Disc Golf with Don Pedro
10:00 AM - 2:00 PM, Monday, 12 August 2024
I got a call from my friend, JumboC, informing me Don Pedro was going to try his hand at the sport of disc golfing. Although I hadn’t really played since around the time of the pandemic and don’t go out anymore, I had to join them for this inaugural occasion.
We congregated at Wickham Park in the early hours of the morning; 10 AM.
The weather was beautiful. The temperature topped-out at 80°F, there was very low humidity, and sky was clear. The view of the city of Hartford from atop the hill at the turn was better than usual. A lot of the time it is obscured in haze/smog, but this time it was crystal-clear [it looked much better than in the picture I took included in the photo gallery below; you had to be there].
While we were gathering ourselves on the tee-box, we met another player, “Jojo Angry,” who joined us for the round. He was a really great guy, and it turned out that he was also a hell of a good player and ended up as the overall winner, narrowly beating our JumboC by one.
Tres Amigos Collage
The picture above is not real: it is a combination of one that I took and one that I’m in. To be honest, when I saw the picture I took, I was a little disappointed that it was not level… I’m not sure how JumboC was holding the phone to get the proportions that far askew.
The Round
Don Pedro’s first ever disc golf throw! Pedro started the day throwing ‘backhanded.’ I am not sure if his decision was based on my suggestion, since that is the way I throw it almost exclusively, or if he was used to throwing a frisbee that way, but by the end of the round he was throwing forehand or “flick” the way both JumboC and Joe were using, and I try only occasionally.
The collage below has me looking a little off and unlike the others, but my form was fine… I used a different technique! It was #13 and the disc entrapment device was positioned uphill through a few trees and to the right, so I chose to toss a ‘thumber’ [opposite side up from a tomahawk hold] similarly to how I would naturally throw a ball. We all landed within a few feet of each other, but Jojo and JumboC were the only ones who got pars as I missed an easy put.
It drove me crazy that JumboC was constantly going off to pick-up wild mushrooms, but apparently he ended up with $80 worth, so that’s great for him.
I don’t think anyone lost a disc, but we found at least three. The owner’s names and phone numbers were written in sharpie on the bottom, as is customary, so they all got the call. JumboC was told he could keep one and another was left at the main gate’s lost and found.
“Throw the Peterson”
To be honest, I have no idea why JumboC used an underhand horseshoe type throw he called the Peterson, instead of a standard put from short distance, but it worked for him multiple times and for me the one and only time I tried it.
Jojo = three birds; five bogeys; two +2.
JumboC [*former ACT Tournament, Amateur, Runner-Up] = two birds; seven bogeys; one +2.
Chi = nine bogeys; four +2; one +3.
Don Pedro [*first time ever playing] = five bogeys; four +2; five +3; three +4; one +6.
This embedded YouTube video shows the course from the disc’s perspective.
On the first ‘hole’ I want to emphatically state that I played it safely on the right while everyone else tried to go over… and went looking for their discs in the Out-of-Bounds brush in front of them. I’ve been in there, and I will never risk it again. The score on #1 would be a little misleading if only viewed on our score card; we don’t count OB, and while they were not penalized, it took me two extra throws to get to where they got to take their free drop.
Driving times are approximate:
Hartford = 0h, 15m.
Tolland = 0h, 20m.
New Haven = 0h, 45 m.
Torrington = 0h, 55m.
New London = 1h, 0m.
Boston = 1h, 35m.
NYC = 2 h, 30m.
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To see any of the posts for the nine years in which JumboC and I played in the ACT disc golf tournaments click this link, https://coleychi.social/adventures/tag/ACT, or go over to my other blog called Adventures and use the tags for "Amateur Challenge Tournament," "ACT," "Disc Golf," etc.
The tags below are hyperlinks that open the pages with all other instances of that tag: