's usually what's going to when you have the pressure on. That's what's going to give you your best performance.
Speaker 3:So I'll bounce over here. What's going to when you have the pressure on. That's what's going to give you your best performance. Do my best, of course, so I'll bounce over here. Robert, we haven't heard from you in a while. What kind of challenges do you face when you walk onto a course like this, Because there's not many in the Pro Tour? What? How is that different? What kind of challenges do you?
Speaker 6:face. So I think first and foremost I mean most of the courses on tour require distance more than anything else and I think that's very, that's a common theme, especially through the front half of the course where we're going through even florida like, if you can throw a mid or fairway on a lot of the shots, that helps a lot because then you're not worried about big rim skipping. If you can dial back on something that you have control over, that may not fade as hard, that's better. Out. Here it's different, especially coming directly from Champions Cup over in Stockton where we're throwing arguably full power on nearly every shot, whether that's full power roller, whether that's full power sidearm, full power backhand, you're throwing hard, especially with wind. You're trying to punch it through the wind, not allowing the wind to really mess with the disc. We come up here. There's a lot more par 3s. There's a lot of par 3s compared to most pro tour courses here and I think that's one of the challenges is because on the par 4s we get a certain distance, we get a certain landing zone and we say, okay, if I can get in this general area, I can then find the green. Whether that's backhand, forehand, I can find a way to it.
Speaker 6:Here. You need to be dialed on that first shot off the tee and so it puts a little more pressure on that. I'm stepping up to the tee. I need to know what I'm throwing. I need to know what I'm throwing, I need to know how I'm throwing it, I need to know where it's likely going to land, especially in a wooded course, whether that's I might try to miss early on a par four to try to get into the left side where the new holes holes 12 and 13 and 13, you almost want to miss left, late left on the tee shot so that you kind of open up that gap.
Speaker 6:You don't want to have that early right turn, you up that gap. You don't want to have that early right turn. You don't want to have something that might go right. You want something that will stay straight to slightly left, and so it's, it's forcing a certain shot and then, however you, whatever angles and whatever speed here that you're comfortable with, you can adjust to that kind of what Holland and Eric said, where they might be comfortable throwing fairway a little bit softer to try to get the angle right. Some other people, myself included, will probably go with a mid. That's just harder because that's the speed that I like to throw, and so that just finding your shot but then learning what the miss is on these very, very technical holes is going to be really important, for the weekend is going to be really important for the weekend.
Speaker 3:I like what you're saying there about the first shot off the tee isn't important. You're not just chewing up distance as much as you can. It has to land in a place where it's going to give you a chance. Yeah, I think that's well said.
Speaker 10:What other challenges are you guys seeing with this course being so heavily wooded and tight and, like you said, a lot of par threes, which you don't see on the tour. Consistency of gap hitting. And you know when we're playing practice rounds you throw a couple, one of them hits a tree, the other one goes over. There you go to your good one and you throw from there a lot and you know it's easier for me at least, the gaps feel pretty big in the practice rounds. But once you start your tournament maybe you late release one it hits hits a tree. Maybe the next hole you, you know you early release left side All of a sudden those gaps just shrink and then every hole you step up to, you know you have to kind of fight to get that rhythm back. And so I think you know this course, it's going to offer that challenge. And then it's also you know we're kind of used to needing to birdie every hole, or at least we feel like we.
Speaker 3:We need to birdie every hole.
Speaker 10:Yeah, not much room for mistakes on the tour no, and I feel like you know, if you're just a tick off but throwing, well, you could see yourself parring seven, eight, nine holes in a row.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and because you're not feet off and going through the trees you're hitting the tree and going through the trees, you're hitting the trees.
Speaker 10:That's right. But that's going to be like sort of a mental test, like who's going to get frustrated and start pressing and who's going to stay relaxed and let it kind of come to them. Yeah, it's different. And yeah, like Casey said, wood sculpt, you're going to miss your line by an inch. You're going to kick into a giant forest and somebody's going to shank one by four feet and have a birdie putt. You've got to be able to kind of be blind to those shots as well and I'll let that frustrate you.
Speaker 3:So bad, it's good yeah.
Speaker 1:You've got to be ready to be creative and humble yourself all at the same time, because there's going to be places where your good tee shots are not in a good place and you're like, dang it, I'm up against a tree. If I try and get there, I might bring bogey into play. So it's like all right, eat your par, get off the hole, move on. But then there are going to be times where it's like all right, this is doable, but it's a shot I haven't thrown in a long time where it's this flippy backhand fan grip mid-range that I need to hold and pan out. But it's like that is the biggest gap, so let's go execute it.
Speaker 1:It's like you put your. You end up in these situations on a course like this that it's you use your entire kit and you might get asked to use your entire kit when I do think that when we play these golf courses and open courses, it's pretty one dimensional. In a lot of ways it's either hyzers or flexes. It's not a lot of flip ups, it's not a lot of that. You do that if that's your strong suit, but coming out here, you gotta kind of have a real range of angles and then ability to make a decision after that.
Speaker 3:So you're saying it's a good test of a broader skill set?
Speaker 1:Absolutely, and I see what you're saying about the coverage, because I mean we watch a lot of coverage when we're bumming around eating dinner, whatever.
Speaker 3:And it's the same three discs over and over and over, or maybe just a slightly different rendition of the same disc. But it's the same three discs over and over and over, or maybe just a slightly different rendition of the same disc but it's the same.
Speaker 1:Three discs over and over. You're going to use a lot of different discs out here, not just maybe a lot of the same discs on the tee, but the second shots are all going to be so different.
Speaker 3:By the way, Holland, you're one with the pine trees on it and stuff that's one of my favorites, oh yeah. Well, how about Matt? You're coming from a different perspective. I mean, you're more on the vendor side of things, but you're on tour. It's grueling. What do you do to take care of yourself?
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's definitely different from what I've been hearing all of these guys talk about. My work week is Thursday through Sunday and I have a little bit of an off time when I'm preparing for the next event and we like to find some of the touristy things to do. I also, as a course collector, will go out of my way to find the different courses higher rated courses to check out in the area. So my off time is spent looking for the different unique disc golf experiences to have the treasures of disc golf, the course owners. I like connecting with the course owners and course designers, especially like around pro tour events. I like to experience the pro tour courses and interact with the people that are dedicated to making the tournament and I like connecting with them and seeing what got the course to where it is today.
Speaker 2:How many courses are you up to playing?
Speaker 4:My total course count is 1720. Nice Matt.
Speaker 2:That's a good total, and you just added Rain Shadow right.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Excellent.
Speaker 4:I just added Rain Shadow. That is my most recently played course. Is Rain Shadow Cool played course? Is Rain Shadow Cool? And I was going to say something I forgot, no worries.
Speaker 3:I think you said something really important there. You go and search out those special experiences out there on the course. So to our pros what kind of special experiences have you had so far getting ready for the Cascade Challenge?
Speaker 1:Oh, brother we were just talking about it, let's do it. No, it's his special experience. He's going to tell you.
Speaker 4:Oh okay, go.
Speaker 1:Utah.
Speaker 4:What am I going to tell you about?
Speaker 10:About going to base camp in Moab.
Speaker 4:Base camp in Moab. Moab Base camp in Moab Base camp is one of the top experiences I've ever had in disc golf. That is one of the most impressive courses that I've ever played and part of it is the drive out there. And I will tell you that the drive out there might ruin your vehicle because I just did it, that there is a lot out there and even even the creek crossing itself isn't that crazy Like. If you take it slowly and go through the creek, you're okay, and the rest of the drive is pretty incredible.
Speaker 4:There's like extreme drop-offs and you're working your way up there to base camp, extreme drop offs and you're working your way up there to base camp and there might be some places where you have to get out and put some rocks under your tires to get up the pass and what not. But we didn't even make it up to the pass. We put our van into the creek on the way up to Hurrah Pass and we lost our van. The creek was a little bit too deep for the speed that I took it at it's on video.
Speaker 1:It's on video. I do have video of it.
Speaker 4:I just saw it it, and I did have to get a new van after that, that's all part of the experience, I suppose perfect that is one of the most incredible courses I've ever played. We didn't make it out there this year and I mean that's part of it. That's. What makes it incredible is that some people might not make it, or the experience getting out to there makes it that much more incredible.
Speaker 1:I always live by. The harder the course is to get to, the better it is. Like the crazier the experience. The more like you know, the more special it feels.
Speaker 3:I can feel that we have a course right behind our house called Fredrickson, and you have to walk up a three-quarters of a mile and, yeah, it's um, find some bears every now and again. Yeah, we're in a cougar tracks. Yeah, we've been, we've been we've been chased out of there by animals before.
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, the horses go through there.
Speaker 1:I mean, I got lost my first time ever playing disc golf and was hooked ever since. So, like that's it right there.
Speaker 3:So what are some of the magical things that you're finding on this course out here, Like Shelton Springs?
Speaker 1:Too close to the main road.
Speaker 3:Too close to the main road. Yeah, Were you here that year when James Conrad was making his birdie putt like on the lead card and the ice cream truck fired up right when he was putting it.
Speaker 1:I don't remember that, but I'm not surprised and that's really funny. Yeah, that happens in Nashville too it was happy, and you know it.
Speaker 3:And he cages out if you're happy, and you know it.
Speaker 1:Oh geez, I know.
Speaker 3:Right on 18. That's tough, I know. I know I can agree with you on the two posts.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I've taken some people that maybe were playing their first disc golf course ever to some crazy destination courses just because I think we're in the wrong place. I'm like, no, we're in the right place, I can assure you.
Speaker 3:Are you sure we're coming back?
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're on SOS and we've been driving for three miles and haven't seen anything of whatever.
Speaker 4:I'll tell you a quick story, real quick. Up at Sprinkle Valley last year, uswdgc, I was talking to my girlfriend Shante. We met her a little bit earlier. She was talking to one of the food vendors up there and he had never played disc golf and he's expressing interest. He lives there or not lives there, he works there on the disc golf course and he's interested in playing disc golf course and he's interested in playing disc golf.
Speaker 4:So in talking I got to take him out for his first disc golf experience on sprinkle valley nice, which is kind of what you're saying, like not really the ideal disc golf experience for the first timer. And we get down. We get down, hole one and he, you know, throws like 12 times to get to the basket or whatever and we're like, okay, we're doing all right. And hole two, I lose my disc and we spent like 20 minutes looking for my disc and dude falls down and gets caught in the briars and he's like, oh, it's not briars, it's barbed wire. And I had to go help him pull the barbed wire out of his leg. He's like bleeding down his leg and I'm like, dude, I understand, this is your first disc golf experience If you need to go home and clean that up. He's like I'm having the best time of my life man. Oh, my God.
Speaker 6:Yeah, that's classic.
Speaker 4:Alright. So we kind of wiped up his leg and on the next hole he lost my dogs. They fell down into the creek. Did you find your bags? We couldn't get them out of it. I mean, it took us a while to get him out of the creek and I was like man, I swear this is not what most disc golf is like.
Speaker 3:He's like I'm hooked man yeah, hell, yeah, that's awesome, so we'll bounce over to Holland real quick. What kind of tips or like strategy can you offer people getting like playing at courses like these? Because we have a lot of tight wooded courses up here, uh, everywhere we just play in the woods. That's what we do. And then second half of that question is one thing that I have trouble with personally is, like I we play all these tight wooded technical courses where it's scramble, scramble, scramble, scramble and you get kind of good at it after a while, but then you go out to like an open course and it's like a whole different ballgame like what kind of knowledge or wisdom can you offer to us?
Speaker 3:you know mere mortals out there.
Speaker 9:I mean, I guess my biggest advice if you're playing, you know, a tight wooded course, is kind of just ask yourself you know what? What are my best shots? You know what are the discs in my bag I feel like I can hit a gap with the most confidently. What's the discs I can throw the straightest, not necessarily get the most distance with, but at least get the most reliable, repeatable shots with and really try to throw those as much as possible, because a lot of times just sticking in the fairway is going to get you the best score, more so than trying to give yourself a putt all the time, because the the less you have to scramble one, you're gonna your frustration levels will be lower and you'll play better for that reason. But also you're just gonna keep the game so much more simple. And then the second part of your question once you're going out into the open it's a little more freeform and it can kind of be hard.
Speaker 9:You don't have anything kind of forcing you to shape shots in a certain way, but generally you know, if it's like a windy day, if you have a good understanding of what your discs are going to do in some different winds and kind of playing that, but also just using maybe some landmarks off in the distance to kind of serve as your shot shape assistance. So you know, you see a tree way off in the distance and you need to. You know, just throw a hyzer, you can use that tree to kind of be like all right, let's start it out right of this tree. It should swing back and kind of create lines. You know, using stuff that's off in the distance.
Speaker 3:So let's jump back over here. Do you guys, when you're lining up shots and everything and you're trying to hit those gaps, you know, miss that tree, miss that tree, like? How far down the fairway do you guys plan that out? I mean, is it like Until the disc's done moving. Yeah, because for like me, I'm like okay, well, if I can get past like the first, like 100 feet, like I'm good, and then it's like all luck from there.
Speaker 2:Let the first like 100 feet like I'm good, and then it's like all luck from there. Let's be honest, if you could just miss the tree.
Speaker 1:You'd be a lot better, james talk about main states.
Speaker 10:I mean what I? One thing I kind of keep two things in mind when I'm playing tech courses, and I grew up not playing tech courses so I had to learn this. It's still not something I'm comfortable with. But the first thing if I have a small gap in front of me you know almost every hole out here I'm picking something in the background and I'm just saying I'm going to hit that. That helps me, not concerned about this tree or this tree, I'm just focused on the back. Once I get through that gap, I don't really care what happens, like I'm not going to lace the gap perfect and then hit a tree 400 feet down there and get pissed off because I hit a tree down there Like I threw a good shot.
Speaker 10:It's disc golf. Sometimes you're going to keep getting through, sometimes you're not, but you can't let those ones frustrate you, and so you know. I think the other thing that kind of plays to my advantage is my. Really my only goal is like give myself an opportunity, throw it inside circle two. I don't necessarily need to try to throw every hole in the bullseye like.
Speaker 10:I'd rather throw a decent shot and trust my putt you know, so I don't need to worry about being in circle one or throwing the perfect shot anything outside of 80.
Speaker 1:You're good.
Speaker 10:Yeah, I just you know if I can throw it inside 60 feet, I'm happy. I'm like I got a chance to make the putt. Casey, you know Pineland, yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean he torched Pineland, yeah, and I was on the bag and it was like he just put it through every gap. Didn't really watch what it did after it went through the gap. He's like cool job's done and then cashed a couple 40-footers and made it the easiest. I said it to a few people you didn't look like you were torching that course. It didn't look like you were doing anything special to shoot 16 down or 14, 15, whatever you shot. It was insane. But how you kept doing the simple things right, shot after shot after shot, was really impressive to watch. It's like it wasn't doing anything crazy.
Speaker 10:I didn't blow my way. Yeah, I think it was a 15 and I didn't throw my way to a 15 down.
Speaker 1:I put it my way yeah, but but you gave yourself an opportunity on 18 of 18 holes almost maybe 16 of 18 holes, and miss one putt maybe, and that was like a 70 footer obstructed yeah I mean we talk about stresses of of this course versus like an open course.
Speaker 6:An open course, you're like I need to get this within 20 feet every time because there's nothing in the way yeah on this course, you you have to trust your putting within, say, 60. You need to be like if I can just give myself chances and chances, whether for birdie or par, you can't be sitting there like I'm not under it. I failed. You said I'm giving myself a chance to execute the next shot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, they definitely don't come easy on these wooded courses.
Speaker 1:Obstructed 40-footers are going to be a prime place to land on this course. You're going to have probably a dozen, if not more than that over three rounds. I mean I'll vouch for. Creativity is exciting. Expected result is terrifying. Like when I land in the middle of the fairway and I have nothing, but nothing in between me and the basket. I'm like, oh shit, like I better pull this off If I'm way out and I'm like, oh shit, like I better pull this off if I'm way out and I'm like nobody's ever thrown this route before
Speaker 1:they have no idea what I'm about to do. And you take, like, the fairway that has now become your fairway. It's nobody else's fairway, but it's yours now. That's when the 40 footer is like oh well, I'm making that now yeah, but when you have the perfect shot and you put it to 40 feet short. You're like ah, I knew it. I knew I wasn't going to get it there.
Speaker 6:It's almost harder when you're lined up, Even on 13, where you're sitting there staring down the gap. You're like I don't know what I'm going to throw. Do you just go dead straight 400 feet? You're like give me a little bit left, I can flex a forehand, throw a flip up, do something.
Speaker 1:But the second, staring straight. You're like I'm going to try, see what I can do. Facing adversity is a lot more easy to believe in yourself than sometimes. I mean, that's just me. But when you land in the ideal of ideal landing zone, it's a lot harder to be like. Oh yes, of course I'm just going to lace this shot, just like the first one. But when you're faced with a what do you want to say? Impossible or improbable task, that's when you're like these people don't know, I've got this in the bag all day, you hype yourself up rather than be scared of oh well, now I better execute, because I've already put myself in position.
Speaker 10:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3:So do you execute because I've already put myself in position? Do you change your kit at all when you guys come out to a wooden course like this? Do you guys change your kit for every course?
Speaker 1:I think I do more than most players on tour. Almost every single course is like six discs in, six discs out. But the one thing that well, I wouldn't say the one thing that never changes. But Matty-O recently told me that he thinks I'm the best seven speed thrower in the world. So right now I have seven, seven speeds in my bag and I just throw those at all costs. And if it's 400 feet, it's seven speed hard, if it's 350 feet, it's seven speed. Stand still, Sidearm, backhand, you name it.
Speaker 6:Isn't that how you ace at USDGC?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 6:Yeah, seven speed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, my signature disc. What about you guys?
Speaker 3:Do you guys change your kit at all for a course like this, or do you change it every week, or how does that work for you?
Speaker 10:I switch discs in and out a lot and you know, for example, on this course, you know, or going back to Champions Cup, champions Cup, I probably had six destroyers in my bag out here, one I only. I think I have a destroyer and a wraith, you know, and that's it. I throw a destroyer on hold, two's t shot and that's it, and the rest is all fairways and mids. Um, so yeah, I mean, I also, you know, will change my discs regularly, but I feel like these are the two extremes. Where you know a lot of golf courses, I'll definitely add a couple more distance drivers and here, you know, I took out some distance drivers. I think I added one or two mids and maybe another fairway, did you?
Speaker 1:throw a mid at Champions Cup? Yeah, did anybody here throw a mid range at Champions Cup? I did a couple times.
Speaker 6:Second shot on one.
Speaker 1:Actually on a backhand. I got far enough, right to where I just threw a straight backhand. I threw like a pitch out with a mid. I was pinched off on a mando. That's the only mid range. I threw all tournament.
Speaker 3:So what about you guys? How do you guys change your bag for a course like this? Or how often do you change your bag?
Speaker 9:Yeah, I mean I have kind of a core, few molds that just always stay in the bag and, honestly, most courses this year before Champions Cup I barely threw any distance drivers because we just didn't need them yet. But, like Champions Cup, you know, had to put some nukes in the bag. I had put my roller disc in the bag, but I don't usually need those on most courses. So, like this weekend, probably not throwing any nukes. I might throw a forehand force a couple times, but it's going to be mostly the fairways and the mid-ranges for me. I don't change my bag a ton just because I don't have that many discs that I need to throw, but I will take the faster stuff out for wooded courses and then I'll take the flippy stuff out for more open courses. Usually.
Speaker 3:How about Eric?
Speaker 1:My bag is pretty much the same most tournaments and I just get really tuned in with those discs. I think the only thing that changes is weather and potential to lose discs like water.
Speaker 10:It's like oh cool water.
Speaker 1:Here's two more emperors and an extra omen that I need to, like, just in case. Or an extra zone, because I dunked mine at Champions Cup and I was like, cool, I had an extra zone in that I need to, just in case. Or an extra zone, because I dunked mine at Champions Cup and I was like cool, had an extra zone in the bag, next hole. I needed to throw an approach and then it got swam out later. So I really add when I need to and or if I'm like this feels good, let's go try it, and then if it's like, oh, I can start using this in the bag, it'll find its way into the bag. To your same standpoint, I'm bagging six dynasties perfect, I love it. Love it forehand, backhand, everything. I have every shot, from overstable to roller which shut up, james, I can throw a roller. Not with that dynasty. No, I got my roller.
Speaker 1:Dynasties have been absolute trash lately, so it's been hilarious watching them come down and cut and run as far left as possible and never stand up and I'm like I can do this promise. It's so funny. But yeah, I'm, my bag is very. Stays the same. I think I get maybe two, two in love with some of my discs. How often do you see discs never coming off the bench from like a tournament, like you played a whole tournament. You look in your bag and you can count how many never got thrown. Oh, totally like I'm having three pathfinders so they never got thrown at champions.
Speaker 1:Of course they did, it was, but I was like there's an opportunity that I might want a fan grip straight shot approach that a putter can't do, and I was like I would rather it be in there than me to ever. Because, yeah, I'll tell you this, I played a tournament where I didn't expect the wind and I didn't have the tools. It was a absolute nightmare and it haunts me to this day. I do not want to ever walk into a tournament where I feel like I don't have the tools because because of an oversight, of something that I could control not that it's like oh, I just don't have that disc in my repertoire. It it's like no, I have it, it just needs to be in the back, and I don't want to ever put myself in that situation. So if I think the wind's going to be up, cool, a couple extra stable discs like ones that are really tanky.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but then at the same time, on an open course, the mid-ranges are probably going to stay in there, just because I've been in places where I need to throw a patent-pending turnover and it's hard to do that with a fairway driver, sometimes depending on the distance, and I feel more comfortable with the mid-range. So I just want to have it rather than not.
Speaker 3:Okay so we're ranging here from pretty solid, solid, stable bags to take out a few and put in a few, that type of thing. Matt, do you adjust your bag at all?
Speaker 4:I can't say I adjust my bag much as a more amateur player bagging courses any course. I have no idea what the course is gonna throw at me and so I'm not. I'm personally I'm not preparing for playing the same course for a tournament. I mean, I do play tournaments, but most, a lot of the tournaments I play are blind and I don't even know what to expect when I go into the course. So I carry the same bag that I carried 15 years ago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, matt has a rock in his bag older than me. Yeah. Crazy, crazy. And he throws it well. James does too, james' bag is insane.
Speaker 3:Under a stable rock.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, what's that disc in your bag, the CE disc that you were throwing? Is it a?
Speaker 10:leopard. Oh, it's a leopard. Yeah, CE leopard. I have two of them in the bag. Like the opaque, chalky fingertippy or pretty nice One's, really nice One is like a little bit.
Speaker 1:It's the most expensive bag Careful it's like 51 degrees right now.
Speaker 10:I think it could shatter this weekend. It won't hit a tree, don't worry.
Speaker 1:It won't hit a tree, all right After you just said you don't care if you hit the tree 400 feet down the fairway.
Speaker 6:It's slow enough by that point. All right, I'll give you that.
Speaker 4:So yeah, I carry the same three rocks, the same three T-Birds and the same three.
Speaker 3:Firebirds that I've been carrying for the last 15 years. Wow, you would love my bag, the dream bag. That's it, just those three.
Speaker 11:So how are?
Speaker 3:you guys adjusting strategies for this tournament, with the wooded courses and the field of players that you're going to be facing. What are some of your concerns, what are some of the things you're working on and what do you guys plan on bringing to the table?
Speaker 1:Don't adjust for the players. It's you versus the course. You can't control what anyone else does, and I say this every player who is showing up has every belief that this could be their tournament. I hope so.
Speaker 1:I've been on tour for 10 years. I have zero pro tour wins and if I wanted to go and boost my win tally I'd play local events. I don't do that because I challenge myself and compete on tour, but I still believe that any one of these weekends can be my weekend, even if I played like ass the weekend before. I know that it doesn't matter because my skills, where I currently stand, I have every ability to win the event and I have to believe in that and I think most players do. So what am I going to be able to do? That's going to put Casey off his game Literally nothing, because that becomes disingenuine and that becomes not what this game is about. But if I go out and just shred and earn it, that's all that matters. And where we're at in disc golf is you can go and have yourself a pretty good weekend and feel really great about it and get last cash on the Pro Tour. Yeah, very easy to do that. It's hard.
Speaker 1:And that's okay. It's because players are really, really good. It feels easier to do that. It feels easier to have a weekend of golf you're very, very proud of and get last cash or one off of cash, than it is to just suck all weekend Because you want it so bad. So you have so many good shots and memorable moments and I actually put a vlog out over the winter when I was building my van, of just footage of me from D-Glo because I felt like I played a great tournament and I did not make the cut. I'm like here's what great golf looks like when you make no money. That was the story of the video. It happens to 12 to 20 players every single week.
Speaker 3:You wouldn't enter a tournament, unless you thought you had a chance, of course.
Speaker 1:And that's what I just said. I would hope that they feel the way that Eric's saying that they should feel If you don't feel like you have a chance, then you shouldn't be playing. I would hope that every single player believes in themselves the way that I believe in myself.
Speaker 3:I love that. Don't play against the player. Play against the players.
Speaker 1:If this was soccer or something like that, I know I can go and get stuck in on a challenge and maybe put a player off. You don't have to guard anybody?
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's literally me throwing my shots Like oh, casey made a putt, that's why I missed mine. No, that's my brain being stupid and manifesting things that aren't there. Well, when I made my putt, and then I started up the ice cream truck. Yeah right, dude, that would excite me. I probably couldn't putt with ice cream music going on, so I get why James missed that. You were on lead card that day, weren't you? I thought you were. I did a chase card two years ago.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, I had a good showing two years ago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I had a good showing. I'm so excited to be back here because hit gaps make putts and I got I had bonus putts that round in round one to earn it. It's like that's kind of what this course, I think, is going to ask of you. It's like, do your thing, stay within what you control and if it ends up being good enough for the weekend, that's what.
Speaker 3:That's what it's going to take I, I totally still remember when you eagled on 10, yeah, and then almost aced 11, yeah, yeah, that was crazy no, I almost aced eight, was it?
Speaker 1:yeah, no, nine, nine, yeah it was nine and then hit the hit the band on nine and then came out to the par three, a par four. That's the chip out, chip in. Yeah, yeah, it's new new numbers. But then, yeah, went sidearm, sidearm spice into the bucket. So I was like that's a good two holes. Yeah, so almost aced and then get an eagle. I was like well, sweet three under through two holes. I'm here for it.
Speaker 3:It's pretty dope it's pretty dope, all right, so let's just go down the line here real quick. What is the number one thing that you could tell an amateur to help improve their game?
Speaker 9:Oh man, there's so many things I could tell an amateur to help improve their game. I mean, I guess I feel like I've harped on it a few times, but it's just having an understanding of your strengths and weaknesses and sticking to those strengths and then you know, depending on how much time you want to dedicate to practicing. You know getting a good base of technique is always going to set you up for success in the long run. But yeah, it's just stick to those strengths when you're competing, work on kind of the stuff that's on the edge of your comfort zone when you're practicing.
Speaker 3:How about you, Eric? What would you recommend an amateur does to help improve their game out here?
Speaker 1:Throw a lot. Stop scoring your rounds, just go throw. Look at how athletes and sports teams when they go about things. They don't play scrimmage after scrimmage after scrimmage and simulate game, game, game, only game. No, they are training, they are running plays, they are dialing in their skills, they are understanding ways to make themselves better and some of that's through game application. But they're not scoring those games. They're going through it to make sure that they understand the system that they need to play. And I think that transfers over to disc golf immensely.
Speaker 1:If you are on a course and all you're doing is scoring, you're not learning necessarily what shots you want to be throwing. You're just throwing and then going to the next shot to throw it if it was good or bad. And it should be about understanding and that's why we've talked about it a bunch. I know what my good shots are, I know what shots I'm going to look for, so I stay in that headspace. But that's from playing practice rounds that I'm not scoring, because it's just figuring out the course and also seeing that, like dang, I am this, this, this dynasty on a slight hyzer.
Speaker 1:Forehand is really good at staying straight the whole way for this distance and I'm like, okay, well, oh, I can use that here, I can use that there, and that's what I'm starting to build in and apply to this widespread of my game. And then I'll carry that same information to the next event, to future tournaments. And then I mean, how many times have you played a hole? And you're like, oh, I've thrown a hole like this before and it feels effortless. That's the type of practice we're trying to simulate with playing less scored rounds and more of those rounds like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it seems as we get older in the game there's a lot more of the same types of shots. Yeah, it seems very repetitive.
Speaker 1:I have a hole in Pensacola. I think about all the time. When it comes to gap hitting I say, all right, you're at hole five at Hitzman and it's a dead straight tunnel shot and it's sick and I have to and I have to row and I can. I use it for mid ranges. I throw fairways on it. I go a long pass it with longer fairways, but it's to me it simulates a lot of the gaps that I need to hit because it's a long straight tunnel that I have to keep hitting. So I go back and I'm like, yeah, we just saw a little five at Hitzman. So I line up on a similar spot on the tee pad and then I go through my shot and I execute and I stay committed and remember how that feels. So I put myself back there. More than anything, it's taking some of the brain processing out of it because I just go back to that muscle memory and just trust I know give me a out of it, because I just go back to that muscle memory and just trust You're next, rob.
Speaker 6:I know, give me a second.
Speaker 1:I mean, I can go for it if you want.
Speaker 11:Yeah, go for it.
Speaker 1:Footwork is so underrated. My dad can throw a disc in a straight line every single time. He'll never miss a gap if he is just letting himself like, just take it, take it smooth, and, like you know, everybody always goes. Oh well, I can throw this far, but the shot is calling for a shot, a distance that I'm not capable of and they always do like either a longer last step or a faster pace and like having the same footwork every single time, like people never really talk about it, but that's really all it comes down to.
Speaker 1:When hitting gaps like I have found myself without, like I say, I lost my swing and I'll look at a video of me throwing that hole from wherever and be like where the hell were my feet and that's when I end up finding it and I'll hit the gap the next time because I know exactly where I started and exactly where I finished. And basically I mean, obviously there's a lot of other things that can go wrong, but if you can get your footwork down to where you know, you just shut off the brain and just enter your muscle memory and it just brings you perfectly to your mini or wherever you want to finish on the tee box, like the worst you're going to do is hit that late tree, like james said you know well, and even if you hit the late tree, I mean, you're still eating up 300 feet, like that's not a bad throw yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:I mean, everybody's got something to be proud of. And that's like where you're saying like a tip for an amateur. If I'm talking to an amateur, that's like thinking about starting to play MA1 versus MA2, or am I talking to an amateur that's like going to AMNATS and going to AMWorlds and all that stuff, like aspiring to be a pro. Those are two different conversations and two different angles of attack. As far as giving advice, how so.
Speaker 1:The person going from MA2 to MA1, it's more on Holland's thing, just knowing your strengths and your weaknesses. Stay away from your weaknesses. Don't try and be somebody you're not. Stick to what you know. Throw the shots you throw the best. Somebody that is aspiring to be a pro going to national amateur tournaments. If somebody beats you in a round of disc golf, don't get mad about it. Learn from it. Why did they beat you? What did they have that you didn't? Whether it's mental fortitude, whether it's a consistent sidearm, whether it's a circle two putt All of those things is what showed me what I was missing, that I was able to aspire to be like the best players in Massachusetts during my time coming up. Casey, you were a sponge. Yeah, you soaked up every round of golf and every bit of golf you could.
Speaker 6:And I still remember all and I've seen you back at.
Speaker 1:Nantucket and then be out in Mass. You were so excited and soaked in every bit of knowledge and it shows, it's really impressive. And now you're the person who's you're kind of rinsing yourself out and spreading that knowledge to all the people you interact with too yeah, and you're still a sponge to this day too, because you're still learning from the people we're out. It's like it's a wonderful thing. I using the term sponge, I know can be weird, but also no, no, it's it's a perfect analogy. You soaked it all up.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. My mom always used to tell me the same thing. When I would go on a trip with Castro and Chris Clemens and I would be going with the big dogs on a road trip, she would say be a sponge, love it. That's what she would say every single time. She would tell me to be a sponge. Your mom would be proud.
Speaker 10:Yes, how about James? What do you think? I think if you want to be a good disc golfer, you have to fall in love with putting. I think if you can become a good putter, you know, hopefully you can figure the throw out. But I think you know that's the easiest way to save strokes. It's the least frustrating way to play. You know I would hate to be a good thrower and miss every 25 footer like I would drive myself crazy. So I mean it's my favorite part of the game you know, obviously throwing is important go watch Gannon or watch YouTube or something.
Speaker 10:But I think you know if you can follow love with putting, if you can be confident inside the circle, you know if you can be one of the best putters in your area, then you'll do all right, I mean you and Eric have been on the tour for a decade, or whatever you want to call your tour stint Eric's been on the tour for a decade straight.
Speaker 1:How many players have you seen? 550 plus, no problem inside of 20?
Speaker 7:Never a chance. You know so many. They come and go and it's unfortunate.
Speaker 1:Their skill ceiling is higher than most. Oh, but their floors are so low that that's what keeps them down. And then they then the mental fortitude, like you talked about crumbles, and they're gone. Yeah, and would I say I have the best mental fortitude. Don't ask the pdga that, because they have different thoughts on that, but I have different thoughts on that too, but we won't go into that. Point being is that I do have good mental fortitude and I have found ways to make myself stay in the game, because I did.
Speaker 1:I stopped trying to throw 550 feet. I started to understand that I'm going to put the disc exactly where I want, right, and I'm going to play this course for what I want. I'm doing it a lot more this year. I haven't thrown a 12-speed backhand off the tee in I don't know how long, because I just go 9-speed exactly where I want, cool. Oh, I have to throw another 9-speed instead of a mid-range into the pin. Doesn't matter, I like throwing 9-speeds right now. Let's do that, and that's the best part of this. I'm adapting to the courses. I'm not complaining or anything like that. I'm just going out and doing my best and forgetting the rest.
Speaker 3:I dig it. I dig it. All right, Robert, you're back on the hot seat.
Speaker 6:I mean. I just want to add on, I think, because trying to play to your strengths is also very, very important, and we've heard that a few times now, Whether that's James playing for his putting anything within 60, whether that's certain players throwing to the basket like you see AB being like, I will get inside 40 on 18 out of 18 holes and then make nine of them.
Speaker 1:Let him have it. I'd say I don't care, you can't make them all.
Speaker 6:That's right, he can't, but he's starting to. Um. But my advice to an amateur player would be, as much as in tournament, you want to play to your strengths when you're in practice, try that shot. You don't want to throw? Yeah, try that shot. You haven't thrown and you're and doesn't fit the hole, but see if you can do it. See if you can flip up beforehand on on that 400-foot hole. See if you can flex something. See if you can find new ways to enjoy it, new flights that you can learn, love that. Don't stick to what you know, because that's how it gets repetitive and that's part of what the pro tour gives us is. Week after week. We get there and we're like have to know my strength, have to play to it. But that's why you see amateurs having arguably more fun than we do, because they get to try a ton of different shots that we wouldn't think about, because we're like I would never do that. That's just not worth it.
Speaker 3:Well, I think it's something that well, yeah, stick to your strengths, but to bounce back for the putting thing real quick. It's something I tried to tell Jenny any a while ago is that like you know you, you it's the whole. You know putt for dough, you know drive for show type of thing. But how many times on tour like somebody smashes a huge, like 600 foot drive, and people are like, oh, but you sink a 60 footer. Everybody, everybody goes nuts, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Good point. I mean. That's why I kind of say, like anything Anthony Barella does at this point with a backhand drive, I'm like, of course, nothing surprises me anymore, none of it. Oh, he outdrove hole two at Shelton Springs. Wouldn't be surprised, it's just for real. But then, like he's got like a 60 mile an hour headwind, 40 footer, and he's like battling for the win, he makes that and it's like now we're wow, that's way more impressive, right, right. Well, you can't even design courses to to hold back ab, because it's just gonna break the rest of the field, let him have it, and it's like, yeah, if people have that skill, we we're fine.
Speaker 1:Yes, I think that's just awesome to see in disc golf. Let's celebrate this as much as we possibly can. We have had course designers that are hyper-fixated on these Eagle-proofed yeah, eagle-proofing Simon-proofing holes. It's like, stop, they have that skill set, let them have it. Don't make this worse for the rest of the field. Stop trying to tailor to one portion of the field. That's what, loki, no offense to it, but kind of what happens on the back nine of D-Glo.
Speaker 1:It's tailored towards these big throwers. And then you just have this riddled of white on the PDGA. It's just pars on pars, on, pars, on pars on pars, on pars, I don't even think it's tailored to them. It's tailored against them, yeah.
Speaker 1:But they're the only ones that still have the perfect capability of. You know we need to be challenging. And I come back to a course like this and you might have some guys who do YouTube videos and they might say that this course is janky and things like that. They might not like it because they can't rip a distance driver on every single hole. And that's fine and that's their opinion, but we're on a course that is asking a lot of us, that is asking us to change our shapes and and sometimes down tempo shots and be able to do that. I like that. I like when a course is like.
Speaker 1:I had a practice round with Erica Stinchcomb earlier and she's like and I threw, like my backhand felt awkward, and she's like yeah, well, you went six holes throwing four hands only. It's been a while since you've thrown a backhand. That makes sense that that felt awkward. Love that, because that is me having to adjust and make sure that I stay locked in that even if it goes, oh cool, I haven't had a 35 footer all around, I'm still locked in and know how to make that 35 footer. Or I know how to throw that backhand hyzer flip, even though I haven't thrown it in 17 holes Like I have to be able to do that. That's what this course is asking of us. You can get really locked in on some of those bigger courses of just Heisering your way to victory. So I think that that's something really special here.
Speaker 1:Yep, yep. And I mean there's something to be said about course design on tour, being that I go all over the country, all over the world, and I tell people you know what's not difficult for me, I can do with my eyes closed 400 for Heiser. You know what's terrifying 200-foot straight putter Because I am never, ever challenged with a 200-foot straight putter. However, there is one shot on tour that it decides the winner almost every year. That is hole 17 at the preserve. We are on this playground of a golf course for an entire weekend, all weekend long, you can land the disc basically wherever you want, not in the water. You can air out the distance drivers, you can lay down the rollers and then, when it comes down to crunch time, you might have a par five to finish, but you have to survive a 200 foot straight putter shot with trees lining the fairway. And several people have lost.
Speaker 1:It's pace, control and you haven't thrown a pace control shot, maybe since you warmed up. And almost every single year somebody loses the tournament on that hole. The tournament has never won on hole 17,. But it can be lost and it's a thing of beauty. Love that, Casey. That's big brain stuff, dude. We do a lot of driving in our. You think we dive into that for sure.
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things I was going to say is that so, shelton, there's not a lot of changes that have been made that are just for the Pro Tour. So, as an amateur, it's really nice to be able to go out there and I've been watching some of your videos from the previous years and then I can go out and play the same course too and be like, okay, so I can make some of those shots, I can make some different shots, but it's nice to be able to actually go out to the course and it's not much different than it is right now.
Speaker 1:Right, I'm always in favor of permanent courses on tour that connect the everyday player with the pro tour players that are only here once a year. Look at Northwood Black. We talked about this today. It's like how, once it became permanent, that the course is actually a lot more playable than it was the first year we played it. Oh, yeah, that first year was a nightmare.
Speaker 1:That's how 12 and 13 will be here. They'll get a little more beaten down by the foot traffic and people being excited to come and play up here. Those holes are going to get better with time and as they add more holes. That's the same concept that's going to happen. I think the courses can start out a little hairy, but as long as they are available to the public and they can slowly build themselves out and grow themselves in, it's going to make it more fun for us in the long run.
Speaker 3:So part of the buzz that I'm seeing online so far from the Cascade Challenge hardest course on the Pro Tour.
Speaker 1:No, no, not even close, I'm sorry. No chance, north or black. Well, let's ask that question. What do we think?
Speaker 3:it is North or black Go on North or black.
Speaker 1:No, not a doubt in my mind. Og, north or Black.
Speaker 6:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Not Champions Cup North, or Black Like OG, og with those like with that 200 foot putter shot, 200 foot putter shot, par four included, like that's what I'm talking about. Yeah, that one was. That's horrible. But guess what? There's a log that you can't just slide it up to the landing zone load it and sink it.
Speaker 10:You know those types of shots. What do you think, james, do you agree?
Speaker 1:um, I mean, yeah, I think tompa to disc golf center.
Speaker 10:Okay, that's a good choice I always think the states first. Yeah, yeah, I think. I mean I'll be curious to see how this plays, because it's going to play harder than the years before I would hope so.
Speaker 1:We were shredding it before.
Speaker 10:Yeah, you know it's funny. You look at courses Like I remember last year, the only course where no one shot double digits was Florida.
Speaker 1:No, they're black too.
Speaker 10:And maybe Northwood Black too. Yeah, hot round was eight. Okay, and because you shot it.
Speaker 1:No, I shot seven Ezra, shot eight, ezra eight, or hold shot eight to make the cut in round 3. Oh, that's sick.
Speaker 10:But, like you know, that course didn't change a whole lot and then people were shooting like 13 under on that course this year. So it's like you know I don't know what the hot round was At Tompita Disc Golf Center. We played it in awful weather conditions.
Speaker 1:I think it was that first day it was Donnie Randon, lata and Paul McBeth shot seven, oh no. And then Gannon shot nine. I think Gannon shot nine. Of course he did.
Speaker 6:Of course he did.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Same thing as Anthony Burrell throwing far Gannon Burr hot round. Of course he did.
Speaker 10:Yeah, you can't change it With this course. You know it doesn't have necessarily a lot of the holes, other than, like maybe that 11, 12, 13 stretch where you're like You're puckered. Yeah, and you know I could see a lot of people taking singles, but I don't see a ton of double bogeys or triples out here, like no tournament ruiners or even round ruiners. You know some of the courses you see people go birdie, triple, birdie bogey, double, triple all over the place and here I feel like and I'm not saying it's a bad thing, but I'm not really worried about taking a double or a triple unless something goes super haywire.
Speaker 10:I think it's going to be a lot of just pars, single bogeys and birdies.
Speaker 6:Yeah, you almost have to bring in weather conditions, because this weekend is not looking very friendly for now. It's always possible to rain around here, bro, but I still feel like the doubles are double.
Speaker 1:at worst, it's probably what you're seeing out here, you just have an early slip. Good for us. There are people out here that are like I cannot triple hole 11. I cannot triple hole 11.
Speaker 3:And that's good confidence to have.
Speaker 1:I feel the same way that James does, as long as I'm committed to my shots, that I don't think doubles should be really in my mind. It can happen, because it can happen on any course. A bad kick to a bad roll, to a spit out, it's like, well, that sucks. It's also something to do with fairness of a course. Sure, I was. It's also something to do with, like, fairness of a course. Sure, like I said, I was saying about mill ridge, which is not a beloved course on the tour. But I said plain, plain and simple, black and white the first two years when simon won, I said that's because it's the most fair course on tour.
Speaker 1:Simon didn't get unlucky and he's the unluckiest player I know. Yeah, and that's why he won and that's why he didn't win this year, because he couldn't get lucky and win. Yeah, it was earned by whoever was going to shoot the best and there was nothing disputing it other than whoever shot the best was going to win. And I feel like Champions Cup was the exact same way. There is OB all over that course and when you look at the stats for the full tournament, like half the tournament didn't take a double bogey. I went OB twice on the same hole and I did not take a double bogey.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's weird how it happens.
Speaker 1:But like a course like this, where it is like the you know early tree on 11 kicking left or whatever. 12, the new par 5? Oh, 12. Yeah, that's a triple bogey in a second. But depends on who we're talking about here. Are we talking about the people on lead card after round one? Probably not. Yeah, but in the field for sure.
Speaker 6:Oh, for sure.
Speaker 1:So, rob, what's the hardest course, do you think? Do you agree with Northwood Black?
Speaker 8:No, not even close he got top ten there last year, just so you know.
Speaker 6:I don't think so Heck, yeah, dude 10 there last year, just so you know. Yeah, I northwood black has stayed the same for enough years on tour to where, if, even if they revert it back, I mean that's, I don't think any shots there are tight enough to where you're sitting there, like I need to really like laser focus in and make sure I hit this gap okay, so.
Speaker 1:so just on a side tangent, you should be in my mind when I play that. I think Maple Hill, nevin or Northwood Black.
Speaker 10:Which one do you think is harder? I've never played Nevin. Oh Nevin's so good. That course is hard. Yeah, that one I think it's equal.
Speaker 1:I think those two are equal. But Maple Hill, I'll give you that because big numbers, that's where I get it.
Speaker 6:I think Maple, simply for you can take a triple before you're even like wow, I'm sitting.
Speaker 1:five, it's possible to take a triple in the birdie stretch at Maple Hill which in my opinion is two through five. Yeah, there are triplable holes on that course, a hundred percent Everywhere.
Speaker 6:But I think that and I also think Tampere over in Europe is one of the hardest ones.
Speaker 3:I agree with that. What about because you have a different perspective here, right?
Speaker 9:Yeah, because I mean obviously our layouts are, we play the same courses, but we kind of don't.
Speaker 1:No we don't.
Speaker 9:I don't think this course this week is up there for me for hardest, because there are holes that are maybe some of the hardest we play on tour. I think maybe 12 and 13 would be up there, but then there's also a lot of holes, like you guys said, like you're just not going to do worse than a bogey. We even have a pretty soft par 5 with hole 2. I kind of forgot it was a par 5. To be completely honest, I think Northwood Black would be up there because it requires some touch in some places and you have holes where everyone is having to throw slower discs, not just the bigger arms, because I think with FPO and kind of, the challenge with our course design is the skill gap between the top and bottom of the field is so much bigger.
Speaker 1:For longer shots like you or Ella can often just go to a mid-range, where most of the rest of the field is always throwing a fairway, if not a distance driver.
Speaker 9:Yeah, and you've got some people. Hole 18 at Sprinkle Valley was so controversial because there are some women who played that tournament who cannot do that shot if it's windy like period. You just don't have that ever happen. In the MPO side I almost throw Idlew wild in the mix a little bit just because there's a lot of randomness to it good randomness or bad randomness in your opinion.
Speaker 6:I think bad oh come on, I mean I don't?
Speaker 9:I'm not a huge fan of just having ob rivers yeah, no, that whole 17 is not a good hole what
Speaker 10:now, all of this being said, don't fall into the trap of trying to make this the harder. You're gonna ruin it like yeah this course it's not, by any means.
Speaker 10:It's not one of the easiest courses on to no, you're not gonna shoot you're not gonna need to shoot 33 under in three rounds to win out here. No, but I feel like a lot of times course designers and TDs fall into the trap of we've got to make it harder, we've got to challenge it Harder, harder, harder, harder. Ropes, ropes, ropes. They don't want to see.
Speaker 1:Weird rules. Hey, do you want to read this full paragraph? And oh, and there's this sidevable puzzle. And I say simple but it's a hard. Simple Because you just got to go do and it doesn't need arbitrary rules to make the course better. I was about to say one thing that Shelton does really well is make me play from Narnia. If I go to Narnia. I deserve to throw my next shot from Narnia. I don't just get rewarded with a fairway drop, yeah.
Speaker 3:Which Narnia are we talking about here?
Speaker 1:I mean, there are many.
Speaker 6:Depends which tree he hits, 400 feet down the fairway.
Speaker 1:I mean, I think about somebody hitting first, available on the hyzer on 15, I think, or 16. Yeah, hitting first available on the hyzer on uh, 15, I think, or 16, yeah, 16, 16, yeah. If somebody were kick right like in in most events, that would just all be out of bounds like oh everything on the right is just out of bounds, and then they'd just like have a decision made for them, but like, first of all, now we have to find the disc yeah, that's a whole project, like that's a demoralizing thing sometimes and like it's all part of the game and like I know people who would literally just hit that tree and and like if it was ob they wouldn't even look for it.
Speaker 1:yeah, but we have to look for it now because it's in play and I love that well to. To tack on to that, it's like it's we've. We end up with these places that are adding strokes without even giving us the opportunity and I and I tend to not like that because it takes away from skill expression. It takes away from the scramble shots that we've learned to throw. I often said in my clinics somebody asked me he's like you didn't tell us about overhands and I was like, well, here's the thing. I don't want to teach you how to throw overhands because I'm teaching you to not have to throw them because you ended up in a bad position. Because unless you're Jake Wolf or somebody like that who leans on it, jared Stoll, it's like awesome, do that? That's a part of your skill set and you can figure that out. I'm not going to be the one to teach you that, because I only use it when I need to.
Speaker 1:So I want to see more courses allowing for our skill expression not only off the tee but in the adverse situations, come out. Shelton does that, and I have to use this as an example. Northwood Black does that. D-glow Back Nine does not do that. It just roped everything and took away scrambling from everybody. So now it just turns to a weird place of who's chipping their way in bounds down the stretch and it doesn't feel good. We're not seeing our skills come out in, I think, in the best ways they could be. A skill is still being asked of us, but I think it's not and I might speak for everybody it's not the most fun way to play the game either is to be chipping our way through a course. I want to be playing the course and trusting the shots that I throw and I want to go out with with the gas pedal down and if I want to go earn it in that way, not have some rules take the gas pedal away from me, and I think that that's far, far too often that happens.
Speaker 3:I think you touched on something there that I was kind of toying with my own mind is do you feel like they maybe make some of these, like you were saying, just chip outs and things like that? Do you think they do that maybe, so it looks better like on TV type of thing and kind of artificially kind of?
Speaker 1:Maybe that might be part of it. It could be speed of play things, but I think we're at a level of if we actually call people on time and we keep to our 30 seconds somebody going in the woods they have 30 seconds. They need to figure out their shot and get it done and if they don't, they get a penalty for it. So I think that there might be the caveats of that of speed of play and I think that there might be the caveats of that of speed of play.
Speaker 1:And you know, I think having OBs sometimes requires more spotters, which requires more volunteers, because then we need to know where we went out of bounds, that kind of stuff, and we're playing a lot of blind shots to some OBs. We can get an idea, but in reality we're still guessing and it's just. There are positives, positives and negatives and there are easy ways to look at it on from both sides. I just think, um, I think more skill expression is is needed right now, and I stand, I'll stand on that. So when we take that away, where it's just straight into ob, we don't get to express our skill because we're back in the fairway throwing a shot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that we've, that we're probably good enough for yeah exactly well, it's like like I hate to say, but like in ball golf, if you go ob, you're still in the stuff. Right, you bring it back in bounds. You take your drop, you're still in the stuff. In disc golf, you go ob and you bring it back in bounds. Like you said, you're in the fairway like you have a. You have a clear ish shot, I mean with probably decent footing too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, most likely the only way that we could even come close to formulating that was like really high grass, and then it would be like you know, like absurdly high grass.
Speaker 9:And then good luck finding discs at that point, right right.
Speaker 1:So it doesn't really work, unfortunately, this course had that two years ago with those yellow bushes.
Speaker 1:On hole two If you pushed it too long off the tee. You didn't get a run up. It was a natural bunker that you had to throw as stance. I've heard that. I've heard that they are invasive, so that is a bummer why they needed to be cut, but it's that brought to mind of what could we do to create that kind of stuff to where, if you throw it into this spot, the footing is awful to a point where you won't be able to have a run up, or we change the rules, and I've had this theory and I'll like, as a oh hazard rules goes to being more like a you have to throw a standstill from this area.
Speaker 1:No penalty, but you have to throw a standstill Like a bunker.
Speaker 7:Yes, so you can't ground your club, so you cannot run up.
Speaker 1:So that creates a skill expression of you now need to learn how to throw standstill backhand, standstill forehands, and be able to do those and execute a 350-foot shot from a standstill forehands and be able to do those and execute a 350 foot shot from a standstill. That becomes something that we now, as players, have to adapt and work on. And now you're able to make use of areas, not by just giving a stroke. This isn't Oprah, where you get a stroke and you get a stroke. Everybody gets a stroke. No, we get to go earn our strokes for our play and the decisions we make and the shots and the skills that we have. I mean, as somebody who loves to throw standstills, I'm not going to argue with that rule.
Speaker 1:But segueing back to what tip I'd give to an amateur player. Strengths and weaknesses a standstill used to be the weakest part of my game and I built it up to be the strongest part of my game, and I've done that with several of the what I would now call strengths in my game is they were originally a weakness and that's why they're a strength now, and like I pride myself on not really having strengths, I feel like all of my shots are just equally good enough for the pro tour and I'm confident enough in every angle and every speed and all those things. It's just like shooter's choice at every single tee box and every single lie and putting too. I can putt on Annie, I can putt on Heiser, I can push putt, spin, putt, whatever. It's just like being able to attack whatever shot is in front of me. However, I want to express myself Build your toolbox. Yeah, have a plethora of tools and have a good time. Be proud of the shots you throw. Don't do it because you feel like Nate Heinel told you you had to.
Speaker 3:I'm going to do it because Casey White told me I had to. That's better.
Speaker 2:I was going to say one of the things I hear you guys saying is the creativity in disc golf, and one of the things I really loved when we made the course for Chief Kitsap and we were able to take the kids around any time is just watching the different ways that they would throw Like they would come up with some of the most creative ways to get a disc into the basket and it's like how did that even work? Like that creativity makes the game fun for the rest of us. Yeah.
Speaker 3:All right, so let's go back over here. Matt, what do you think the winning score this weekend is going to be? Mpo, fpo.
Speaker 4:Hard to say I'm going to say, because I have no idea, I'm going to say, because I have no idea, I'm going to go 22 for MPO.
Speaker 8:All right Easy weekend.
Speaker 6:So it's cash like four. I can do that Maybe.
Speaker 1:With the conditions it might. Yeah.
Speaker 4:And 11 for FPL.
Speaker 1:Considering. I have absolutely no idea what the FPL layout. What do you think about that?
Speaker 9:I think eleven's pretty good. I would have gone maybe thirteen.
Speaker 1:Okay, but say ballpark at least.
Speaker 9:I could see about seven maybe being the hot round.
Speaker 6:Okay.
Speaker 9:And then slowing down that person, maybe getting a couple, threes or fours after that.
Speaker 3:Easy to do. What do you think?
Speaker 1:Eric, I had a conversation with the homie over there, long hair about what we thought the hot round would be. Shout out to long hair homie in the corner. We said 24-ish. I feel like 27 I think would be hot if it was good conditions.
Speaker 1:Perfect conditions and I think that's like because that's three nines but you're not going to do it three nines. You're going to do it in a couple ways. You're going to shoot 10. You're going to shoot. You know you're going to shoot a nine and then you're going to go down You're just like you're not going to keep that going. And then, with the conditions that's why I think 24 feels pretty good, because then again you're going to have one good hot round and then you're going to tailor off and that would be still pretty sick to get there. To go 3.8s in that average yeah, that's kind of what I'm expecting. I do think 21 to 22 could also be there, with the weather ends up being not favorable for us in that way.
Speaker 3:The thing about Shelton and this is where the gals have a bit of advantage over you guys is in the morning it's usually pretty calm as far as wind goes and everything.
Speaker 1:Wind ramps up.
Speaker 2:Yep, and then in the afternoon it gets up 15, 20 consistently, yeah, and the rain is not so bad in the trees.
Speaker 3:You might want to talk to the tournament director and get an earlier tee time.
Speaker 1:Yeah right.
Speaker 3:What do you think, Robert? What's going to be the winning score this weekend?
Speaker 6:I think Eric was about right. I think the field usually overshoots whatever we think it's going to be, so I'll actually bump it up In my head. I thought 25 would be just about right. I think whoever's going to win will shoot 10 to 12, probably on their best day, whatever that is, whether they deal with rain well, whether they deal with anything else well. I think they're going to shoot 10 to 12, and then I think they'll shoot somewhere between 6 and 10 twice, and their 6 could just be a bad day. And then they get back on that train. They could shoot a couple like 7, 8s. They could.
Speaker 10:Somehow they're going to find a way to 25 and I think it's going to come from one really hot round and then playing consistently well for two rounds yeah you feeling the same way, james yeah, I mean, I thinking about it, you know, and, and the numbers that we're at, I also feel like this is going to be. It could be an event where there's three to four guys who are within a stroke or two coming down, like I think this could be an exciting one, like real tight I don't see someone running away, um, but yeah, I think I 24, 25 is a good number. I'll go 23 just to keep it exciting, and then, yeah, maybe 14, 15 for the FPO.
Speaker 6:Yeah, I think 15 is about right.
Speaker 1:I can't even give a guess for the FPO. I literally don't even know what the course looks like until I'm watching tomorrow morning.
Speaker 10:That's fair, ella said that she was going to shoot one better than Holland, so I don't know what. So then, what do you shoot? She says that a lot.
Speaker 9:I don't know man, I've been waiting. I've been waiting since Florida ever heard of you. Oh.
Speaker 1:Nice, nice, nice.
Speaker 3:What do you think?
Speaker 1:The tour surprises me every freaking week. Man, I think the winner's going to be 30-plus.
Speaker 3:I swear to.
Speaker 1:God, I think this course is going to get annihilated this weekend one way or another. Tight race runaway. There's spent some weeks where I'm like whew, this is a tough course. Best score is not going to be hot. They torch it Ten people torch it. I'm telling you, I'm telling you it, I'm telling you. I'm telling you, I will not be surprised when the winner is better than 30.
Speaker 3:How much do you guys feel that the trees are going to be a factor? The?
Speaker 10:trees yeah.
Speaker 3:What trees?
Speaker 2:There's lots of them.
Speaker 10:Bring on For the guy that wins. Not a whole lot, Not a single one. They love him.
Speaker 6:The trees love him so much. The ones by the basket exist but none of the other ones do.
Speaker 1:What's our tee time tomorrow? 2.40? 1.50. 1.10. I'm at 1 on the dot 10 am.
Speaker 6:Early tee time for the group.
Speaker 9:Late as possible.
Speaker 4:I've got to be there at 7.30 in event.
Speaker 1:Nice 8.10 for me yeah we've got to be there at 7.30 in event.
Speaker 2:Wow, nice 8.10 for me. Yeah, we got to be there at 8 to volunteer.
Speaker 1:Wahol, or what are you doing? For volunteering. We're scorekeeping Scorekeeping cool yeah, you are 150.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll see what our time is.
Speaker 3:Usually the way it goes for us is we get there early and we do one round, and then somebody doesn't show up and we do the next round and the next round, and it would be. Usually we do three to four rounds in a day. Oh my god, we just, we just do the marathon, yeah, yeah, maybe we get 20 minutes for a lunch.
Speaker 1:I was about to say lunch or?
Speaker 6:he's gonna be walking down hole one with you with a sandwich, like oh, this is my lunch break, dude Fair enough.
Speaker 3:Well, the hot dog guys set it right outside the unicorn zoo. Awesome, you guys know about the unicorn zoo, don't you I?
Speaker 1:absolutely have no idea what you're talking about.
Speaker 3:It's like the mythical creatures of disc golf, and you guys have that nice little caged in area where you guys can putt. Oh, yeah.
Speaker 5:The practice area, the unicorn pen. All you disc golf unicorns out there.
Speaker 2:But, I am going to say I literally thought we were going to have a horse out there with a freaking horn and sparkles and everything there might still be some mini mermaids that are about this big still on the course. We did 77 at our tournament two weeks ago. Love it.
Speaker 6:So, there might still be some mermaids Something to do while waiting on the TF. We hit 77 at our tournament two weeks ago, love it, so there might still be some more mates Something to do while waiting on the.
Speaker 3:TF12. You get to punch your bingo card if you find one that's been a big hit is the disc golf bingo.
Speaker 2:Yeah, have you guys played disc golf bingo?
Speaker 3:I don't think so. We need to do that on the pro tour.
Speaker 2:So we run disc golf bingo at our tournament, and so if you go into a hazard, you get a bingo. If you land on top, you mark your scorecard and then you guys.
Speaker 1:And everybody has different boards, or everybody has the same board, everyone has the same board so that everyone is challenged like so for the women's event.
Speaker 2:If you go in the hazard, it's like but I get a bingo.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you're on the last toll and you're like, well, if I throw this out of bounds, I get a bingo.
Speaker 2:Yep, throw this out of bounds. I got bingo.
Speaker 1:Exactly.
Speaker 2:Okay, yeah, I like that.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. That's really cool.
Speaker 2:It's a lot of fun.
Speaker 1:All right Sweet.
Speaker 3:What's everybody's favorite part of the course?
Speaker 10:What was the question?
Speaker 3:What's everybody's favorite part of the course? Big trees.
Speaker 10:I like big trees, how fast it plays. I've never played fast through practice rounds.
Speaker 6:It's playing fast, which is a lot of fun. You get through it quickly, or it feels quickly, even if it's not actually fast.
Speaker 3:Just like shot, shot, shot shot.
Speaker 6:Yeah, it's just shorter holes shorter.
Speaker 10:walking, you know, like some of the courses we play, you know the par fours are 800, 900 feet and then you're walking 600 feet to get to the next tee pad. And you know this. I mean we were playing our practice rounds in like two hours and then it happens. But I'll also argue this point.
Speaker 1:We were just playing all week and this is a tournament that the bottom of the field is weekend warriors, so they're all practicing today. So we had kind of like the course to ourselves as like the 90 to 100 of us where usually it's 200 of us practicing every single day. That's kind of how I saw it, at least I was like this course is empty. The tee time sheet is empty.
Speaker 1:That's when I was, like all these other players don't know about the tee time sheet. It's just us going out here for these days and they're coming out Thursday taking the weekend off.
Speaker 10:That's true.
Speaker 3:I wanted to bounce over here to Holland real quick. Something that I saw of yours that I really like is you're talking about how to maximize your practice. Could you talk about that a little bit?
Speaker 9:Yeah, that was something that I got because when I first started, you know I was working a full-time job and only had maybe 30 minutes to an hour a day to go practice. But it kind of comes down to just first having a plan. So knowing you know what do I need to work on, and you can get that through doing some video review, getting a lesson, going to a clinic, but having an idea of just one thing that you're going to work on, knowing the drills you're going to do and having time carved out for it. Setting you know, having your discs and your clothes and all that stuff set up for after work, just so that you can get going quickly and then you're not just out in the field kind of throwing without a plan and not really getting any better.
Speaker 3:What do you do to maximize your practice?
Speaker 1:Use at least one of the rounds to just be on the course, absorb, see shots, understand it and then from there it's really dialing in everything I want to be doing, whether I'm taking notes of checking my shoulders, staying in my throw to make sure I hit the gap, lining up in a specific way, picking out a structure, make sure I hit the gap, lining up in a specific way, picking out a structure. I slowly build it up in that way to where there becomes a purpose to the practice round of understanding. Today even I used a reference of shortening up my sidearm to where I'm not overthrowing it like my run-up on my sidearm, so it's just a quick two-step and hitting it through a gap rather than doing kind of a full run-up sidearm and I pull it to the left and bring trees into play. So that's the stuff that I'm trying to figure out and make sure I dial in and I've noticed a lot of my preparation has been the biggest boost to my game.
Speaker 1:I was going off of Fuel a lot in the last few years and this year it has been just. I have my game plan, I stick to it. I play boring golf and I let it work and I play it very consistent. I haven't gotten as hot as I would like, but my consistency has put me in a really good place to find success and I'm going to keep riding that wave because when I hit the jackpot or hit my bingo and go super hot for a round, it's going to show, and most of it's going to show because of that preparation I put in with my practice.
Speaker 6:Love it, robert. I mean almost in comparison to where Eric said he takes one round to just be on the course. For for me, I have to take one round, very specifically, where I'm playing alone on the course and I'm just going through every hole and just figuring out my play, whether that's I'm throwing five shots on a roll or I just need to throw one, and I just throw it and I'm like, yep, doesn't matter what the wind is, I'll just adjust on stability. I'm doing that Doesn't matter. I just need one round where I'm alone, where I have nothing else to think about but myself and the course and how I want to do it.
Speaker 3:Be one with the course.
Speaker 1:May the course be with you. That's right here. We've got a button K-C-Y. Here we go.
Speaker 3:All right. How about you, James? What do you do to maximize your practice preparation?
Speaker 10:I'm not the best person to answer this. James is like show up.
Speaker 1:I kind of be there on time for his tee time round one, I put my socks on flew in.
Speaker 10:On Wednesday I played my match. I mean, I hate to say this, it sounds bad. I just kind of rely on my past experiences learning courses and throwing and it's pretty intuitive for me to know how I want to approach holes. You know, I keep it really simple. Like I said before, when I get to a course like this, here's the first gap, here's the initial gap, here's my high percentage shot. That's what I'm gonna do and then I'll worry about what happens later. But I don't know. I've never been one to really like grind hard and play a lot of rounds and throw all the shots. I just kind of roll with the flow. My man.
Speaker 3:All right, Casey, what do you do to maximize your practice and preparation?
Speaker 1:I mean I typically say I don't think anybody practices the way I do.
Speaker 1:I definitely don't practice like James but I also definitely don't practice like the people he's talking about, all the reps, whatever I do. A pretty unique approach, similar to Eric, though. First round is just like figure out what I want to do, this is what I want to do. It doesn't matter who I'm playing with or whatever they can do. Whatever they want to do, they can throw as many shots as they want to know.
Speaker 1:I'm going to adjust angles, adjust speeds. Adjust angles, adjust speeds, adjust power, whatever sidearm, backhand, you name it. And then I'm going to go into my next practice round, every single hole, and say that's my play, that's what I'm going to refine tomorrow. And then I throw in the curveball and I take those discs that I've decided. No matter what, I'm throwing this disc on this hole and then I smoke the first tree with it. So then, when I get to the first round, I'm like truly disciplined, and I'm like you are going to, you're not taking this for granted, you're dialing it in, you're gonna take this shot seriously, you're not. You're not gonna miss this gap again, you smoke it on purpose.
Speaker 1:Well, it just happens, because it's practice because basically what I'm trying to say is that I am not the same person in practice I never will be than I am in tournament, because in practice I have no, no punishment ever, except for losing my favorite discs. Like that's my. That's the only thing that can really hurt me. But I'm just saying it's not a bad thing if I take the. This is going to be the disc I'm going to be most confident in on friday, when I step on this hole and then give myself a reality check and be like whoa, like that didn't really work out. So then on Friday I am like ultra focused, ultra disciplined, like not going to let this one slip and just say, oh, I'm just going to chuck it and really, who cares? I'm going to like really dial it in Love. That.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's awesome, that is awesome. Well, uh, how?
Speaker 1:do you guys?
Speaker 3:feel about doing a little Q&A real quick. Sure yeah.
Speaker 1:Q&A let's do it.
Speaker 2:Having some people come up and ask some questions. Jace, do you have some questions? All right?
Speaker 3:Does anybody want to come up and ask some questions of our panel here, jake.
Speaker 9:Jace, oh no, Casey we have a mic no.
Speaker 2:No, he's fine. He can come right here. There, you go Jace. How do you putt better? How do you putt good?
Speaker 6:How do you putt good James?
Speaker 9:James, we would all like to know, james, actually, yeah, james.
Speaker 1:I gave a tip to somebody recently that they actually thanked me for, which I don't really give tips. I don't think that my formula works for most players, but I say use your back leg. All of my power comes from my back leg and that's it. So use your back leg, yeah.
Speaker 10:The weight transfer. Push off your back leg, I think you know, starting with a little bit wider of a stance, sitting your butt down as opposed to like leaning back, and I don't, I'm not a huge fan of the rock sit down, engage both legs and then really just extend forward. Uh, you know it's all repetition, but, um, you know there's no one right, perfect way to putt. I think, just practice reps. And you know a lot of putting is up here. So whatever you can tell yourself up here to give you confidence, do that and do that every single time. Whether I'm putting an eight footer or a 60 footer, I tell myself the same two things. The last things that go through my head before I putt is trust yourself and open your hand, and that allows me to confidently extend towards the basket. And you know just whatever you can tell yourself up here to keep the confidence high, that do that, love it how do you uh?
Speaker 2:how do you do what?
Speaker 10:okay, how do you do what.
Speaker 11:Okay, thank you, jake.
Speaker 3:All right Does anybody else want to ask some questions? Come on up.
Speaker 10:Who's this beautiful girl? What did you get me?
Speaker 7:for my birthday. Colin, I have a question for you, oh wow. So I was going to ask you how you balance your practice days with your workout. Do you go to the gym and obviously it's taxing to be on the course it's physically taxing. So really, how do you balance that? And like, what's your workout regime while you're practicing?
Speaker 9:for a tournament, yeah, so the workouts that I'm able to do during season are a lot different than off season, cause obviously practice is super taxing and I can't afford to be super fatigued going into the weekend, um. So I usually do mine in the morning, they're usually pretty short and I keep the volume a little bit lower, so it's just less fatiguing overall. And then I know like certain muscle groups will recover slower than others and I try to hit those earlier in the week and then so I'm sore earlier in the week, you know, maybe on travel day when it doesn't matter, and then by the time I get to Friday I'm like completely recovered okay, and what are those slower recovery muscle groups usually?
Speaker 9:the bigger ones. So like legs, um sometimes like back, will recover a little slower.
Speaker 7:So you'll hit those like earlier in the week, like Monday. I'll hit those like Sunday night a lot of times.
Speaker 9:And then Monday I'm just in the car all day, so I can be sore and then I might be a little sore still on Tuesday, but that's usually when I'll hit like back, and then Wednesday I'll hit, like you know, chest and smaller muscles.
Speaker 3:Then some like really small muscles on Thursday, because those just don't get sore. Very cool, thank you All right Did you guys have some questions back there. Come on up.
Speaker 11:Yeah, I've been struggling with grip on the disc lately. I keep dropping my pinky, I drop the pinky and then now I'm starting to drop the other finger and then I come out with early releases. Is that common? Talk to the goose man.
Speaker 1:He's got the two finger blaster. Uh, that guy throws 500 feet. No problem on either. I've been like struggling with the grip. I think grip is all feel. I know three finger, four finger two finger, you name it yeah, focus, gibson throws a three finger yeah yeah, put pressure in a different place.
Speaker 6:I know I have it for.
Speaker 1:I think different places like try and move it around to put pressure in, because I my pinky used to come off.
Speaker 11:My pinky seems to get in the way, and then I've been finding myself okay, pinky's in the way and this finger's in the way, so then I drop it too.
Speaker 1:Like power. Grip. And then they come out early, though it could just be. Adjust with it and also don't think about it. Grip is so weird because here hold this Everybody's hands are different. I don't grip a disc the same way. Gannon Burr grips a disc and, like Kyle Klein, has smaller hands than I do. It doesn't compute the same way. So the way you're gripping the disc right now the first thing I would tell you is to move your thumb about a half inch to an inch in. Yeah, Agreed.
Speaker 4:I've been trying to get for more pop too.
Speaker 11:It's mostly Trying to press down more on the drivers and get that pop out of the hand.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's your buddy's disc.
Speaker 3:Love it.
Speaker 10:You can keep it if you want Good question. Thank you.
Speaker 3:All right, does anybody else have any questions they want to ask? All right, all right.
Speaker 11:Yes, please. Hey guys, I'm Kyle. Hi, kyle Hi. Kyle. Hi Holland, I was watching you throw while I was protecting Jeff's truck and installing that axe in the tree.
Speaker 9:Oh Holland, I was watching you throw while I was protecting Jeff's truck and installing that axe in the tree.
Speaker 6:Oh yeah, that axe looks sick. Did you see the axe? Yeah, I did, actually it looks so sick, nice, nice, thank you.
Speaker 7:Anyways, really impressed by your forehand and I've been working on my forehand for years and I'm like doing this and then I give up it.
Speaker 11:And, eric, you've done incredible for it as well, thank you. Just give me a couple pointers, let's go. I've just switched over to like this and I know I need to point.
Speaker 9:But what do you got? Yeah? So, looking at you right there, make sure your fingers are pressing more into the rim of the disc rather than the top of the disc.
Speaker 2:Because if you see like this motion versus this motion.
Speaker 9:This is way more powerful. So, number one, get your grip. So you're like this yeah, yeah.
Speaker 11:And then what I would do is just take a stack of discs in your backyard doesn't matter what discs they are and then just work on this little wrist pop all right, because back, like honestly, how I, how I started with forehand is with one finger and it was more and like with one finger from here to that car over there I can hit a six foot gap, it's really accurate.
Speaker 11:But if I want to throw a 334 drive one finger's not doing it. Usually you want to, but if you can work on that you got it.
Speaker 1:Some of the most lethal forehand players on tour are one finger Gavin Babcock. He does kind of back it up, though he uses his other fingers to kind of provide a little support.
Speaker 9:I was looking because it's tough but he does do a very good one-finger grip. But you work on that snap.
Speaker 9:I'll give you Marley and what you're doing is, if you're still getting wobble and you're getting wobble from here, you know it's something to do with the grip. And then, once you get the grip dialed in and it's not wobbling, add a little tiny reach back and then, if it's not wobbling, you can add a little bit more of a reach back and you're just slowly adding distance and you're also able to diagnose and get rid of that wobble along the way yeah, because I've seen the like the little power thing with the yeah, the power grip yeah, so I just needed that, not this.
Speaker 1:Okay, cool yeah, when I switched my grip, so I was one fingy originally. Then I switched to that stacked grip but that only stuck around for putters and mids and mids. I can switch it up. But I switched to the sexting grip, which is like my fingertips are facing the target, they're not facing the sky, and that's just like the middle finger with just a little bit of extra leverage. And that's just like the middle finger with just a little bit of extra leverage, but both of my fingers are putting all of their force into the direct line of the shot. It was like the easiest 30 feet of distance I ever gained on a sidearm. And then with the reach back, that was a really good tip, like don't just go way behind your ear on the first go. You've got to start small and then slowly reach out Albert Tom.
Speaker 11:I feel like I had a really good feel for it with the one finger. But then I was like I need more power, so I switched to two and then I started like turning things.
Speaker 1:Okay. So if I can give you any advice, don't lose the one finger for your touch shots.
Speaker 11:Yeah, no, from here to the truck it's one finger buzz all day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, keep that and then work on a new part of your game. Don't throw it away and leave it in the past.
Speaker 9:You might like a little bit of a sextant grip, because it's basically a one thingy with the middle finger reinforced.
Speaker 11:Yeah, it's that.
Speaker 9:It's do your one thingy and then stack the middle finger on top of it Cool, yeah, I mean yeah.
Speaker 6:I used to.
Speaker 11:I used to like only do this Well thanks for coming out to the course we appreciate you guys. Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 1:Broderick, you got a question.
Speaker 6:I mean, I used to like how to not hit the first available on hole 16. Like I had to, I was like, sorry, 14, 14. And now I'm playing for long enough where I go back to my normal.
Speaker 3:You're going back to Jason again.
Speaker 8:Okay, you got one more. He's going for the mic. No, he's going for it. So this is for James.
Speaker 8:Every time you film it in the bag it's like a completely different bag, Not just bag like the discs, but I like it because I like a lot of the old school discs too. But as a player who clearly likes like old Innova disc craft, whatever it is, two different kind of questions what percentage of like the discs you've thrown in your touring career do you think are stuff you've just had since you were a kid or acquired from like maybe collectors, versus the allotments that you've gotten from companies like you know kind of where's that line? And then like you throw like ct birds, leopards, all that. What is your thought between like do you actually think the c leopard is better than just a good leopard from nowadays or is it more of like? It's just cooler and has that nostalgic feeling, Because I throw these 20-year-old firebirds and they're my favorite but I don't really like a new firebird just because it's like. I think it's worse but I also think it's not as cool.
Speaker 10:So like I don't know. I mean first the first question. I'm to be honest, like in my contracts, I don't even know what my allotment is. I don't, I've never been well, I've been to the infinite warehouse one time but I don't really collect allotment. I guess like I'll text, be like hey, can I get four of these, or whatever, um, but a lot of what I throw is stuff I've had for a long time and, to be honest, for me it's sort of a feel thing, like I like the way my 11 time rocks feel. Um, I like the way the older leopards, the t-birds, feel I I've a lot of them are super seasoned in and I'm a hyzer flip guy.
Speaker 10:So like some new leopards, leopards I've thrown, I'll throw a hyzer flip and they just fade left and I'm like this is useless. I don't. What is this? You know I like that late flip up. That only happens when you beat a disc in for eight years.
Speaker 10:So I mean I was very fortunate growing up in Northern California. That's a lot of old Innova territory. So you know I've had access to a lot of good old destroyers firebirds, leopards, t birds, rocks, you know, and it's just kind of what I grew up throwing. They're comfortable in my hand. You know I'm I have to see leopards, three old T birds and an 11 for T birds and an 11 time firebird and that's like all I throw on this course and it's just a comfort thing for me. But yeah, if I did it in the bag this week it would be a lot of new discs that you guys haven't seen yet. It's just fun for me. Like I'll go home and I'll be like oh wow, I haven't thrown this one in a while and I'll just pull out of the stack and add a couple out and just always kind of switching them in and out that's what I do on my off week, yeah.
Speaker 1:But then when I get to the tournament I'm like ha, this is the same disc I was throwing here two years ago and like I'll go to whatever course, like gmc. I've been throwing the same disc on the upshot of hole seven for four or five years, because that's as long as I've been on dysmania and like those are the things I take pride in. It's funny that you're just like new bag. Yep, I mean.
Speaker 8:Do you think, like all these discs, like you're like, oh, I haven't thrown that in a couple years. Do you kind of like remember enough, like I know how this throws, I throw the same. So like it's not like learning a new disc. Or is it because I think it's kind of cool how you know when, like, players switch bags everyone six months ago, whereas you switch every week? You know what I mean. They're giving players excuses for the whole season to play bad because they got a new bag, but then James Proctor has a new bag every month.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you obviously know the discs it's still Destroyer, but I'm like I don't know, I kind of did that too.
Speaker 10:I was playing the match. I put two 11-time rocks in the bag. I had no idea how they were going to fly. I'm like, oh, these will probably work in the woods. And you know, I threw one and it was more stable than I thought it would be and I got kind of excited by that. It's actually going to be perfect for one of the holes. But most of the time, yeah, I know exactly how they're going to fly or I can remember. Very rarely do discs surprise me when I'm doing that old switching in and out. But yeah, I mean throwing a new bag. Most of the discs we can find we can hand pick, cherry, pick the good ones. We can get them from players who were on the team before and we kind of know how they're going to fly. I think the hardest part about that is just the difference between how a seasoned disc flies versus a new disc. If your whole bag is just straight new discs out the box, it's going to be harder to find those like hyzer flip-ups, those really straight pushing discs.
Speaker 1:It's like the ones that flip up to flat and don't turn versus roller. Like those are like the hardest ones to get that in between. Yeah yeah, the drift yeah.
Speaker 10:Like it's up, and then it's hard to find leopards now that a lot of them are either too stable, where they're just dead straight, or they'll just kind of burn. But they don't really drift like a lot of older. And same thing with the rocks like nothing drifts like an 11 time rock. Does you know what I respect, though?
Speaker 1:yeah that's kind of why I asked like I see you throwing and I'm like I'm the same like I'll yeah, he's a. Buzz SS guy yeah, vertical. I like that. You didn't hit the field with those rocks, you just took it right to the course. Right to the course. Oh, it's going to work perfectly, we'll figure it out.
Speaker 6:I've thrown enough 11-type rocks, I know. Took it right to the course. It was like, oh, it's going to work perfectly.
Speaker 10:We'll figure it out. I don't know.
Speaker 6:It's like I've thrown enough 11-time rocks.
Speaker 10:I know how it's going to fly. One of them is going to work good. I love that.
Speaker 3:Jace has one more question for us.
Speaker 9:How do you forehand really good.
Speaker 10:Really good.
Speaker 6:Don't look at me, bud. Simplify it, make it as simple as possible, as Eric was saying. He said he switched to like a one or two step just to make sure he got the timing right, because all disc golf is is timing on any throw, forehands especially.
Speaker 10:I think avoid the trap of starting with an overstable disc. Like learn how to forehand your straight stuff and you just won't have to work as hard.
Speaker 9:So forehand your I mean so forehand, your, uh, your drivers Depends on what you want Forehand, like a road runner or something.
Speaker 1:Yeah, get something under stable.
Speaker 6:You can start with what like a Mako Mako 3? Glitch, if you can forehand a glitch you're already on your way, buddy.
Speaker 9:Yeah, that's not easy.
Speaker 1:Let the disc work for you, not against you. Yeah, I mean shout out to Broderick. He released a video not too long ago. He said can't throw the glitch, probably just trash. That's good, Simple as that. There's no other way to put it.
Speaker 3:I love that All right. So we're coming up out of here. Let's go into a few uh wrap up. This is a question that we ask of everybody that's on the show. It's really a two-fold question. It is, first of all, what do you got in the bag? And, second of all, the long lost fabled disc, your favorite disc ever, regardless of, uh, of sponsorships or anything. If you could have this disc back in your bag, what would it be? We'll go over there. How about Matt? What do you think?
Speaker 4:What was the question?
Speaker 3:So it's really two in one. It's first of all, what are you bagging and what is your favorite disc of all time? It could be because of nostalgia, it could be because of we already know his whole bag.
Speaker 1:Three rocks three leopards three firebirds, that's right, or T-birds, not leopards.
Speaker 4:T-birds, rocks firebirds, t-birds, destroyers, rocks firebirds, t-birds, destroyers. I do think about that candy firebird that I lost. I think it was in Missouri, like Albert Oakland. There's like a downhill with a river on the right and I lost that firebird. It was a candy firebird, like 160. Just flipped up, almost perfect, but off a little bit too far to the right and over the river. That was not retrievable Dang. Not retrievable Dang. Not retrievable. So that candy plastic Firebird, that's one of my favorites.
Speaker 10:Is that the old Pro lines? What's the old Pro ones?
Speaker 4:I think it was a Champion Are you talking like Jolly Launcher?
Speaker 1:Yeah, Okay, oh yeah those were good.
Speaker 10:The old Pro Firebirds were good.
Speaker 1:L or Sorry. I'm thinking about the Monster. I'm thinking of the Monster L. Those are insane.
Speaker 4:My standard bag is three DX or KC Pro Rocks and a couple. I have a couple DX. I have a couple of DX. Let's give it up for.
Speaker 1:The Rock.
Speaker 4:I have a couple of DX T-Birds. It's crazy how hard it is to find a good DX T-Bird. Like Walmart is maybe the best place to find a good DX T-Bird.
Speaker 1:But you might be the best DXT bird thrower in the world.
Speaker 4:Oh, thank you.
Speaker 1:I've seen it.
Speaker 4:I appreciate it.
Speaker 3:All right, holland. How about you? What do you got in the bag and what's your favorite of all-time discs?
Speaker 9:You want me to list every mold in my bag?
Speaker 5:No, just maybe some of your go-tos, just the highlights. Yeah, some highlights.
Speaker 9:Yeah, like Vultures and Raptors, are probably ones I have the most in my bag. I think I have three of each right now. Big fan of the Nebula Very underrated discraft over stable molds, buzz Zone, challenger SS those are probably the heavy hitters. I don't know. Honestly, I haven't lost that many discs. I haven't been playing that long that I've had discs that I've had for five years that I've lost, maybe just when you've retired. I haven't even really retired that many discs, but I have discs I would be really sad to lose.
Speaker 3:Will that suffice? That'll work.
Speaker 9:Okay, I've got this. It was the Tour Series Raptor from last year that I've been throwing so long that it's flippy now and I can throw a 340 laser beam forehand with it and I just don't have anything that flies like that and I would be heartbroken if I lost that guy.
Speaker 3:What are you putting with?
Speaker 9:Challenger. Ss. Yeah, ct swirl plastic, so really really stiff and they actually get tackier when wet. So I don't mind if my grip gets wet in the rain.
Speaker 3:Alright, Eric, what about you?
Speaker 1:The Dynasty is probably the best disc in my bag and it's the. It's the old CD2 mold from Discmania. The Innova made CD2. We brought it over and made the Dynasty for the Infinite lineup and when I was with Discmania a long time ago that was the disc that really kind of shaped my game forehand, backhand and made me a very, very good player. So being able to kind of go back to my roots with that and throw a bunch of Dynasties now with Infinite has been unbelievable. So it's an incredibly straight, flying 9 speed that I can use everywhere. And then I definitely lean on my Emperors for a lot of forehands. They go really far. It's pretty sick, just a great destroyer. Mold Pathfinders for mids and Alpacas for putting.
Speaker 1:The disc that I miss the most that I did lose when I moved to Salt Lake City was the very first D-Lline P2 I ever purchased. It was this white DX D-line P2 with the psycho stamp. Threw it on this turnover, slid into the creek and was pretty Russian. That day spent 45 minutes walking around on a rocky creek, never found it. It was really sad I kept. That same day I bought an S-line FDD and a D-Line P2, and that got me started on the Dysmania journey and I feel like it was what eventually led to me having the opportunity to work with them for the period that I did. And then I still have that FD. So it would be awesome to get that P2 back. But I think she's probably gone and that's all right.
Speaker 1:And it was also a dope thrower, like. It was one of those that I could power grip it, and power gripping putters is something I don't do very often, but I could power grip it, throw it on hyzer and it would flip and then it would low speed turn. It would have when it's slowing down in its flight, it would work right. So it's slowing down in its flight, it would work right. So it was awesome. Thinking about hitting tunnel shots, it's like, oh, you're at the end of your flight, you should be fading out, like most discs do. It just had this wonderful seasoned end where it would just be like, oh, and now we drift, right, it was beautiful. Low speed turn is the way the term I came up with, because you think about that like what, how does a disc low speed turn?
Speaker 3:Funny story. We were playing this course up by a river and Jenny, you know, put a couple in the river, took a couple, hits off the tree. Well, we're back the next weekend to play a tournament and the river had washed her disc up on a sandbar in the middle of the river oh, amazing, and and we're with you. There's no way you can get to it, but it's sitting right there, yeah oh my gosh, that's crazy all right.
Speaker 3:How about you, robert? What are you? What are you bagging? Some highlights, what are you putting with? And if you could have any disc back in your bag or in your possession, what would it be?
Speaker 6:I mean I feel like my bag is, I guess, not standard for a dynamic player. I have almost completely enforcers and I don't. I don't have any rives, which seems to be anybody on trilogy's favorite, but that's one that I never really connected with. I just have a ton of Enforcers. I have a General that's a little flippier, which is nice, and then the Pine from Westside has been a new one that I've really been enjoying. Yeah, pine is great. I actually have a Trilogy Challenge one from back in 2017. Those were the best runs and it's just like dead straight, thrown flat. It's exactly what I need for this course and I'm happy to have it. I mean Justice, harp, compass, I mean Felons, otties, like Honors, glories, explorers, like you name it. I've thrown it and they've been in and out of my bag because I kind of work through what my bag is still and you know I'm still learning a little bit of the lineup and that comes with the territory but I feel good in my bag. I'm putting with juries right now. They're nice and beat in. The ones I have are pretty flat on top and pretty straight up to 35, 40 when they start to fade off, and I just like the stability up to 35-40 when they start to fade off. I just like the stability. I like to have a little more stable putter, just so I can work it from distance. That's what I want.
Speaker 6:The disc I'd want back would be back in my possession, not necessarily in the bag. I lost an old Glow Wraith, an old PFN Glow Wraith. It came flat. It was one of the first three my dad and I ever bought because we wanted to go play glow rounds at a at our local nine holder and it was beaten perfectly. It was back when I was on innova and I there was this like 800 foot hole with like I was playing it for the first time and it got to the point where I was rolling it because I finally got like 500 feet of power.
Speaker 6:I was was throwing it flat. It was getting over to like a perfect roller angle and I asked the people on my card like, is there any chance I'll lose this disc? Like, is there water anywhere left if I don't turn it? Like, can I lose it? And they're like no, there's no chance you could possibly lose that disc.
Speaker 6:So I threw it and I threw what I thought was a great shot and then it just disappeared, probably into the water, and I still think about it now and again like man, that was the best disc I had because it was the perfect stability to where in the woods. I could throw it softer and it would flip up and glide forever. I could forehand it, I could roll it. It was one of the discs where it's like oh, I'm going on a trip and I'm taking three discs to play a course. I take that disc, take that disc like probably a rock rock three, and then I don't know what I was putting with Invader. At that point, like I just enjoyed that disc so much and it has so many good memories attached to it. Invader's a good disc.
Speaker 1:I mean, I don't know if I would ever putt with it, but for a thrower.
Speaker 6:It's a good puttering disc too.
Speaker 1:It's just dead straight. I think Kona putts with it right now.
Speaker 6:Does Kona putt with it? I know Emily does right now.
Speaker 1:Last I checked, she did.
Speaker 6:Yeah, it's just low profile straight. It's essentially a Casey Pro with a flatter profile.
Speaker 10:But yeah, that Wraith. I'd pay a lot of money to have that disc back, but oh well, all right, james, what do you think? Um, I can roll through my bag real quick. I putt with alpacas, I got a couple rocks, I got the crux from thought space, four t-birds, two leopards, a firebird, a roman which is the pd mold a wraith, a destroy, and the one disc I would love to have back is an old yellow KC T-Bird with a blue stamp. That was Very specific.
Speaker 2:I got a photo of it.
Speaker 10:It was like I mean, it was my favorite disc. It was my favorite disc. No, I wasn't pulling off a picture of mine. I threw it so good and I don't even know where I lost it. I just left it somewhere. It just disappeared. I went to grab it one day and it wasn't in my bag. Those are the worst. That's the worst. I can't live with that.
Speaker 1:Every single disc I've ever bagged or owned, or everything. I know where I got it from and where it ended up. If it's no longer in my possession, and that really irks me if I don't know what happened to it.
Speaker 10:It's like gone. It's just gone. No idea, All right.
Speaker 3:Casey, how about you?
Speaker 1:I mean I'll just keep it simple for my bag. I putt with B2s, I throw more 7 speeds and 11 speeds than anyone else on tour. That's basically my whole game. And I throw an FT3 because everybody with a sidearm would. That was for Dismania. But as far as I mean like, it's different between like my favorite disc of all time or like my most like iconic discs of my career, because I would argue that my Just Send it DD3 was like my most iconic disc in my bag at any point, or the D-Line MD. The D-Line MD was the other one. Yeah, so like, but like back in like maybe it's because I'm not I'm not far removed enough from those being in my bag that I'm still like. Oh yeah, you know like, but but casey pro rock man, I had this one at home. It's just just like he was saying he was talking all about his 11 times. It taught me how to hyzer flip and I'm a hyzer flip player now. So what more do I have to thank than that disc? And it's gone.
Speaker 1:By the way, the one that I'm yes, yes, I do. It is a golf course steel club in Pennsylvania. I hit a rock with it. I hit an earth rock with my rock, and then I decided to throw it off one of their top of the world, 400 footers and it just drifted too much. And into the thick of it, never to be seen again, but it served its purpose. How many episodes do you have? And into the thick of it. Never to be seen again, but it served its purpose. Six, I said I had seven. Seven speeds, they all fly different, I got my dynasties.
Speaker 3:I have six. I'm like locked in with you right now.
Speaker 11:I go from.
Speaker 1:FB to Flippy Skywalker 1 to Straight Skywalker 1 to Straight Skywalker 2 to Beefy Skywalker 2 to Beefy Sea Lion FD1. Simple as that. Oh, and Overstable Glidey Skywalker 1. So I forgot about that one.
Speaker 4:All this talk about the disc is really about the mini.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I got a Treasures of the Forest mini in the bag. Hey, my money.
Speaker 10:Although I have a long drink mini in my bag. Nice.
Speaker 8:Shout out to the Spanish yeah.
Speaker 3:Well, anyway, we would like to thank all you guys for being with us. We're going to wrap it up here because we got tea times and everything and we're coming up on two and a half hours. That's pretty good, it's pretty fun. So anyway, once again, let's give it up for our discussion panel. Here we have Casey White, james Proctor, robert Burrage, eric Oakley, paul and Hanley and Matt Sun thank you both for having us Great hosts.
Speaker 3:Thank you. Is there anything you'd like to say to our audience before we close her out? Spread positivity, be a good human, all right. So on this episode of the Intentional Disc Golfer Podcast, we had a discussion panel with five DGPT pro players that are here for the Cascade Challenge and we were talking all about tournament prep and getting ready and how to maximize your practice and your skills.
Speaker 3:And if you like what you hear here, you enjoy this podcast. Please like, subscribe, follow, tell all of your friends. You can find us on all of the social medias. We have Facebook, instagram, we have Twitter or X, however you want to say it and you can also email us at theintentionaldiscgolfer at gmailcom. That is, theintentionaldiscgolfer at gmailcom. We'd also like to thank our sponsors. We have Treasures of the Forest, which are here with us. We're very honored Not very often we get to have that live and we'd also like to thank Salty Unicorns, who is also sponsoring us. And, of course, we need to thank the fans, because you guys are the reason that we keep doing this. We couldn't do this if you guys weren't around and showing your support. So thank you and closing out the Intentional Disc Golfer, I am one of your hosts. My name is Brandon.
Speaker 2:And I'm Jenny.
Speaker 3:And here at the Intentional Disc Golfer, we truly believe that disc golf changes lives, so go out there and grow the sport.
