Speaker 1: Welcome back to another edition of The Fried Egg Podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Garrett Morrison, managing editor at The Fried Egg, and
Speaker 1: today we dive into the world of disc golf architecture.
Speaker 1: You heard that right, disc golf, and it turns out
Speaker 1: to be a really interesting subject. But first, this episode
Speaker 1: is brought to you by the Frida Egg Pro Shop.
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Speaker 1: way to support the pod, all right, So today's guest
Speaker 1: is John Howke, who is widely regarded, even universally regarded
Speaker 1: as the leading designer in disc golf. He's behind courses
Speaker 1: like Harmony Benz in Columbia, Missouri, see the Ranch in Talco, Texas,
Speaker 1: and Hillcrest Farms on Prince Edward Island. These courses are
Speaker 1: considered to be among the very best in the disc
Speaker 1: golf world. And just last year there was a tournament
Speaker 1: at Hillcrest Farms and I'll put a link to a
Speaker 1: video of it in the show notes. I want you
Speaker 1: to see it. It's a pretty stunning place. So until recently,
Speaker 1: I had never really thought about disc golf architecture. And
Speaker 1: here I have to apologize to any listeners who are
Speaker 1: avid disc golfers. I have a great deal of respect
Speaker 1: for the sport, but I just don't know a whole
Speaker 1: lot about it, So parts of this episode might seem
Speaker 1: a little basic to you. But trying my best, I
Speaker 1: was aware of disc golf. I just hadn't really put
Speaker 1: it together that the sport had to have something like
Speaker 1: its own tradition of design, just like golf does. And
Speaker 1: it turns out that the world of disc golf architecture
Speaker 1: has a lot in common with the world of golf architecture.
Speaker 1: Disc golfers love to talk about courses and rank courses
Speaker 1: they travel to see new places. There's a healthy debate
Speaker 1: about what makes for good design and poor design. Disc
Speaker 1: golf even has its own issues with distance and technology
Speaker 1: and the obsoleting of older courses and things like that,
Speaker 1: But there are also some big differences. There's a lot
Speaker 1: less money in disc golf, for better or for worse.
Speaker 1: From my perspective, maybe mostly for better. The courses are
Speaker 1: really natural, and abundance of trees is a good thing
Speaker 1: for disc golf because trees are the main hazard in
Speaker 1: the sport. The properties are pretty small because a disc
Speaker 1: doesn't travel as far as a golf ball. There doesn't
Speaker 1: need to be this intensively cultivated short crop turf because
Speaker 1: disc golfers are just standing on the ground instead of
Speaker 1: playing off of it. Maintenance is really manageable. Just about
Speaker 1: everybody walks. Golf style carts aren't available or even practical
Speaker 1: most of the time. In the green fees I mean,
Speaker 1: a lot of disc golf courses are free to play,
Speaker 1: especially the ones on city land. Some do charge, but
Speaker 1: the rates are really low. One of John Howke's newer courses,
Speaker 1: seal a Ranch, charges twenty dollars for unlimited play, all day.
Speaker 1: And keep in mind that see the Ranch is regarded
Speaker 1: as one of the best disc golf courses in the world,
Speaker 1: certainly one of the most ambitiously designed. So I find
Speaker 1: all of this incredibly appealing. I feel like golf could
Speaker 1: actually learn a good bit from disc golf. And at
Speaker 1: the same time, disc golf is at this interesting place
Speaker 1: in its history where it's growing, getting more popular, attracting
Speaker 1: more money, and that money, on the one hand, will
Speaker 1: allow architects like John Howck to do more and to
Speaker 1: realize their visions more fully. On the other hand, part
Speaker 1: of what's attractive about disc golf and part of what
Speaker 1: it does better than traditional golf is usibility and affordability.
Speaker 1: So disc golf is going to have to figure out
Speaker 1: how much it really wants to change as it gets bigger. Anyway,
Speaker 1: that's why I wanted to talk to John Howck, and
Speaker 1: without further ado, here's my conversation with him. I miss
Speaker 1: a green, for example, I'm already upset when I find
Speaker 1: my ball in the bunker, I'm really upset.
Speaker 2: And when I find my ball in a fried egg
Speaker 2: Friday egg, the dreaded Frida egg, Frida egg, Frida egg
Speaker 2: egg Frida egg Bride egg Lie. I'm about ready to
Speaker 2: run off the golf course.
Speaker 1: So why don't we just start by talking a little
Speaker 1: bit about your background in disc golf, the sport, and
Speaker 1: then how you got into disc golf course design.
Speaker 2: Sure. Well, I loved frisbee since I was a little kid.
Speaker 2: I have a very clear recollection of being maybe in
Speaker 2: third grade and playing catch with a friend and not
Speaker 2: not even wanting to catch it sometimes, I just I
Speaker 2: just loved the way it would hover and land. I
Speaker 2: was just fascinated by it. So I by the time
Speaker 2: I got to seventh eighth grade, this was now mid seventies,
Speaker 2: ultimate was starting to get big, and you know, so
Speaker 2: we learned about it and we would play, you know,
Speaker 2: two on two or three on three. I remember teaching
Speaker 2: myself how to throw a sidearm, which took hours, throwing
Speaker 2: the throwing my master frisbee into the garage and picking
Speaker 2: it up and throwing it again. Of course, now I
Speaker 2: can you know, I can teach a kid how to
Speaker 2: do it in two minutes. And by the time I
Speaker 2: got out of college, I was very sure curious about it.
Speaker 2: You know, in those days, if you played frisbee, you
Speaker 2: did everything. So we did disc golf, we did freestyle, distance,
Speaker 2: maximum time, aloft, all that stuff, and by the time
Speaker 2: I got out of college, I actually had a chance
Speaker 2: to kind of make a living doing freestyle demonstrations around
Speaker 2: the country. So at that point in my career, I
Speaker 2: was really focused on freestyle. But it became clear that
Speaker 2: disc golf was about to explode, and so I ran
Speaker 2: my first disc golf well overall event that included disc
Speaker 2: golf in nineteen eighty four. I had to design the
Speaker 2: course for that event, and that was the beginning at
Speaker 2: Zilk Park in Austin, Texas. And as far as golf,
Speaker 2: you know, my dad started pulling me around in a
Speaker 2: little red wagon when I was five, and he always
Speaker 2: liked to be the first one on the course, so
Speaker 2: we were up early and he'd be out there and
Speaker 2: pull me along until I was old enough to start
Speaker 2: playing on my own. I will also never forget the
Speaker 2: day I think we were on about hold twelve and
Speaker 2: I was, you know, probably give or take one hundred
Speaker 2: and fifty, and he and all his friends were around sixty.
Speaker 2: And that was the day he told me that the
Speaker 2: highest score doesn't win, So I almost gave up the
Speaker 2: sport that day, but I hung in there, and you know,
Speaker 2: my whole thing was was promoting the sport and trying
Speaker 2: to get more people involved, and to do that we
Speaker 2: needed more courses. And so thankfully that's you know, right
Speaker 2: around the time that people, particularly here in Texas where
Speaker 2: I was at the time, we're really getting interested in it,
Speaker 2: and the phone started ringing and we started putting in
Speaker 2: disc golf courses.
Speaker 1: So it sounds like you have a bit of a
Speaker 1: background in golf as well. When you started designing golf courses,
Speaker 1: were you drawing on some of your experience with traditional golf.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, I mean, you know, the disc golf world is
Speaker 2: a little divided. Some people think we're brothers or cousins,
Speaker 2: and some people think, you know, we might as well
Speaker 2: be disc golf and snowboarding. I certainly don't take that view.
Speaker 2: I also have a lot of respect for golf. I mean,
Speaker 2: there's there's a reason why it's one of the most
Speaker 2: popular sports in the world, and you know, four hundred
Speaker 2: years of learning how to do things right. Clearly, there
Speaker 2: are things about disc golf that are very different and
Speaker 2: we need to emphasize those. But there's so much about
Speaker 2: golf that we can learn from and incorporate or you know,
Speaker 2: use variations of. So it was really important to me
Speaker 2: to learn as much as I could about golf, you know,
Speaker 2: learn which principles we could incorporate, which principles maybe we couldn't,
Speaker 2: which we could use varieties of. And so I've always
Speaker 2: been a big advocate of learning from golf.
Speaker 1: And we'll get into some of those similarities and differences
Speaker 1: later on. I'm very curious to dig into the details
Speaker 1: there and talk about design, But just to begin with
Speaker 1: the basics, do disc golf courses usually have eighteen holes?
Speaker 2: Well, that's so funny you asked that because a statistic
Speaker 2: just came out last week. I would have said easily yes.
Speaker 2: But apparently where give or take fifty to fifty or
Speaker 2: sixty forty between eighteen and nine or sometimes other numbers.
Speaker 2: I mean, we go I think as low as three
Speaker 2: or four, and we go up to twenty seven. There's
Speaker 2: a thing in Michigan where there's a lot of twenty four's.
Speaker 2: I don't know where that came from. But eighteen, you know,
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, you may know the history of it
Speaker 2: better than I do. But eighteen is a sacred number,
Speaker 2: and if we're not doing eighteen, we're usually doing nine.
Speaker 1: Gotcha. Okay, how long are disc golf courses typically? How
Speaker 1: long are the holes? And what's the mixture of pars
Speaker 1: and you know, what are we looking at?
Speaker 2: Well, the rule of thumb on distances was always about
Speaker 2: a third. There have been substantial improvements and changes in
Speaker 2: our technology over the last ten twenty years, so that's
Speaker 2: not so much the case anymore. I think when you're
Speaker 2: at the highest level, par threes are almost all going
Speaker 2: to be you know, to seventy to three seventy. Occasionally
Speaker 2: they'll be a little shorter. Occasionally they'll they'll be a
Speaker 2: little higher.
Speaker 1: And we're talking feet here.
Speaker 2: Yes, I'm sorry feet. Yes, we do everything in the
Speaker 2: feet excepting where we have to convert from meters and
Speaker 2: you're a player, so yes, but exactly we typically use
Speaker 2: feet instead of yards, and so you know, par four
Speaker 2: for us typically about double that, so you know, five
Speaker 2: point fifty to seven fifty for the top players. Again,
Speaker 2: par fives, you know, eight hundred to eleven hundred typically
Speaker 2: that kind of thing. So, but yeah, discs are flying
Speaker 2: farther and that's that's been a real issue for us.
Speaker 2: I mean, I know you all have an issue with
Speaker 2: older courses being somewhat obsolete. We have that problem times ten.
Speaker 1: Oh well, we'll dig into that later for sure. What
Speaker 1: do the pins look like in disc golf? They're these
Speaker 1: baskets or do you call them pins?
Speaker 2: Some of us call them pins, we call them baskets.
Speaker 2: We call them targets. Typically, the center poll is give
Speaker 2: or take five feet tall, and there's a a basket
Speaker 2: that's about two foot diameter and about two and a
Speaker 2: half feet off the ground, and then there's a series
Speaker 2: of chains above the basket. And if you've ever seen
Speaker 2: I don't know if they even exist anymore, but they
Speaker 2: used to make basketball nets out of chain, right, so
Speaker 2: wider at the top and narrow at the bottom. That's
Speaker 2: what that's what our chains kind of look like. And
Speaker 2: that allows you to throw a shot that's flat and
Speaker 2: it hits the chains and drops into the basket.
Speaker 1: And I have to say, when the disk hits the chains,
Speaker 1: it makes this very satisfying sound.
Speaker 2: That is the sound of life for many disc golfers.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So do disc golf courses have teas and greens
Speaker 1: as golfers would understand them?
Speaker 2: Teas? Yes, of course. Our te'es. You know, we run
Speaker 2: up on the tee and the only golfer who does
Speaker 2: that is Happy Gilmour, right, but we do that almost
Speaker 2: all the time. So the tea's are always, if possible,
Speaker 2: a flat, hard surface. We're experimenting with a lot of
Speaker 2: different surfaces. You know, a rubber has been experimented with
Speaker 2: over the last couple of decades. Turf is becoming popular now.
Speaker 2: The king is still concrete in my mind. But the
Speaker 2: idea is you have to give the players a level,
Speaker 2: predictable surface for players to run up and so a
Speaker 2: tea pad typically on my championship courses we do six
Speaker 2: feet wide, twelve or fifteen feet long. They need to
Speaker 2: be flush with the ground so that people don't have
Speaker 2: to step up onto it and so they can't you know,
Speaker 2: fall off it. As far as greens, that is one
Speaker 2: of the huge, huge, huge differences between our versions of golf.
Speaker 2: In your version, I mean, the greens are like a
Speaker 2: whole different world, right, all of a sudden, you're using
Speaker 2: a different a very different club. The ball is not
Speaker 2: leaving the surface. It's about reading and pace, right. That
Speaker 2: doesn't happen with us. You know, we have discs that
Speaker 2: we call putters and that we use in short range.
Speaker 2: But they're just kind of taller and rounder than all
Speaker 2: the other discs we use, right, they're not that that
Speaker 2: kind of night and day difference that that traditional golf uses.
Speaker 2: And so for you, being on the green and being
Speaker 2: off the green is a big deal, and for us
Speaker 2: it's more of a continuum. Right. When we're closer, we're
Speaker 2: using the putter. As we get further out, we're still
Speaker 2: going to use the putter, and the shot is similar.
Speaker 2: But as we go back, there's no point where we go, Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm off the green. You know, life is different. So
Speaker 2: in my mind, there are design elements for our green areas.
Speaker 2: You know, I still refer to the area around the
Speaker 2: basket as the green typically, but it's it's not at
Speaker 2: all like what happens in the in the traditional golf world.
Speaker 1: And I should mention that for those who don't know
Speaker 1: much about disc golf, that disc golfers use a number
Speaker 1: of different discs for different situations. I'm not sure how
Speaker 1: many disks disc golfers usually use. Is there is there
Speaker 1: a limit?
Speaker 2: We do not yet have a bag limit, So it's
Speaker 2: you know, typically when people are starting out. We recommend
Speaker 2: just three a driver, a mid range and a putter.
Speaker 2: But you know, once people get serious about it, they
Speaker 2: can carry thirty or more and may have up to
Speaker 2: one hundred in their arsenal. You know that they may
Speaker 2: take out, you know, depending on the course and the weather.
Speaker 2: So discs will vary in speed, which is the biggest
Speaker 2: factor in terms of distance, but also in the carry
Speaker 2: the glide, whether they like to go right, it all
Speaker 2: how much they want to go left, which you know
Speaker 2: we refer to as understable and overstable. And with our discs,
Speaker 2: even though we're able to curve them either direction, and
Speaker 2: believe it or not, we have disks that you can
Speaker 2: throw that will go to the right and then come
Speaker 2: back and break to the left or vice versa. When
Speaker 2: our disks, particularly drivers start to slow down, they always
Speaker 2: fall one way. We call that paid so a right
Speaker 2: handed backhand. If it's still in the air and it
Speaker 2: runs out of gas, it's going to fall to the
Speaker 2: left every time. And if you throw a side arm
Speaker 2: or forehand, when it runs for a right hand or
Speaker 2: when it runs out of gas, it's going to fall
Speaker 2: to the right every time. So huge, huge, huge variety
Speaker 2: in discs and don't forget. You know, we also do
Speaker 2: skip shots, we do roller shots, we do upside down shots,
Speaker 2: and those you know, different discs are are good for
Speaker 2: different of those shots. And every model comes in a
Speaker 2: variety of plastics for more durability, different grip, and every
Speaker 2: disc comes in a variety of weights, typically between you know,
Speaker 2: one hundred and forty five grams and one hundred and
Speaker 2: seventy five grams. So it's very different from choosing clubs.
Speaker 2: And as they age and start to get beat up,
Speaker 2: they'll fly a little bit so they can get seasoned,
Speaker 2: you know. Club quote. Club selection for us is a
Speaker 2: very can be a very complex decision.
Speaker 1: This will be I think reassuring to a lot of
Speaker 1: traditional golfers who get obsessed with their gear. Hearing that
Speaker 1: there that there's this extent of and variety of equipment
Speaker 1: and disc golf the disc is both the ball and
Speaker 1: the club. It seems like, yes, it takes on this
Speaker 1: sort of extra importance, right, and you can.
Speaker 2: Yes, if you're someone who likes to get obsessed, you
Speaker 2: can get very obsessed about discs.
Speaker 1: So just generally speaking, if a traditional golfer were to
Speaker 1: walk onto a disc golf course, what would look different,
Speaker 1: what would be kind of unfamiliar about that environment.
Speaker 2: Well, the first thing you notice is our courses are
Speaker 2: are so different from each other, right, I mean, for you,
Speaker 2: if you've never been to a course before, you know,
Speaker 2: before you get their pars probably going to be between
Speaker 2: sixty eight and seventy two. The fairways are going to be,
Speaker 2: you know, give or take a certain width. The par
Speaker 2: threes are going to be in this range, and the
Speaker 2: fours in this range, and the fives in this range.
Speaker 2: With us, you have no idea what's coming. There are
Speaker 2: courses that are more or less wide open with wide fairways.
Speaker 2: There are courses that are all in the woods where
Speaker 2: the fairy you know, instead of a three hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty foot hole with just a couple of trees, it
Speaker 2: could be a two hundred and fifty foot hole through
Speaker 2: a five foot fairway that has a thousand trees. So
Speaker 2: you just never know. And I think we probably have
Speaker 2: more variety in terrain. Two. You know, we love big hills.
Speaker 2: There's more variety in the type of terrain we use.
Speaker 2: There's more variety in our design. So you'll probably notice
Speaker 2: almost always there's no big clubhouse. There's almost never a carpbarn,
Speaker 2: but you know, once you get on the tee, it's
Speaker 2: it's really the same kind of idea.
Speaker 1: What does it take to maintain a disc golf course?
Speaker 1: I'm sure this depends on the kind of land that
Speaker 1: it's on, but what are the typical sort of like
Speaker 1: maintenance standards for a disc golf course?
Speaker 2: I would say in general, maintenance on a disc golf
Speaker 2: course is pretty similar to maintenance in you know, a
Speaker 2: city park. The height of the grass is not a
Speaker 2: big deal for us the way it is for you,
Speaker 2: all right, and that's that's a good thing and a
Speaker 2: bad thing. So you know, if we're typically at four
Speaker 2: or five inches, that's that's fine for us. We just
Speaker 2: don't want it to be so tall that we can't
Speaker 2: find our disc. So the the you know, species of
Speaker 2: grass not a big deal for us. And again you know,
Speaker 2: not having the greens as you do where you know, height, species, dryness,
Speaker 2: all of those factors are so important that that really
Speaker 2: doesn't happen for us. So we we actually have more
Speaker 2: issues with tree branches growing into the fairway because we're
Speaker 2: so dependent upon trees or you know, brush growing up.
Speaker 2: So maintenance is very important to us. And if a
Speaker 2: course isn't maintained, it becomes much less of an enjoyable experience.
Speaker 2: But our maintenance is very different from your maintenance.
Speaker 1: You don't necessarily need an agronomist in the way that
Speaker 1: a golf course need an agronomist. It's just, you know,
Speaker 1: mow the grass where you need to mow the grass.
Speaker 1: And I've also noticed that disc golf courses, when they
Speaker 1: play through these heavily wooded areas, the ground will be natural, right,
Speaker 1: It'll be dirt, which is the usual kind of natural
Speaker 1: state of ground that's under a thick canopy of trees.
Speaker 1: That can be part of a disc golf course as well.
Speaker 2: It can. I think we're starting to move out of
Speaker 2: that era a little bit. Part of what I tried
Speaker 2: to do in my designs in particular is give people
Speaker 2: more options. You know, when we're in a wooded environment,
Speaker 2: which means clearing a wider fairway, leaving some trees in
Speaker 2: the middle for people to go around. I mean it's
Speaker 2: almost like having you know, multiple fairways on the same hole.
Speaker 2: And what happens when you do that is if you
Speaker 2: get to the point where you're letting more sunlight in,
Speaker 2: it's going to be easier for you to have grass
Speaker 2: in there, which which is a really nice benefit. As
Speaker 2: a matter of fact, I'm doing one course now in Pennsylvania,
Speaker 2: you know, where after they cleared the most of the
Speaker 2: wooded holes, they went in and put seed down. And
Speaker 2: I came back and I mean it was incredible, you know,
Speaker 2: for disc golfers to have, you know, grassy fairways in
Speaker 2: the woods. But we did that in New Orleans too,
Speaker 2: at the park day from Me course where they seated
Speaker 2: everything and it almost looks like a golf fairway with
Speaker 2: some of the trees left. So, you know, the difference
Speaker 2: in maintenance makes disc golf courses a lot less expensive
Speaker 2: to build and maintain, even though you know, we're starting
Speaker 2: to raise the bar there, but it makes it, you know,
Speaker 2: less expensive to play, less expensive to install. And our
Speaker 2: thing is, you know, we need to it's more about
Speaker 2: discovering the holes out in nature than building them. Now
Speaker 2: we're doing more building, and I don't want to say
Speaker 2: that golf architects don't discover, but it's a big difference
Speaker 2: in emphasis there. We kind of you know, carve out
Speaker 2: of the woods. We don't clearcut, you know, I mean,
Speaker 2: for us a fifty foot fairway in the woods is gigantic.
Speaker 1: So we're talking a little bit about terrain here, you know,
Speaker 1: as a golfer, and I'm sure there are many golfers
Speaker 1: who would disagree with me about this. This is a
Speaker 1: subject of debate. But to me, the ideal piece of
Speaker 1: land for a golf course would be attractive links land. Right,
Speaker 1: you have sandy rolling terrain, not many trees, if any,
Speaker 1: firm turf that the ball can roll along, interesting contours
Speaker 1: that have been shaped by the sea, sandy base to
Speaker 1: the soil that you know, you can just kord of
Speaker 1: dig out and you have bunkers. That to me is
Speaker 1: really the ideal land for a golf course. It's where
Speaker 1: golf began, It's where many of the best golf courses are.
Speaker 1: If you were to say what the ideal piece of
Speaker 1: terrain for a disc golf course would be, what would
Speaker 1: come to mind?
Speaker 2: That is a great question. You know, our whole thing
Speaker 2: in design is to capitalize on the natural assets. You're
Speaker 2: giving me the opportunity to say, with the natural assets
Speaker 2: are going to be ahead of time, you know. The
Speaker 2: important thing is is we want to create an experience
Speaker 2: for the player that emphasizes decision making, recovery options, you know,
Speaker 2: fairness and wits and fairness and rewards for execution. So
Speaker 2: the three things that we always say we look for
Speaker 2: are mature treaties, interesting terrain, and water features. And we're
Speaker 2: typically happy if we can get two of those, and
Speaker 2: we're really happy if we can get three of those.
Speaker 2: And the four things that we're always looking to create
Speaker 2: and these you know, I kind of codified these back
Speaker 2: in the nineties and you'll recognize them from the Gulf
Speaker 2: World variety, balance, character, and strategy. So we would want
Speaker 2: interesting terrain. What does that mean. It's going to be hilly.
Speaker 2: It's going to have a good number of trees because
Speaker 2: that's what we use for obstacles, and we want the
Speaker 2: design to be complex and rich, So the trees are
Speaker 2: really important. Water is actually turning out to be a
Speaker 2: topic for debate. Water features if you use them right,
Speaker 2: are great, you know, because you know, same thing for us,
Speaker 2: the esthetics are important. So my ideal property would have
Speaker 2: a lot of variety in the terrain. It would it
Speaker 2: would be hilly, there would be firms and raised areas
Speaker 2: that we could use for tees and landing areas and greens,
Speaker 2: a lot of slopes, and you know, like I said,
Speaker 2: trees and water are critical. So those are all aspects
Speaker 2: of it. And when we need to, you know, we
Speaker 2: plant trees. We're getting at the point where, you know,
Speaker 2: we can actually build mounting features. I just created some
Speaker 2: really neat mounds because we had the opportunity to do one,
Speaker 2: but the client's budget was devastated by COVID, so we're
Speaker 2: keeping that available for future projects now.
Speaker 1: So it sounds like earth moving is on the horizon.
Speaker 1: I was going to ask what kinds of alterations to
Speaker 1: the landscape you might make in creating a disc golf course.
Speaker 1: Is earth moving typically part of it or not? Do
Speaker 1: you remove trees? Sounds like you sometimes plant trees.
Speaker 2: Historically, earth moving not a big deal for us, but
Speaker 2: we are we are headed in that direction cautiously. I
Speaker 2: really have been focusing on landing areas, and I've been
Speaker 2: working on well defined landing areas, you know, on par
Speaker 2: fours and par fives. You know, again, we want to
Speaker 2: give the players good footing on landing areas. So you know,
Speaker 2: the first time I got to work with an excavator
Speaker 2: was a revelation for me because I had an area
Speaker 2: that was rocky and you could hardly walk on it.
Speaker 2: And the guy went in there and leveled it out
Speaker 2: and got the rocks out, and I had a beautiful,
Speaker 2: you know, landing area with good footing for the players
Speaker 2: and a slope coming down into it and a slope
Speaker 2: coming off of it. So it had great risk rewards.
Speaker 2: So we're just heading that way. I've done you know,
Speaker 2: several courses where we've done a little bit of it.
Speaker 2: Most designers haven't had the opportunity to do that yet.
Speaker 2: I've got some projects coming up where we're going to
Speaker 2: have more of that opportunity. But I think the first
Speaker 2: step for us is they're going to be key parts
Speaker 2: of the fairway, you know, like the landing areas on
Speaker 2: par fours and five. We did this at Harmony Bins
Speaker 2: a little bit where you know, we're able to create
Speaker 2: a flat area on the side of a steep slope
Speaker 2: so that if you hit that landing area, you're going
Speaker 2: to get rewarded with good footing and you'll have a
Speaker 2: run up and if you miss it, you know, you
Speaker 2: have to deal with the slope. So we did some
Speaker 2: of that at the International Disc Golf Center on the
Speaker 2: on the W. R. Jackson Course, and so we are
Speaker 2: slowly incrementally heading that way. So since about ten years ago,
Speaker 2: you know, you'll you'll see sculpted features on courses here
Speaker 2: and there, but I think as we move forward, we're
Speaker 2: going to see more of that. So because man, I'm
Speaker 2: telling you, working with that excavator was was.
Speaker 1: Fun intoxicating, right, Yeah, A lot of a lot of
Speaker 1: golf course shapers say that what does the what did
Speaker 1: the budget look like in terms of time and money?
Speaker 1: And where are those budgets headed.
Speaker 2: Well, in terms of money, it's never enough. And in
Speaker 2: terms of time Championship course for me, I'm typically working
Speaker 2: two to three hundred hours, almost all on site. Some
Speaker 2: of it obviously is going to be at my desk.
Speaker 2: But you know, there's there's so much variety, Garrett, you know,
Speaker 2: I mean, because there's so much variety in the courses.
Speaker 2: So when you're when you're into the bigger courses, you
Speaker 2: know where par is in the mid to high sixties,
Speaker 2: and particularly if it's in a wooded environment, because a
Speaker 2: lot of the a lot of the projects that I've
Speaker 2: been getting the last ten years where it's basically virgin
Speaker 2: woods and we have to carve everything out of it.
Speaker 2: So the biggest budget that we've been involved with so
Speaker 2: far has been six hundred and fifty thousand. You know,
Speaker 2: even on the bigger courses, the average, which by the
Speaker 2: time it's all said and done, is probably closer to
Speaker 2: two hundred thousand. But I am dreaming and ready for
Speaker 2: starting to see some seven figure budgets because there's so
Speaker 2: much that that I can do that I that I
Speaker 2: haven't been able to do.
Speaker 1: You.
Speaker 2: I mean, I just I just did a course, started
Speaker 2: a course last year where I got to implement an
Speaker 2: idea and sitting on for ten years and just never
Speaker 2: had the right opportunity.
Speaker 1: What I what idea was that it.
Speaker 2: Was kind of a split level landing area. One of
Speaker 2: the hard things for us, and of the one of
Speaker 2: the real advantages that I think you have in your
Speaker 2: game is you have such a great correlation between brisk
Speaker 2: and reward, and you know, if you execute a little
Speaker 2: little less well than your hoping. Let's say, I mean
Speaker 2: you're you know, you missed the fairway by a little bit.
Speaker 2: Maybe you're in the first cut right, so you can recover,
Speaker 2: but you have to make a great shot. So often
Speaker 2: in disc golf, Historically, you make a little mistake and
Speaker 2: you got nothing. I mean, you can be in the
Speaker 2: woods and the only thing you can do is pitch
Speaker 2: back to the fairway ten feet and then move up.
Speaker 2: So that has been a real mission for me, is
Speaker 2: to say, you know, small mistake instead of being severely punished,
Speaker 2: deserves an opportunity, right, the opportunity to recover. That's been
Speaker 2: so lacking in disc golf. So this this split level fairway,
Speaker 2: if you hit any part of it, you're rewarded with
Speaker 2: good footing and you know, a decent shot up the fairway.
Speaker 2: But you hit the higher part, you know you've got
Speaker 2: an easier shot from there. You hit the lower part,
Speaker 2: now you've got more uphill to deal with, and that
Speaker 2: kind of thing. So I've been real fortunate so far
Speaker 2: that I've had several clients that said, look, we want
Speaker 2: the best course that we can have, you know, give
Speaker 2: in our limitations, and they say, go and do what
Speaker 2: you need to do. I mean, when the owners of
Speaker 2: Cela Ranch, after much deliberation, agreed to spend seventeen thousand
Speaker 2: dollars to put the bridge out to the island so
Speaker 2: we could incorporate the island, and we have a beautiful
Speaker 2: par five with an actual island green. I knew that
Speaker 2: they were all in So.
Speaker 1: Was that island there in the in the Yeah, it was.
Speaker 1: It was just about building the bridge out to it.
Speaker 2: Yes, you had to up until that point you had
Speaker 2: to swim or I don't know. I think at the
Speaker 2: narrowest point it's only seventy feet out there, but you
Speaker 2: couldn't walk out there. But they built the bridge and
Speaker 2: we were able to incorporate that into the design. We're
Speaker 2: just getting into a situation now where I can create
Speaker 2: water features. I'm not a pond designer by any means,
Speaker 2: but you know I can. I can recommend shapes where
Speaker 2: were you in peninsulas or greens or cheese or landing areas,
Speaker 2: and you know where the where the undulations are and
Speaker 2: the concavities and the ponds and lakes. Huge ability for
Speaker 2: us to uh enhance the strategy when when we have
Speaker 2: that kind of control.
Speaker 1: So water on disc golf courses. You mentioned earlier that
Speaker 1: it might be something of a subject of controversy in
Speaker 1: the disc golf world, but just considering the relationship that
Speaker 1: players have with their discs, what's when when you have
Speaker 1: a water hazard on a disc golf course and somebody
Speaker 1: throws their disc into it, what happens.
Speaker 2: Then, Uh, well, they lose a stroke. I probably shouldn't
Speaker 2: comment on some things that that might happen at that
Speaker 2: at that point, but let's say, you know, from a
Speaker 2: design perspective, if it's used properly, if people have the
Speaker 2: opp opportunity to play around it and play safe, that
Speaker 2: is key. Some courses at this point maybe don't always
Speaker 2: offer that. But if you add to the the risk,
Speaker 2: you know, and you use the water features so that
Speaker 2: it's beneficial to play close to it, but you don't
Speaker 2: want to get in it, that's a huge deal. And
Speaker 2: I'll just tell you real quick. I don't know if
Speaker 2: you've seen this, but there are a lot of courses,
Speaker 2: you know, where they don't have the water, they don't
Speaker 2: have the natural terrain, and the designers, particularly for tournaments,
Speaker 2: they'll just put down rope and pretend that that's a pond.
Speaker 2: And you know, obviously that can enhance the strategy, but
Speaker 2: it's not the same, right. I mean, aesthetics are important
Speaker 2: to us just as they are to you. And for
Speaker 2: someone to be on the wrong side of the rope
Speaker 2: and say, you know, I'm high and dry and you're
Speaker 2: telling me I have to take a stroke. Psychologically, it's
Speaker 2: it's very different. So you know, I'm not a fan.
Speaker 2: I would much prefer water. And look, we're we're at
Speaker 2: a stage in our development where we're trying different things
Speaker 2: and what works and what doesn't. And if somebody says, look,
Speaker 2: I don't have water, what am I supposed to do.
Speaker 2: I'm not looking to pick a fight. I'm just saying
Speaker 2: it's preferable to have real water. Then just kind of pretending.
Speaker 2: So it's it's not for me, And you know, to me,
Speaker 2: I may have to spend another ten or twenty hours
Speaker 2: on that whole to get it to where it plays
Speaker 2: with sufficient strategy with without having to put rope down.
Speaker 2: But you know, to me, that's worth it.
Speaker 1: If your disc goes in the water, do you go
Speaker 1: in after it?
Speaker 2: Again, I'm under legal advice. You can use your you
Speaker 2: can use your imagination.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, So as far as as far as hazards
Speaker 1: are concerned on a disc golf course, we've talked to water.
Speaker 1: That's obviously one. It seems to me that trees and
Speaker 1: disc golf are almost like bunkers in traditional golf in
Speaker 1: that they are kind of the primary standard hazard that
Speaker 1: creates strategy on a hole. You know, golf is played
Speaker 1: on the ground. You have to hit the ball off
Speaker 1: the ground, so obviously inconsistencies on the ground create a
Speaker 1: kind of hazard for traditional golfers. Disc golfers play the
Speaker 1: sport through the air and trees obstruct their paths through
Speaker 1: the air. Could you talk about how trees are used
Speaker 1: on disc golf holes and how they create what you
Speaker 1: would consider strategy.
Speaker 2: Yes, I love that question, And let me be clear,
Speaker 2: we love trees. We need trees, all right. Sometimes we
Speaker 2: have no choice but to remove them. But even in
Speaker 2: the cases where you know it's it's solid woods and
Speaker 2: we have to do something to create the fairways, my
Speaker 2: job is to discover, you know, the bigger trees, the
Speaker 2: nice groupings of trees, and work around those. I don't
Speaker 2: ever put a design on paper and say, okay, go
Speaker 2: cut this shape out of the woods. And you're absolutely
Speaker 2: right about the playing surface, and when you come down
Speaker 2: to it, that may be the biggest difference in the
Speaker 2: biggest challenge for us. Like I said, you know, you
Speaker 2: have the first cut, and it's clear that people don't
Speaker 2: want to be in that right, it makes no difference
Speaker 2: to us. Sand traps so critical to traditional golf, mean
Speaker 2: nothing to us, right, we would just stand in it
Speaker 2: and throw out of it. I've actually been been trying
Speaker 2: to figure out if there is an analogous thing in
Speaker 2: disc golf to a fried egg, and I haven't. I
Speaker 2: haven't been able to figure that out.
Speaker 1: But maybe maybe getting stuck in a tree.
Speaker 2: Well, getting stuck in a tree, yeah, actually used to
Speaker 2: be if you were above two meters used to be
Speaker 2: a stroke penalty. We got rid of that, although some
Speaker 2: designers can still use it if they want. So if
Speaker 2: you're if you're stuck in a tree, you bring your
Speaker 2: lie straight down and you may be behind the tree,
Speaker 2: which I think is what you were getting at. So
Speaker 2: we need to we need to ensure a variety of
Speaker 2: shots and a variety of fairway shapes because we want
Speaker 2: it to be, you know, a complex and rich experience.
Speaker 2: So don't forget we're we're able to go around trees
Speaker 2: right in ways that you can't, and you know, using
Speaker 2: the skip shot or the roll shot, sometimes we can
Speaker 2: go underneath things. So we need to have a variety
Speaker 2: of fairway width, a variety of shot shapes, and so
Speaker 2: it's been a challenge and really a mission for me
Speaker 2: to try to find a way to use whatever we have,
Speaker 2: which is merrily trees the way golf designers use the
Speaker 2: different cuts of grass and sand traps. So I try
Speaker 2: to get to where if you make a small mistake
Speaker 2: and you're you know, you're not an ideal position where
Speaker 2: you have a fair let's say, a sixty to eighty
Speaker 2: percent opportunity to get to where you want to on
Speaker 2: the next shot. You've missed the fairway a little bit.
Speaker 2: I want to make sure you know that you have
Speaker 2: the ability to recover. So the primary thing that I
Speaker 2: do is take that area quote unquote off the fairway
Speaker 2: and open it up enough to open some alleys for
Speaker 2: you so that you know, now you've got to hit
Speaker 2: instead of a ten to twenty foot gap, now you've
Speaker 2: got to hit a four to five foot gap, and
Speaker 2: if you can hit that shot, you can still save
Speaker 2: your birdy or save your par as the case may be.
Speaker 2: But being able to do that, which is very time consuming,
Speaker 2: and you know it takes it takes a lot of
Speaker 2: work to do it. It's very difficult because you know,
Speaker 2: if I miss the fairway, by a foot or if
Speaker 2: I miss it by three feet, I still want, you know,
Speaker 2: both of those players to have an opportunity to recover.
Speaker 2: But basically creating secondary and tertiary gaps off the fairway
Speaker 2: for people to recover. Now, there's there's other ways to
Speaker 2: do that than just you know, making tight gaps by
Speaker 2: using the elevation and the angle that the player requires.
Speaker 2: Sometimes the area you have to throw through is height
Speaker 2: limited instead of just left and right. So those are
Speaker 2: all techniques difficult, but to me, really important techniques so
Speaker 2: that we give people the opportunity to recover from mistakes,
Speaker 2: because that's such an important part of the golf experience,
Speaker 2: I think, right, I mean, that's what shot do you
Speaker 2: talk about at the end of the day, right when
Speaker 2: you're with your friends. It's like, oh my god. You know,
Speaker 2: I was really in a mind. I didn't know if
Speaker 2: I could get out of there, and I just hit
Speaker 2: it perfectly, or I threw it perfectly and I saved
Speaker 2: my birdie. You know, those are the ones that you
Speaker 2: talk about and right, those are the ones that keep
Speaker 2: you coming back in a lot of instances. So being
Speaker 2: able to create that for people is really important. And
Speaker 2: I realized several years ago that if I can get
Speaker 2: better at what I do, people will enjoy the experience
Speaker 2: of playing the course and not even be able to
Speaker 2: say why right, because it has to work and it
Speaker 2: has to look natural. It can't feel contrived. They just
Speaker 2: have to say, yeah, you know, I got in trouble,
Speaker 2: I made some great shots and I can't put my
Speaker 2: finger on it, but I loved playing that course.
Speaker 1: That's so true that the good, good design is often
Speaker 1: not noticed by the player, who nonetheless is having a
Speaker 1: lot of fun, even if they don't know how to
Speaker 1: express why yes exactly.
Speaker 2: And of course, the downside of it, which I'm sure
Speaker 2: all golf course architects are familiar with, is the end
Speaker 2: result is people go, I could have designed that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that looks Easy's.
Speaker 2: What's the big deal? Right? But that's where you want
Speaker 2: to be. It's like, well, you know, I mean, what
Speaker 2: does it take. You throw some bunkers out there, and
Speaker 2: you know, you put some mounds and you undulate the
Speaker 2: green and what's uh, what's the big deal? But the
Speaker 2: truth is there are hundreds of things that go into
Speaker 2: the decision making process, and so if you if you
Speaker 2: do it right, people can just enjoy it and you know,
Speaker 2: don't don't even know how much you really did.
Speaker 1: Right, So it sounds like what you're talking about with
Speaker 1: trees and gaps between trees is essentially creating different options
Speaker 1: with different levels of risk and reward, ye, both off
Speaker 1: the tee and on recovery. So off the tee, maybe
Speaker 1: you have a gap that's pretty wide but kind of
Speaker 1: takes you the long way around or doesn't give you
Speaker 1: that great of an angle to the pin or the basket,
Speaker 1: and a narrow gap that kind of takes you straight
Speaker 1: there and if you hit it, you're great. But if
Speaker 1: you don't hit it, then you're screwed. But then on
Speaker 1: the second shot, if you're off the beaten path of
Speaker 1: the hole, then you have again another set of gaps
Speaker 1: between trees, another set of options to choose between and
Speaker 1: decide what level of risk you're willing to bear. Does
Speaker 1: that sound? Does that resonate with you?
Speaker 2: Yes, you're exactly right. And that's that's another thing that
Speaker 2: I really focus on. I mean, for me, the concepts
Speaker 2: of strategy and the goals of design are similar in
Speaker 2: golf and disc golf, that how we achieve that is
Speaker 2: going to be very different, right, and one of the
Speaker 2: most obvious things is you know, you can be standing
Speaker 2: on a tee and have two or three or four
Speaker 2: completely different routes that you can take right and anybody
Speaker 2: goes well, you know, I can make a hole with
Speaker 2: four routes, but you have to balance all the options right. So,
Speaker 2: like you said, this route is easier off the tee.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm not likely to get in trouble. But
Speaker 2: even if I hit it well, I'm not going to
Speaker 2: be in as good a position as if I take
Speaker 2: the riskier route and I nail it and I'm exactly
Speaker 2: where I want to be. So to me, the first
Speaker 2: level is if I can make a hole with a
Speaker 2: bunch of different options and different players take different routes,
Speaker 2: that's a win. But the bigger win is when one
Speaker 2: individual player, every time they step up to the hole,
Speaker 2: I'll say, well, I tried it this way last time
Speaker 2: and it really didn't work, so I'm thinking about going
Speaker 2: this way, or you know, my left to right shot
Speaker 2: really isn't working today, so I'm going to do that.
Speaker 2: And it's so important for me because back in the
Speaker 2: old days, when I first started playing, there was only
Speaker 2: one way to play every hole. I knew before I
Speaker 2: got out of the shower that morning that I'm whole sixteen.
Speaker 2: I was going to throw a rock at this particular
Speaker 2: angle and seventy five percent of full power and it
Speaker 2: was going to work or it isn't. So you guys,
Speaker 2: course management and strategy is such a big part of
Speaker 2: your game, and I've been trying to bring that into
Speaker 2: our game, and you know, just so you know, all
Speaker 2: that becomes so much harder for us because we have
Speaker 2: such a huge spectrum of skills between beginning players and
Speaker 2: players who are really good. So, and you tell me
Speaker 2: if you think I have my numbers wrong. Here, Let's
Speaker 2: say a young, fairly athletic person who's never played golf before.
Speaker 2: You can, you know, give them a lesson and put
Speaker 2: him on the range for a couple hours, and odds
Speaker 2: are that first day that person's going to hit a
Speaker 2: ball two hundred.
Speaker 1: Yards something like that. Depends on gender and age, I suppose,
Speaker 1: but but yeah, I mean, I think it's fair to
Speaker 1: say generally that if somebody's pretty strong and athletic, even
Speaker 1: if they don't have great technique, and even if they
Speaker 1: aren't keeping the ball in the face of the planet,
Speaker 1: then they can they can hit the ball a pretty
Speaker 1: long ways, almost almost right away. Yeah, so the.
Speaker 2: Right not consistently, yeah, but it's doable. And let's do
Speaker 2: apples to apples. Let's say a young athletic male who
Speaker 2: hits two hundred yards and last time I checked, you're
Speaker 2: you're kind of middle of the pack on the PGA
Speaker 2: tour if you're averaging two sixty.
Speaker 1: Right, it's a little more than that now, But I
Speaker 1: think you know, the point that you're building towards is
Speaker 1: that golfers, even though there's a big disparity between the
Speaker 1: distance of a professional that a male professional hits the
Speaker 1: ball and a male amateur in his twenties or thirties
Speaker 1: hit the ball. Even though there's a pretty big difference,
Speaker 1: that difference in disc golf exactly massive. I mean, it's
Speaker 1: it's not even if people think it's big and traditional
Speaker 1: golf and disc golf. I've seen some of these professionals
Speaker 1: through the disc Oh my.
Speaker 2: God, exactly. So let's say our guy in our example
Speaker 2: is you know, maybe seventy percent of the way to
Speaker 2: middle of the pack PGA guys, right, the gods of
Speaker 2: golf day one, not consistently, but in disc golf, you
Speaker 2: can start and work your butt off for a month
Speaker 2: to get to three hundred feet. And I mean, I
Speaker 2: know people who you know have been playing for years
Speaker 2: and can't throw three hundred feet and that is half
Speaker 2: or maybe even a little less than half of what
Speaker 2: the what the top pros can throw. So you know,
Speaker 2: what kind of challenge does that make for the designer
Speaker 2: knowing that all these different people have to be able
Speaker 2: to use the course and enjoy it, and par has
Speaker 2: to make sense for them and all that, so, you know,
Speaker 2: and part of it comes from the design of the discs.
Speaker 2: Right as we make discs that can go farther, some
Speaker 2: people who are beginners may not even be able to
Speaker 2: take advantage of that technology. So it's kind of the
Speaker 2: rich get richer. I don't know if that's true with drivers. Mean,
Speaker 2: I kind of assume if you give me a driver
Speaker 2: with a big head, I'm going to be able to
Speaker 2: hit farther. Is that not the case?
Speaker 1: Yeah, But what you're talking about is pretty much exactly
Speaker 1: the case and traditional golf right now, in the sense
Speaker 1: that the design of the driver face and the spin
Speaker 1: model of the golf ball makes it so that players
Speaker 1: with a lot of clubhead speed can take advantage of
Speaker 1: those things in a way that a normal person would
Speaker 1: never imagine. And so it sounds like there's there's Is
Speaker 1: there a technology debate right now in disc golf? Are
Speaker 1: people worried about where disc technology is going?
Speaker 2: Yes, However, in one sense, we're like the golf world
Speaker 2: in that the average person that says, Wow, you're gonna
Speaker 2: let me hit it farther, You're going to give me
Speaker 2: more spin control, you know, give me, give me a gimmick.
Speaker 2: And you know, you're not worried about courses being obsolete
Speaker 2: for them, but because of you know, where are our
Speaker 2: design is? I mean, almost everything gets obsoleted as the
Speaker 2: technology changes and as the players get better, right, they're
Speaker 2: getting better conditioned, and they're now that they're making more money,
Speaker 2: they can train more. You know, they don't have to
Speaker 2: be working a job. You know, you can quit your
Speaker 2: job and go on tour more or less. So that
Speaker 2: that all is part of it.
Speaker 1: So this we're talking sort of about things that are
Speaker 1: happening now, things that are changing in disc golf. Last
Speaker 1: question here, how do you hope disc golf design evolves
Speaker 1: in the future or where do you think disc golf
Speaker 1: design is going. Is there going to be a response
Speaker 1: to the increasing distances that the elite players are throwing
Speaker 1: the disc? Are there going to be changes related to
Speaker 1: more courses being built or greater budgets being spent on courses?
Speaker 1: What do you think the next you know what ten
Speaker 1: twenty years look like in your field?
Speaker 2: Well, I you know, the sport is growing, so it
Speaker 2: seems like it's growing so rapidly, and it is, but
Speaker 2: if you look back, it's been it's been really steady
Speaker 2: over the last few decades. You know, you mentioned I
Speaker 2: think maybe before we started that you'd seen disc golf
Speaker 2: on ESPN two recently. That's a huge step for us
Speaker 2: to have the finals of the Disc Golf Pro Tour
Speaker 2: covered on ESPN two an hour for the for the
Speaker 2: men and an hour for the women, and did well
Speaker 2: enough that it got replayed again a few weeks later,
Speaker 2: and I think maybe even a third time. So there
Speaker 2: is so much in our future and with more players,
Speaker 2: bigger purses, you know, no doubt, we always want better courses.
Speaker 2: And you know, property owners understand that disc golfers are
Speaker 2: like traditional golfers and that they love their sports so much.
Speaker 2: They will travel, they will plan vacations around disc golf.
Speaker 2: They will choose where they take a job based on
Speaker 2: disc golf, they will choose where they go to school
Speaker 2: based on disc golf. And so when those factors become
Speaker 2: an opportunity to bring income to a community or to
Speaker 2: a facility, you know, whereas twenty years ago a city
Speaker 2: would put in a disc golf course and just be
Speaker 2: a drain on their budget. But now if I can
Speaker 2: build a private facility and I'm going to get green spees,
Speaker 2: I'm going to get lodging and the economic impact that
Speaker 2: comes with it, that just gives everybody an incentive to
Speaker 2: keep raising the bar, which I'm excited about because I
Speaker 2: have a vision for kind of the next level of
Speaker 2: what happens in course design, and then I have a
Speaker 2: vision for for what happens after that. So you know,
Speaker 2: keeping in mind that you know, designing a disc golf
Speaker 2: course is a different set of skills from designing a
Speaker 2: golf course. That you know, we're going to have different
Speaker 2: needs as you brought up in terms of, you know,
Speaker 2: the type of properties. But we're getting better properties, we're
Speaker 2: getting better budgets, we can we can do more in
Speaker 2: the design than we've been able to do and all
Speaker 2: that will allow us to make the experience not only
Speaker 2: more enjoyable for every buddy, but as you said, to
Speaker 2: make the tournament courses more challenging and more fair and
Speaker 2: more rewarding for the top players. So I mean, believe me,
Speaker 2: I have a vision for all kinds of design features
Speaker 2: and player experiences that we have not had the opportunity
Speaker 2: to create. Yet. We are absolutely headed that way. There's
Speaker 2: so much that we haven't done, or so much that
Speaker 2: we've just kind of put our toe in the water
Speaker 2: and very very bright future. You know, those bigger budgets
Speaker 2: are going to be there, and it's going to be
Speaker 2: worth it because you know, whoever puts up the money
Speaker 2: is going to reap the rewards from the from the
Speaker 2: players that they get. So tell all your people in
Speaker 2: the golf world, start to start setting some money aside
Speaker 2: for disc golf. It's going to be worth it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, you know, from a golf perspective, something that
Speaker 1: is so so tremendously A number of things are tremendously
Speaker 1: appealing about disc golf.
Speaker 2: To me.
Speaker 1: A couple of things about the courses that I've noticed
Speaker 1: one and you talked about this, the courses the designs
Speaker 1: are about finding things in the landscape, and that's how
Speaker 1: golf really used to be. More there are designers in
Speaker 1: traditional golf who do that now. But you know, these
Speaker 1: courses are so natural and it's just lovely how the
Speaker 1: good holes use the landscape and use the natural features there.
Speaker 1: But then at the same time, you know, the fact
Speaker 1: that they're natural allows them to be accessible, allows the
Speaker 1: green fees to be very low, and that's really appealing
Speaker 1: as well. And so I wonder if you're at all
Speaker 1: worried about that aspect of disc golf going away as
Speaker 1: more money and more popularity comes to the sport.
Speaker 2: Two things. One, I think the old school, city heart
Speaker 2: free to play courses are not going away. Those are
Speaker 2: far into our future, always going to be there, so
Speaker 2: people don't have to worry about, you know, oh my god,
Speaker 2: we're building you know, these big disc golf resorts or
Speaker 2: whatever's coming, and we're going to lose where we came from. Okay,
Speaker 2: that's that's not going to happen. Number Two, for me,
Speaker 2: you're absolutely right right. Using the natural features is where
Speaker 2: we come from. It is a big appeal for the
Speaker 2: sport and for our clientele. So I feel like, I
Speaker 2: need to stay on that path. There's going to be
Speaker 2: times when you know, this natural feature isn't quite big
Speaker 2: enough for me to use as a landing area. So maybe,
Speaker 2: you know, I need to do a little bit to
Speaker 2: make it a little bigger, maybe augment it. But I
Speaker 2: don't see us saying, okay, we're going to seat it
Speaker 2: like a golf course worse, and we don't. We can
Speaker 2: look beautiful without doing that, and we don't need that.
Speaker 2: So somebody said to me, you know, if you if
Speaker 2: you had an unlimited budget and you could build whatever
Speaker 2: features you wanted to do and put the you know,
Speaker 2: big trees wherever you wanted to, I I'm not sure
Speaker 2: I'd want to do it that way. I mean, it's
Speaker 2: it's great to have more control, right, but using the
Speaker 2: natural features also make every course different from from all
Speaker 2: the rest. So yes, I want to I want to
Speaker 2: have that creative control and be able to, you know,
Speaker 2: make the slopes that I want and the flat areas
Speaker 2: that I want, and the and the water features that
Speaker 2: I want. But it's always got to stay in line
Speaker 2: with where disc golf came from. And I mean, my god,
Speaker 2: look look at look at the backlash you know the
Speaker 2: golf has had over the years from using fertilizers and chemicals,
Speaker 2: and you know we don't need to go there, right
Speaker 2: and we live in an era where that is even
Speaker 2: more frowned upon than it used to be. So the
Speaker 2: natural aspect of it is very important. I want to
Speaker 2: be able to keep innovating within that tradition and framework
Speaker 2: that disc golf has. Y would I love to be
Speaker 2: able to plant a huge tree somewhere as opposed to
Speaker 2: planning a fifteen foot tree and waiting for it to grow. Sure,
Speaker 2: but I think I think you're absolutely right. We would
Speaker 2: be disappointing our own clientele if we got too far
Speaker 2: away from just being out there in nature is such
Speaker 2: a big part of it. So yes, bring on the
Speaker 2: big budgets, don't forget to hire a great designer. We'll
Speaker 2: keep it natural looking and we'll make it fun for
Speaker 2: everybody and challenging for the top pros. That is all doable.
Speaker 2: I've seen it. We're going to get there. Mhm.