Columbus, Ga. finally gets it's first course!

[Jody Mitchell]

After countless meetings with our local parks & rec. group and deputy city manager, we finally got the approval of adding a DGC to a park here.
Leading the course design team is yours truly, with help from Nick Wrenn, Jayson Camper and Mike Griner. Special thanks to my wife Carrie Mitchell for making the initial call to the city and parks & rec. and hundreds of hours being on the phone with very important people in the Disc Golf know.

Moving on, the course is located at Flat Rock Park, 18 holes, concrete 5x10 pads already down and dry, Disc King's King Pin baskets which will have 3 alternate pin placements to be shuffled around throughout the year. I'll add more info on an official opening date in the next few days. Course par is set at 59 but could be tweaked as the basket won't be in the ground for a week or so. There's still some manicuring and touch ups to do with underbrush, foliage, etc. I'm not a big fan of mandos but we have 4 holes with safety mandos because there's a bike path that serpentines throughout the park. As far as actual footage for each hole I can't give you because as I've said, the sleeves for the baskets aren't in the ground at this moment. I can tell you that the overall footage could wind up being around 7500 ft. with the longest hole being 800+ft. and shortest 220ish. The front 9 are fairly open with the back 9 being longer and more wooded.

Right now, I can show the the land we're using, the park's site and our parks & rec. department's site which will also update within the coming days.

This will be 2 courses under my belt (one still private on hunting land) that I've designed so that too is just as exciting as having a home course itself.

Anyways, if you have any questions, I'll answer the best I can.

http://www.columbusga.org/parks/

http://columbus2004.web.infoseek.co.jp/columbus/flatrockpark.html

^Photo 12 is hole #1.

http://www.discking1.com/Baskets.html

Anyone passing through, PM me and I'll meet up for a round.

Also, we're undecided on what to name it. We've chosen 2 but I'm up for opinions. The 2 we have are Disc Golf Playground At Flat Rock Park or De La Roca which is spanish for "of the rocks".

:thmbup:

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Figured I'd add a few pics.

Coming down from 18 to the parking lot.

And, this is Hole #2's Tee, the concrete pad is down now. It's around 320 ft.

And Hole #7 and 8's fairways. #7 is around 240 ft. down the tunnel and 8 is going back uphill around 400 ft.

I'll put up more later today and maybe an overhead view of some of the lay-out.

Peace.

 

[Thumber]

Congrats....from the photos it looks like sweet land

 

[jkdisc]

looks like aztec ruins, i will hit this place next time i'm through GA

 

[billnchristy]

Sweet, Christy will be in town Sunday, I will tell her to check it out.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Cool, it's been in the works since November last year but I was told to keep it hush hush until actual physical progress was made. We broke ground on the concrete pads last week, then parks and rec. put the notice on their site, so I figured it's ok to spill the beans.

I'll be out there taking hole by hole pics tomorrow and placing markers in all the basket locations for them to dig Monday.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Hole #2 overhead view. Hole 1 isn't complete because we're in a toss up on the pin location.

All that greyish and lighter stuff is natural rock. We didn't put it into play but this hole and 18 so you won't have to worry about rock rashing your discs, unless you look at it as if it were a lake and throw into. It's more than likely going to be a signature hole due to the park being named Flat Rock and here you are throwing over a lake of Flat Rocks...lol.

The mando is there because of the road and the hole is 320 ft.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Here's #3 and #4's overhead. Like I said, I'll have actual photos from the tees of each hole before the weekend is over.

Hole #3 is a tunnel shot about 290 ft. with trees lined down both sides with low ceilings. There is a RHBH Hyzer route but seeing it in person, it's probably better to just toss something down the pipe.

Hole #4 is a big LHBH hyzer route or RHBH anny, but there's also a tunnel up the middle but the hole is going to be around 340-350 depending on basket placement next week.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

I have the final official footage for each hole. I also have a ton of pics I'm going to upload to an album then I'll link it here.

Hole #1 - 230 ft. Par 3
Hole #2 - 340 ft. Par 3
Hole #3 - 250 ft. Par 3
Hole #4 - 300 ft. Par 3
Hole #5 - 350 ft. Par 3
Hole #6 - 500 ft. Par 4
Hole #7 - 320 ft. Par 3
Hole #8 - 260 ft. Par 3
Hole #9 - 425 ft. Par 4
Hole #10 - 360 ft. Par 3
Hole #11 - 470 ft. Par 4
Hole #12 - 420 ft. Par 4
Hole #13 - 220 ft. Par 3
Hole #14 - 295 ft. Par 3
Hole #15 - 330 ft. Par 3
Hole #16 - 240 ft. Par 3
Hole #17 - 240 ft. Par 3
Hole #18 - 820 ft. Par 5

Total Footage - 6370 ft.
Total Course Par - 60

These footages are the white concrete tees and if all the alternate pins were in their furthest location, it bumps the total up around 6900.

Hole by hole pics are coming next. As the course gets closer to being officially complete and open for play, I'll post a hole a day because we're just a few weeks away from ribbon cutting.

 

[12StonesScott]

I so wish that course had been around in 2006 -- I spent over six months working Mon-Thu as a consultant at one of the larger local companies there, driving down from Atlanta and spending Mon-Wed nights in a corporate apartment on Schomburg Road right off Allen Parkway. That would have been practically just around the corner and I could have gotten a lot of rounds in during afternoons after work. Good luck with getting the course officially open, and maybe I'll make it down there sometime to check it out.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

I so wish that course had been around in 2006 -- I spent over six months working Mon-Thu as a consultant at one of the larger local companies there, driving down from Atlanta and spending Mon-Wed nights in a corporate apartment on Schomburg Road right off Allen Parkway. That would have been practically just around the corner and I could have gotten a lot of rounds in during afternoons after work. Good luck with getting the course officially open, and maybe I'll make it down there sometime to check it out.

Sounds good, I just got back from a meeting with the sign designer/maker again. I have no picture to provide yet of the sign template but they're gonna look sweet. As soon as I get a pic of one, I'll have it up.

You were only minutes from the park. I'm about 15 minutes from it, I'm towards downtown Columbus but Flat Rock was the ideal place for a course.

The idea was proposed back around 2003, it's just that the city didn't have the funding. We brought it back up last year and approved it right off the bat.
So it's actually 7 years in the making, lol.

They mayor and city manager are shooting for a labor day opening but I think it could be sooner than that.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

A look from Hole #1's pad, the branches will be cut back this week.

From the side of #1's pad, better view, basket up the hill in a few trees. Very picturesque hole.

And this is from the basket location looking back down towards the tee.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Hole #2's tee, mando to the right, basket way over on the left between a tree and creek.

I'll do more later as they're trimmed and manicured.

 

[Lewis]

That really does look like sweet land. Congratulations!

 

[Jody Mitchell]

Thanks, if you're ever in this neck of the woods, shoot me a PM.

:thmbup:

 

[Easy Tigur]

Have you decided on a name yet? De La Roca gets my vote.

But the land looks nice and seems like a promising course. I'm on the other side of the state, but if I'm ever around there I'll make sure to play it.

 

[Jody Mitchell]

We've ran a couple of names through to the city manager and parks & rec. So ultimately it's up to them, it could just remain Flat Rock Park DGC just like our parks & Rec. website displays.

The park itself is somewhere near 250 acres, the course takes up around 30 acres.

I'll have up more hole by hole pics throughout the weekend. Baskets may or may not drop in the ground this week depending on the heat indexes. If it gets too hot, the city workers are told to knock off work for the day.

 

[billnchristy]

Christy said she remembers this park from when she was a kid. It will be cool to play.

 

[Lewis]

Maybe call it "Flat Roc Disc Golf Park"?

 

[hughb]

Thanks for your effort!

Jody, I'm from Columbus, but have lived in Florida for a long time. My son Ben is an avid player and is excited about having a good course to play when he visits grandma. I know Flat Rock, and I don't guess you could have found a better place to build. Is the course finished?

PS: Are you related in any way to my classmate Barry?