Major Tomahawk
Eagle Member
Sounds like it's only a problem for the 5 that didn't cash.
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Green Mountain Championships
- Thread starter jvphobic
- Start date
Sounds like it's only a problem for the 5 that didn't cash.
LukeButch
Birdie Member
yes, we all know we need to find more sponsors but...
no one is FORCING anyone to enter the tournament. they know the odds and they registered anyways. While there may be pressure not to "bag" at a c tier, Paul and Ricky aren't calling them up and telling them they have to register in MPO so they can make another $100 that weekend. I would bet almost all of them enjoyed the tournament and can't wait to go back next year. TD's draw big attendance by putting on a great event for all pro players, not just the ones who win all the money. That's why everyone loves the vibram open for instance- whether last place teeing off at 8am or first at 2pm EVERYONE gets the same experience. Same course, same announcer, same spotters, same amenities, etc. Alot of people are willing to "donate" their entry fee for that top tier tournament experience and that is their right until there is such a demand that there are ratings qualifications to enter(see Beaver state fling).
alfonseski
Birdie Member
- Joined
- Oct 15, 2014
- Messages
- 324
I played in GMC and did not do as well as I would have liked and enjoyed it immensely. I did not speak to anyone complaining about the tourney except for early tee times that hurt the consumption of the elite beer readily available there. Bravo to Jeff Spring and the sponsors who put it togethor. I cannot wait to go next year. If you have not been up there you are missing out.
With respect, I think you're way off the mark here.
The concept that only property boundaries should be OB, else it is automatically weaker design, is frankly arbitrary and near-sighted. There's so many opportunities to create doubt, fear, the illusion of choice, or force a very difficult choice in a players mind using OB. I also believe that the majority of disc golfers around the world disagree with you. Many of the highest rated courses in the world have sculpted OB, and many of the most prestigious tournaments (as determined by the pros) are played on those courses. I don't think the data supports your assertion at all.
Height of foliage is also not equivalent to sand traps/bunkers. Trees are still used in golf, for the same purpose, to change the angle of attack.
Bunkers are designed to change the maximum distance you can get on the shot out of them, as well as make the lie of the ball more difficult. So if we equate lie of the ball and loft of the club into disc golf terms, you're talking speed of the disc and ability to run up - or restriction of power by forcing 1-steps or standstill throws. Trees are one way to do this, but not the only way. Bunkers in disc golf are obstacles that force you to throw lower speed discs...in fact low foliage does the opposite, it forces you to disc up.
The core set of challenges in golf and disc golf are exactly the same, to complete the course in as few attempts (strokes, throws) as possible. The design elements hinder the ability to do that quickly. OB is a design element.
I think you're making a correlation that's not parsimonious. Promo pics are usually chosen because they display an emotion, without the dreaded "huck face" pictures that unfortunately always appear on the front cover of discgolfer magazine.
Honestly, it sounds like you're making this stuff up. I don't want to beat up on you, but the most famous golf courses in the world are the most penal.
The Old Course
Augusta National
Pebble Beach
In the 90's we went through "Tiger Proofing" courses, courses were made longer, more narrow, and more challenging.
Cgkdisc
.:Hall of Fame Member:.
Sorry Jamie, but you're off the mark regarding challenge versus penal design. Ball golf gave it up in newer designs as in replacing penalties with challenges. Recognize that the average number of penalties taken in four rounds of play by PGA players is one. One penalty per four rounds. They may have all kinds of shots from the rough and sand traps to demonstrate their skill in recovery. Compare that with the penalties taken by our top players in the excessively penal course designs in some events and you'll see those designs are on the wrong track. Let alone TDs in lower tier events applying these penal design elements on tournament courses played by much lesser skilled players.
Not a great way to grow the sport. What other sport takes away your equipment as part of the game design? Makes no sense and again detracts from demonstrating skills when the player can't throw their most appropriate disc. And even worse, penal designs introduce more luck and don't keep scores as tight as we would want for drama and spectator interest which our pro game sorely needs.
lyleoross
* Ace Member *
In a large sense I gree with Jamie. I understand, if you walk into a forest, and can cut what you want using natural growth, you match a written PDGA philosophy of "playing in nature.". However, those situations are rare. That means course designers have to work with what they have, and often enough, with effort, there are good outcomes.
As an aside, five years ago Neal Dambra made pop up sand trap bunkers. Similar philosophy to pop up goals from soccer, only bigger. They could be placed anywhere in a fairway and pegged down. It didn't catch on but what a great way to add depth to a hole.
In addition to being able to re-arrange their environment, golf designers have the benefit of different surfaces having a significant effect on play. Not just sand and high grass---think of the slope of greens.
I don't know that O.B. is more luck-prone than trees, particularly on wooded courses. Where you have trees, you have variable kicks off them---sometimes to the open, sometimes to a terrible lie. A difference of a couple of feet in the lie can make a big difference, too.
Penalty-prone courses may result in greater scoring spread, but they also open up greater comeback possibilities. I'm not sure that's any less spectator-worthy.
The most valid knock on ropes courses is that they are hyzerfests---the same basic shot, over and over, instead of demonstrating all the flightpaths your discs can make (or fail to make).
I don't know that O.B. is more luck-prone than trees, particularly on wooded courses. Where you have trees, you have variable kicks off them---sometimes to the open, sometimes to a terrible lie. A difference of a couple of feet in the lie can make a big difference, too.
Penalty-prone courses may result in greater scoring spread, but they also open up greater comeback possibilities. I'm not sure that's any less spectator-worthy.
The most valid knock on ropes courses is that they are hyzerfests---the same basic shot, over and over, instead of demonstrating all the flightpaths your discs can make (or fail to make).
Cgkdisc
.:Hall of Fame Member:.
Note: I'm not saying penal design is inherently poor design, it's just not conventional disc golf design on most courses players play to develop their skills and rating. It's a different game. The worst scenario is when penal hole designs are just sprinkled in with conventional hole designs. That's where the luck factor comes in because shots sightly offline, which even top players have, are differentially penalized depending whether the flub randomly happens on a penal hole or not. Throw & distance penalties are "excessively penal designs", not just penal.
It's a bit like a narrower than normal bowling lane where the gutters have bumpers in them so your first throw always gets some pins. But randomly one or both bumpers retracts to a regular gutter in some frames where an offline roll gets nothing. Ideally you either want bumpers all the time or none at all. Two different games. But at least there's consistent border design for every frame in either game.
So if designers and TDs want to use penal design boundaries because they think it's necessary to test the players, they should use them everywhere on every hole so the same percentage of offline throw gets penalized the same. Just work the players hard. These rounds should either not be rated or I've suggested they be rated separately as their own category. I'm not sure it's the right way to go because it's less fun for the players and will reduce the amount of close matches, especially in single rounds. Figuring out how to better challenge top players in the putting area is probably a better way to increase the scoring averages with a tougher challenge than direct penalties. That should be the new frontier for experimentation.
It's a bit like a narrower than normal bowling lane where the gutters have bumpers in them so your first throw always gets some pins. But randomly one or both bumpers retracts to a regular gutter in some frames where an offline roll gets nothing. Ideally you either want bumpers all the time or none at all. Two different games. But at least there's consistent border design for every frame in either game.
So if designers and TDs want to use penal design boundaries because they think it's necessary to test the players, they should use them everywhere on every hole so the same percentage of offline throw gets penalized the same. Just work the players hard. These rounds should either not be rated or I've suggested they be rated separately as their own category. I'm not sure it's the right way to go because it's less fun for the players and will reduce the amount of close matches, especially in single rounds. Figuring out how to better challenge top players in the putting area is probably a better way to increase the scoring averages with a tougher challenge than direct penalties. That should be the new frontier for experimentation.
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You keep moving the goalposts in the debate. We're not at all talking about lower tier TD's. We're talking about a very specific course, which you criticized as having weak and overly penal design...but I feel all of your purported evidence doesn't support the claim at all.
You're also butting up against a point that separates disc golf from golf - golfers have trouble shooting under par - disc golfers don't.
Course design was advanced far beyond club tech in Tiger's time, now it's evening out. In disc golf we have the opposite problem, our disc tech is way beyond the course design.
Clearly we have to agree to disagree here. Fox Run Meadows was a great course, and I don't give that distinction out often. I'm a harsh critic of courses, especially when they're presented for professional play.
Cgkdisc
.:Hall of Fame Member:.
I first asked the question whether there was a reason for the OB lines along the tree lines, not about OB lines in the open area, although Jussi has done a decent job using buncr rethrows versus penalties for some situations like that. If players were able to play from those wooded areas (only those that didn't involve steep drop-offs) I believe it's weaker design to not allow players to demonstrate recovery skills, especially on courses and fairways that are more open versus just slap their hand with a penalty and give them a decent lie.
As an announcer, you have to believe that it's more interesting for you to tease the viewer whether the player shanking in there can make the tricky shot or not from an awkward position rather than the minor drama for viewers who can already see whether the shot went OB in there or not before the flag goes up. It's not about penal design but more interesting and challenging design where possible.
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Ball golfers have trouble shooting under par because approaching and putting is much harder and are typically par 70 courses with SSA about the same or actually often much harder respectively vs most disc golf courses with par in the 50s or low 60s that have SSA much lower or easier than their set par so the scores are even lower inflated. All of which has nothing to do with OB. Rope OB is artificially trying to compensate against par in course designs that lack natural obstacles or older short courses or refuse to accept par 2 and these are also the courses that tend to put up monster inflated rated rounds.
Courses like Iron Hill and Frost Valley have almost no OB, but shooting par 72 and 68 respectively is still nearly 1000 rated. Personally I would much rather watch players play these courses as well, nothing better than watching a disc bend through a wooded fairway. On a similar note, I dislike when the camera is not shooting from behind the tee because it's hard to get a feel for the hole and the disc thrown. It's more 1st person perspective(RPG-like) action and intimate from the tee, vs behind the basket/mid-fairway feeling more 3rd person and away from the action.
gdub58
Birdie Member
My two cents:
I don't think it makes sense to bring ball golf course design into the discussion - the issues are just too different. Sure, advances in equipment, and to a lesser extent, advances in skill level among the players, had a lot to do with the evolution of ball golf course design.
That said, it was also about the money - if you built a high-quality, pro-level course you could sell memberships and command exorbitant green fees. In the 80s and 90s, getting a tee time on a nice course was harder than getting a reservation at top restaurant. Those days are largely behind us - the bubble has burst and courses are closing.
Overall, ball golf made courses longer, greens faster, and put in more hazards (many of which were more aesthetic than game-altering). Again, much of that was financially driven. Also, in ball golf you can create a lot of score separation by messing with players' lies - whether that be sand, long rough, waste areas, mounding, etc.
Of course PGA players rarely take penalty strokes. Instead, fast greens with tricky pin placements, narrow, sloped fairways, and gnarly rough around the greens is how they separate the more highly skilled players.
Disc golf simply isn't able to replicate much of this. Sure, course designers can lengthen holes, but beyond that they pretty much have to work with the land available to them. Even if the money was there to bring in heavy equipment and spend 7 figures to carve out the perfect course, what would that course look like? I'm guessing that there would be lots of water, trees, and OB - how else are you going to present a challenge for top players?
And, while I would certainly rather play a course like Iron Hill, it makes spectating harder and makes watchable video (at least on tee shots) for those who don't know the course intimately or don't play the game nearly impossible. IMO, all the artificial OB at the GMC made the tournament more interesting to watch – on a lot of holes I didn't see discs disappear around trees only to wonder if the throw was a good one.
Finally, as far as putting OB on the edges of the woods, I'm guessing that is partly to address pace of play – rather than having a player trudge into the woods and spend a couple of minutes to figure out what to do, they took their drop and moved on.
I don't think it makes sense to bring ball golf course design into the discussion - the issues are just too different. Sure, advances in equipment, and to a lesser extent, advances in skill level among the players, had a lot to do with the evolution of ball golf course design.
That said, it was also about the money - if you built a high-quality, pro-level course you could sell memberships and command exorbitant green fees. In the 80s and 90s, getting a tee time on a nice course was harder than getting a reservation at top restaurant. Those days are largely behind us - the bubble has burst and courses are closing.
Overall, ball golf made courses longer, greens faster, and put in more hazards (many of which were more aesthetic than game-altering). Again, much of that was financially driven. Also, in ball golf you can create a lot of score separation by messing with players' lies - whether that be sand, long rough, waste areas, mounding, etc.
Of course PGA players rarely take penalty strokes. Instead, fast greens with tricky pin placements, narrow, sloped fairways, and gnarly rough around the greens is how they separate the more highly skilled players.
Disc golf simply isn't able to replicate much of this. Sure, course designers can lengthen holes, but beyond that they pretty much have to work with the land available to them. Even if the money was there to bring in heavy equipment and spend 7 figures to carve out the perfect course, what would that course look like? I'm guessing that there would be lots of water, trees, and OB - how else are you going to present a challenge for top players?
And, while I would certainly rather play a course like Iron Hill, it makes spectating harder and makes watchable video (at least on tee shots) for those who don't know the course intimately or don't play the game nearly impossible. IMO, all the artificial OB at the GMC made the tournament more interesting to watch – on a lot of holes I didn't see discs disappear around trees only to wonder if the throw was a good one.
Finally, as far as putting OB on the edges of the woods, I'm guessing that is partly to address pace of play – rather than having a player trudge into the woods and spend a couple of minutes to figure out what to do, they took their drop and moved on.
This is where I agree with Chuck---in principle, because I don't know the particular course or land well enough.
"Save" shots are more fun and dramatic, for players and spectators. Where a bad drive can force an attempt at a save, I think it's better than a penalty and good lie. (Where the woods are so dense the only option is to pitch out, that's about the same as making them OB).
Cgkdisc
.:Hall of Fame Member:.
I remember the course workers doing something I think was called the German cut or trim up at Highbridge on the wooded fairway edges. Essentially, you clear the brush going back 10-15 feet so when a disc kicks in there or even beyond it, the player has a decent chance to attempt a skillful recovery throw rather than just flail or pitch out.
I have the pleasure of frequently playing courses that involve both---wooded areas off the fairway from which to attempt saves, and O.B. areas to avoid. Personally, I like the variety of hazards.
lyleoross
* Ace Member *
What if you took a compromise position between Jamie and Chuck. No OB, but added obstructions. Chuck mentioned the long cut grass to add footing issues. Sand traps set 300 to 400 feet from the pin do something similar, as Texas States found out two years ago when they played on a golf course that had the underlying sand base showing in some areas. The pros hated the lack of footing and complained constantly. Built in bunkers or screens that inhibit run ups and throwing (see for example, the screens protecting trees at DeLa).
Such courses wouldn't look as nice as courses where you are able to use trees and shrubs or shule to get the same effect, but you can build difficulty without OB. But if you used such things in a limited fashion, and effectively, you might gain a lot without giving up too much.
I also liked the approach that Kansas City WO used to use. They had fake lakes. They were essentially rocked in areas that were supposed to represent lakes (if I recall correctly). How you play them would matter. A lost disc? Lost for rest of round?
There are other ways to "difficult" a course than OB. Perhaps it is time to consider some of them?
Such courses wouldn't look as nice as courses where you are able to use trees and shrubs or shule to get the same effect, but you can build difficulty without OB. But if you used such things in a limited fashion, and effectively, you might gain a lot without giving up too much.
I also liked the approach that Kansas City WO used to use. They had fake lakes. They were essentially rocked in areas that were supposed to represent lakes (if I recall correctly). How you play them would matter. A lost disc? Lost for rest of round?
There are other ways to "difficult" a course than OB. Perhaps it is time to consider some of them?
Bad footing has limited effect, especially within 200' of the basket, and tall grass means disc searches.
If we had golf course budgets, we could do a lot. But we don't, so we can't.
More, better use of casual relief and buncrs is something we could do, though.
If we had golf course budgets, we could do a lot. But we don't, so we can't.
More, better use of casual relief and buncrs is something we could do, though.
gdub58
Birdie Member
I agree - I would much rather see recovery throws out of the woods then a penalty and drop. The latter doesn't provide any advantage to those who can execute creative shots. I was merely offering a possible reason for the way it was done in this particular case.
gdub58
Birdie Member
Agreed. I think it can be a slippery slope - there are some ways that could be perceived as too "tricked up", but there should be some discussion about it.
I'll throw a couple out just for fun...
- A hazard area from which you can only stand & deliver from your lie.
- A hazard area that sends you to a drop zone that is partially obstructed by trees that requires a very precise throw.
lyleoross
* Ace Member *
Bad footing has an impact on long throws though. Again, not a solution for all problems, and it certainly isn't something you'd want to overuse, I can hear the complaints now, but if you had a 1000 foot hole with a sand trap that you're gonna be in, you change the dynamic of the hole. Maybe not a good idea, but something to consider.
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