It has been weeks since I had the chance to disc golf. My health hasn’t been good, plus work has been keeping me incredibly busy of late. But today was the day my wife and I got to make the seven-hour drive North to Seattle, Washington, to watch our youngest daughter (Eleanor) participate in the Western International Band Clinic for the second (and final, since she is a senior in high school) time in two years. And NOTHING, not health, or rain, or ??? was keeping me from checking out a few new disc golf courses.
My first stop on the afternoon was at Cowlitz Riverside Park in Kelso, Washington. A new course that had opened in the past year (since the last time I had driven through the area), it was a quick, fun nine holes. There were a few safety hazards present (Holes 2 and 9, in particular). But in the rain, I mostly had the course to myself.
I didn’t realize how tough it was going to be to throw discs again, as I’ve been added to two new medications since the last time I’ve played…and one of the side effects of one of the meds is all-over body aches. I think I’ve lost about fifty feet off my driving distance on the tee, not to mention at LEAST 2-3 “points” off the speed of my release. 🙁 It hurt to get my drives out there more than 300 feet, but I did my best. And as I tried to knock all of the rust off my game, I limped my way to a -4 (24) on this 2,604-foot course, for an estimated round rating of 955. Not the worst round in the world! But it felt/looked bad. Particularly on the tee.
That bit of a blow to whatever little ego I might have with a disc in my hands (ha)? It was onward, North toward Seattle! But before we got there, we had a break in the rain right around the time we were passing through Centralia, Washington. Where there was another nine-hole course I had yet to play: Rotary Riverside Park. When we pulled into the parking lot and I walked toward the Hole 1 tee, we even got a brief bit of sunshine (the beautiful cover photo for this post)! The sunshine was short-lived, however, as I spent most of the round in the rain. But I had fun. And I met a nice local who was trying to see if I might be a new player he could recruit to local leagues. He said he moved up to Centralia from Newport, Oregon in the recent past.
Before playing the round, I had forgotten how hard it can be to play disc golf in the Fall on courses with a lot of trees! Two or three inches of leaves on the ground made trying to find discs a challenge. I switched from my favorite orange ProLine Squall to a sky-blue ProLine Squall for the round. But even having a bright blue disc on a canvas of brown and orange proved difficult to find my shots off the tee. Thankfully I didn’t lose any discs, carding a -4 (23) for an estimated round rating of 994 on this 2,342-foot course. Well, more like a “924-rated” round…but DGCourseReview.com telling me it was closer to a 994 rated round was good in recovering a bit of that tiny ego I had lost back in Centralia. 🙂
Tonight Becky and I are calling it a night in Federal Way, Washington, then tomorrow we’ll see what kind of time I have to sneak in another course or two before Eleanor’s WIBC performance.
Magic Number = -39 (2,039 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.