So,
The Davis County Open was held at the Davis Applied Technology College (DATC). The DATC course has 15 permanent baskets. 6 temporary baskets were added and out of bounds (OB) lines were painted between fairways for the tournament. All of the holes were par 3. The additional baskets were placed in such a way as to add a bit of technical challenge to a course that is essentially a "grip it and rip it" course. The OB lines encouraged players to try to stay out of other fairways and penalized errant shots that otherwise would be considered okay to play in a casual round.
Most of the permanent baskets are set out in the open with no obstacles. To compensate for the lack of technicality and keep the holes somewhat challenging, distance and/or elevation was added to the holes. Either the distance was increased beyond typical or the tee was placed at the bottom of a hill and the basket was placed somewhere up on the hill, effectively making a 300 foot hole play more like 350 to 400. One of the holes plays from corner to corner across a field that looks like it's used for baseball practice. The distance is 511 feet with no obstacles between the tee and the basket. This type of course presents a couple of challenges for me.
The first and most obvious challenge is that I can't throw a disc 511 feet. Or 500 feet. Or 450 feet. Or 400 feet (on purpose). My usual drive distance with a controlled, fairly well aimed drive is 300 - 325 feet. These means that after my drive, my putt for birdie on the longest hole is 211 feet. Now, I have done that a few times in the past but it's not something you count on. Even the shorter uphill baskets left me about 75 to 100 feet away from the basket after my drive. When we have practiced at our local course, I have often told my son that par is not acceptable. I broke this rule for Cherry Peak but generally, if you are getting par on every hole, you're losing. When a hole is par 3 based solely on distance, it pretty much makes it un-birdie-able for me.
The temporary baskets were a nice addition to the course. There were still long enough or challenging enough that I only birdied one of them. It was fun though to have holes that were brand new (my ADHD brain likes new shiny things of course) and holes that didn't rely solely on distance to make them challenging. A couple used narrow fairways, a couple were island holes, and the last two used trees, buildings, and OB to penalize slightly off target shots.
The other challenges to this type of course are that you really can't practice for the best shot or technically outplay the other players or adjust your play based on the previous round. If I have a chance, I will usually play a tournament course a few times before the tournament and arrive an hour early to warm up and get in some last minute practice shots. This gives me a chance to try different discs and different types of shots on each of the holes. I may throw 3 or 4 different discs from the tee to see which one might play the best. I met try a hyzer route and a flex route and see which one works best and which one I can most reliably throw. I do practice driving every week at the soccer field across the street and I have improved this year but that's more of a long term thing. At the age of 50, I'm not sure how much I'm going to improve. Not that I'm going to give up trying. At the very least, I need to keep from backsliding.
On a more technical course, I might be able to kind of, sort of hang with the kids (you know, the 20 somethings that are half my age and a foot taller than me - arm span is a factor in disc golf). If there aren't that many distance holes, the difference between my score and the score of the winner in the Open division might be single digits. If I feel like I played well, I will compare my score to other divisions to see how I would have placed in a tougher division. For this blog post, I compared my score to the Open division winner and here's what it looks like. My total score was 129 - 2 rounds on a par 63 course - so 3 over par. The Open division winner, Kesler Martin, had a total score of 109 - 20 less than me and 17 under par. This isn't to say that he isn't better at putting than me or in other aspects of the game but this course definitely favors the big arm.
Last is kind of minor thing if I've had time to get a few practice rounds in before the tournament but it still applies in tournaments that have more than one round. If a particular shot didn't work for you in the previous round(s), you can make some kind of adjustment to do better in the current round. I did this in the second round of this tournament on one of the holes. For some reason, hole #11 at DATC confounds me. I think I should be able to get close to birdie range, if not actually get into birdie range because it's a downhill shot. The downhill part of the holes comes after a dog leg right and it seems like I always hit a tree and end up with an unnecessary challenge just to get par. In the first round, I tried playing it a little straighter but still cut it too tight. I hit a tree and fell shorter than I did in all of my practice rounds. I couldn't even see the basket from my lie. I ended up with a bogey. In the second round, I said screw it and didn't drive for distance. I played a perfectly straight shot just over the crest of the hill, leaving me with a very clean up shot, and a tap in par. On the long holes, unless you threw it out of bounds the first round or the wind has changed, the choice of adjustments is between throwing a straight shot with your favorite driver or throwing a straight shot with your favorite driver.
Thankfully, there are age protected divisions and I was with a great bunch of players for both rounds and I found the challenge of the course to be a fun one rather than a discouraging one. There are very few tournaments that include my actual division, Grandmaster (50+ year olds), so I usually play with the 40 somethings but I have found that I can compete with them. The difference between me and a 45 year old is minuscule, unlike playing against a lanky 25 year old.
I was tied for 3rd after the first round with 3 over par. One of those was that downhill dogleg I described earlier. I lost a couple more on that 511 foot hole. I threw my drive a little high and it stalled out against the wind, falling 75 feet short of my usual drive. I tried too hard to make up for it on my second throw and put the disc far to the right but luckily still in bounds. I made a strong run for the basket to save my par because there is a slight hill behind it to stop the disc if you miss, which I did. However, I missed the very easy come backer and ended up with a double bogey. I had a couple of birdies in the round and a couple more bogeys that evened out.
For the second round, I tried to play it just a bit cleaner and made that adjustment on hole #11. My birdies and bogeys cancelled each other out and I finished the round at par. One of the big difference between my play and many of the others was that I only went OB once the whole day (and that was because of a dumb mistake). Playing clean and letting par be acceptable for the day was enough to move me up to take first place for Advanced Masters.