After a busy 50+ hours working to improve my skills as part of the Oregon Small Business Development Center network, I decided to reward myself by checking out a couple of new disc golf courses a little to the West of me in Salem, Oregon.
The first course I decided to play today was a relatively new eighteen-hole course at Chemeketa Community College in Salem, Oregon. I honestly knew very little about this course prior to playing it, but I came away very impressed. A beautiful piece of property! Great tee pads. Nice signage! About the only thing that was missing was “scoring spread.” More specifically, what I mean is that just about every hole was extremely difficult for all but the very best players to have a chance to deuce. Yet while twos were incredibly hard for the vast majority of players to reach? Par threes were WAY too easy for most players with modest to “good” skills to get.
Since deuces were all but impossible to achieve? You simply throw your tee shot out there to somewhere safe. Somewhere you know you will have an easy approach shot to the basket, so you won’t need to sweat your putt. So that’s what I did, every hole except the two “must deuce” holes (Holes 10 and 14, which I deuced).
My only mistake on the road was a bit of grip lock on the Hole 17 tee, which caused me to limp to the barn with a bogey-four. Other than that? It was a round on auto-pilot or cruise control. Just take it easy, don’t take stupid chances, and card your 52 or 53. I got a 53 (see: mistake on 17), which Disc Golf Course Review said is good for an estimated round rating of 972. But I would say it was a round in the 930s-940s, based on previous experience.
After finishing up at Chemeketa, I went over to a little three-hole course at Brush College Park that had popped up on my UDisc map of unplayed courses a while ago. As I thought it might be, it wasn’t much of a course (or much of a course to remember). Hole 1 has you throwing over an entire parking lot, while Hole 3 has LHBH players essentially throwing at/through the Hole 2 basket on your way to your Hole 3 basket! Hole 2 was a cool shot (which I deuced). But there would otherwise be no other reason to ever return to this course.
Another +2 to my Courses Played Collection! Now for a good night’s sleep, then trying to knock out a few more new courses on my way home tomorrow.
Magic Number = -59 (2,059 Courses Played)
ABOUT DEREK
Derek Tonn is a member of the DGA’s Ambassador Team. His company, Mapformation, LLC, has been DGA’s partner in the development of disc golf tee signage since 2012. The longer our two companies have worked together, and the more Derek has gotten to know all the great folks at DGA, the more he has wanted to formally sing the company’s praises. The more he has realized that “Steady” Ed’s (the father of disc golf and the modern-day Frisbee) vision for the sport and his company perfectly describes his own interests and priorities related to disc golf, and the more Derek has recently been encouraged to share his story.