THE BASKETS ARE IN!!!

[BuzzSharpe]

Point By Point, Hole By Hole

Since this site doesn't seem to like to publish posts of any great length, I'll make short, separate posts to address the good points many of you have been making. Hole 3...poor, poor, much maligned 3. I saw a partial title of a post some time back that read, "Is This Supposed To Be A Joke? Number 3..." I was sure that it was another gripe about SPC #3, but it turned out to be a #3 somewhere where the tee is about ten feet in front of a wall of forest.
When I first stood on that ridge, looking out across and around those ball fields to the pine stand across the way, I envisioned, a challenging, sweeping hole that would emphasize precision and placement as well as pure power. As for it not being "fair", I remember what Prof. Pood taught us in college: "Nothing, and I repeat, g*d damned nothing in life is fair!" And as The High Priest of the Church of the Painful Truth always said, "It's not fair!" is the mantra of spoiled little lads and lasses and the liberal left.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt, # x #

5 and 17....Both have been reviewed as filler holes that do nothing but get you from point A to point B. Sorry to say, but getting from point A to point B to point to point to point, so that you wind up right back at point A is the primary objective. The tract of land containing 16 and 17 was originally seen as another testy, testy, testy 1000' par 5. Tertiary designer saw the same thing. Thankfully, secondary designer saw it as it should be and is. By designating these holes as par 2's, they do present a unique challenge of being real deuce or die holes, in terms of overall round score against course par. And as course par is about a stroke and a half on the preferred low side of this site's projected SSE, which pleases me greatly. PDGA guidelines do not recommend, but allow for par 2's, because they know, as I've always known that sometimes, lay of the land dictates design.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt; # x #

Hole 7 seemed to be one of the rare opportunities for a legitimate par four, with its distance and uphill lie. But play has shown that it is indeed a three. Hell, I've even threed it...from the Blue...don't know if I ever could from the Gold:wall:

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt; # x #

Number 8....the hole everybody loves to hate. It will be better, when we get it returned to a state similar to that when I first walked and surveyed the tract. As for it being a par 6...there are a few already out there. I've even encountered a coupla of 7's during my research for this course. Again, I relied largely on PDGA guidelines for this determination.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt; # x #

Hole 11...the one hole that has been received and reviewed with nothing but praise...until now. Originally rated as a par 4. During the walk-through and demo, Wiggins, Jr drove the green from the gold and I hit the back of it in two from the blue. With its distance putting it right on the bubble between 3 and 4, it is better as a long, hard three, rather than as a short, easy 4.

 

[BrotherDave]

No! No! No!

Not already!!! Two weeks and you stoner jerks are already littering and leaving your bongs on a beautiful new golf course? Same goes for you alcoholics that can't go 18 holes without a beer. Let me run it down for you jerks: alcohol is not allowed in city parks, marijuana is not allowed in North Carolina, and littering is not allowed anywhere in this entire country. If you think Parks and Rec is going to put up with the few stupid disc golfers who can't pick up after themselves leaving trash on their crown jewel of a park, you are dead wrong. DO NOT let me catch you littering on this course. I will happily come to court with the officer who arrests you for littering after I call the police out.

Fact of life I'm afraid. Disc golfers (people) litter and smoke. I've already picked up some water bottles and a can of insect repellent the last time I've played. But people in general love to abuse common spaces with their waste, all you have to do is journey into the rough beside that neighborhood to find beer bottles and cans that have been there long before any disc golf course. The more popular the course, the more of this kind of disc golfer (shirtless fratboy chuckers and jugalos) you'll get leaving their crap behind. Just have to humbly pick up after them and threaten to beat the crap out of them when you see them do it.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt; # x #

18, especially 18 Gold. An uphill, finishing par 5 following a demanding deuce or die par 2, difficult from the drive by design. It will probably be even more hated when the Mando sign goes up. It is better placed than originally planned and there is a bit more trimming to do. I can't say that the slight down slope of the blue tee is by design, but perhaps it will be an unintended extra challenge like the wind in your face on Cedarock #7.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

Pt x Pt; # x #

Overall, The SPC is intended to run the gamut from the minimal distance of 150" to perhaps the longest hole in the Carolina's. It is meant to run the range of allowed for pars from 2 to 6. It is hoped to reward pure power, as well as precision and placement. And it is designed so that its par designation will closely coincide with its SSA.
Originally conceived as a White/Blue course, on the advice and input of pro player friends and from much study of PDGA Course Design Guidelines, the designers determined that The SPC is indeed a Blue/Gold layout. Much like ball golf's Pinehurst #2, it is a pro/championship level course that will challenge the best of pros and advanced amateurs, and which will draw and attract lesser amateur players to test and improve their skills.

 

[sloppydisc]

Thank you Madison Avenue.

 

[BuzzSharpe]

You're welcome And I do appreciate your Paine quote

 

[bcbrown]

I'll throw my 2c into the mix. The whole worlds a critic, so here's my thoughts.
I played from the Golds.
Before I start though, I should explain my thoughts... I love risk-reward holes. I agree with Houck's design beliefs almost unilaterally and I could tell a few of them were applied here (intentionally or not). I can't wait to play here again (will play my next day off), so I hope the following critical comments can be read in the light of "I am PUMPED to have this course as a playing option."
Thank you so much to everyone for the hard work, time and money that you have poured into this course.

Hole 1 was a great starter hole.
Hole 2 felt a little off. There isn't enough risk-reward to me to really encourage a go at the basket. It would take too much precision (with the current trimming) with how much power is required to get it to the basket to be worth the risk of not being able to 3. As is, I'd throw a 175'ish drive with a 100'ish upshot. I honestly considered a huge spike-hyzer, RHBH and will try in a future round; might want to consider that as an (unintended?) option from the golds.
Hole 3: I (unfortunately?) didn't play the mandos, so I won't comment on the hole, but I will say that I enjoyed throwing from the manicured grass!
Hole 4: Despite my adjustments, the crosswind was so strong it blew my 2nd shot onto the crosswalk. This was even after a pretty good drive. This may be an issue that could be solved by moving the basket right. I don't think it detracts from the hole to move the basket right (directly toward the gold pad for 5).
Hole 5: Enjoyable, but a little too friendly to the spike hyzer Forehand.
Hole 6: Great.
Hole 7: No problems.
Hole 8: Without some clearing of graded hill, I don't think this is playable or able to be judged. With some landing zones and/or total clearing, this will be a great hole. Be careful when clearing the section immediately after the blue pads to make sure you don't give too much incentive to bombing from the Golds (to detract from potentially going into the parking lot).
Hole 9: It may be too easy to RHBH spike hyzer, but I don't see a way around that, other than moving the basket back toward the tee a bit and a bit left (so the fir? protects the basket).
Hole 10: Love it, look forward to figuring it out.
Hole 11: Loved it. Perfect 3. Perfect risk reward.
Hole 12: Another great risk-reward. I was not rewarded.
Hole 13: I'm not sure what to make of this hole. Fairly bland, but still quite playable. I hope I never have to play it while a soccer game is going on...I'll probably just skip it...too much wind available. Sidenote: Totally walked up on a shirtless haircut on the back porch as I tapped in the putt.
Hole 14: Deceptively long (a good thing). Enjoyed it.
Hole 15: Is there a fairway here and I missed it? I threw a roller and was rewarded. If you don't want a roller from almost every pro, something will need to change.
Hole 16-17: I think they have to be what they are.
Hole 18: I expect you're going to get a lot of flack for this hole from pros. The gold drive is not a disc golf shot. The drive off the TEE PAD should never be under 200 feet for a hole of this distance. As is, you're asking a pro to basically throw an upshot up (with no risk/reward options) to where the hole really starts. It's a wonderful hole once you get past the tee shot, and it does it a disservice to have that tee pad start you where it does.

I don't care about pars on each hole because honestly who cares what the scorecard says. It's a disc golf hole. I play it the same if it reads par 2 as I do if it reads par 6. I try to get the best score I can. When throwing the 3rd shot on hole 11, does it really matter if the card says you should be putting it in vs. you should be laying up?

Is it OK to thrash down some of the stuff on hole 8? If so, please be specific where. I have a few machetes and a hatred for the brush that pierced my head and arms! on that note, are machetes even allowed out there?

 

[Tenacious EJ]

bcbrown, I'm curious why you didn't try to play the mando's on 3. As its one of the most contentious holes on the course, I'd of thought you would have at least tried them. Just curious. 3 has grown on me, except that last damn pole. I don't see how it adds distance, really, as throwing over the baseball grass is far too risky if there are people on the fields.

Anyways, something HAS to be done about 8. I watched a guy play it today, throwing what I assume was his second or third shot, from the field south of the red tee. A lefty, he intentionally threw to the south of the first shelter on the south side to curve it to land between the two shelters. He had no way on knowing if anyone was there, and I assume he did not care. Buzz, 90% of the players to the course are laying up on the lawn and throwing over and through it. Hell, I did it the other day on accident. I don't think we can just wait until Winter for it to thin out. Even with thinning out I think you're going to be hard-pressed to get most of the golfers who play the course to stay in the valley, and I can't think of a way to fix that. Maybe plant some mando trees? I think the biggest problem with 8 is that there is no obvious landing pad for your tee shot. Lots of duffers, myself included, are ending up in the street, which throws off the rest of the hole for us. It must be fixed, one way or another.

 

[bcbrown]

I skipped the mandos on 3 because I read the scorecard poorly. I am playing again tomorrow and will be playing as intended by Buzzz. I will even be taking another shot at #8.

 

[DSmith]

The only work out there has been from volunteers. So my guess would be any future work would also be from volunteers. Parks isn't supplying the labor on this one.
Basically what I'm saying is step up and volunteer and quit bitching about #8 needing work.
I marked out 100ft long landing zones 250-275 feet apart starting at the short pad (notice I didnt say blue pad). First landing zone was an issue because you'd have to clear out the brush on the right where the fairway bottlenecks to make it wide enough so I pulled it back. The first flag that was in the fairway marked the up fairway side of the landing zone. About 250ft from that is the start or front of the next landing area (the next flag),100ft from that is flag marking the back side of that landing area and then 250ftto the next landing zone and so on. You get the picture. I told Buzz he didnt need to clear out the whole area, just landing zones 100x60 ft. It'll save alot of sweat clearing out that area.
Only issue I came upon was the shot to the last zone which is kind of a blind right to left turn with a huge blackberry bush on the front left of the zone. That whole thing will have to come out.

So heres my thinking on these zones and why I measured them the way I did;
Higher rated players should be able to skip easily zone to zone (risky but doable) with a good 300-350 ft open fairway shot at the most if they land in a good spot in the zone they are throwing from. The zones just need to be wide enough. Lets say you land in the middle of a zone halfway between the front and the back then you have to make a 300ft shot to reach the next zone (50ft + 250ft). If your on the back edge of a zone you only have to throw a 250ft shot to reach the front end of the next zone. If you are at the front you either have to throw a 350 ft shot or land it in the narrow fairway.
Now there will be people who will try and crush a 100% power shot on every fairway drive, those will be the people that will lose a disc.

From the "rookie pad there is a landing zone to the right off the pad and the large last zone straight ahead. Yes the blackberry bushes will need to come out because for the "rookie" fairway, there one just about dead center.

Anyway have fun with that, I cant do anything till I can get my car driveable.

Drew

 

[BrotherDave]

So from first flag to the next is good to be worked on, from the 3rd flag to the next and so on? I don't want to hack away and be clearing up the opposite areas. I'm pretty sure I can figure out where your LZs are to be I just want to double check.

Not sure I'll be able to volunteer any this week (magically threw my back out a couple of days ago, plus my bro has the week off and will drag me on DG roadtrips (not complaining, mind you). But I definitely want to chop up some nasty rough on 8 and make that bad boy worth playing.

 

[bcbrown]

I'd love to help clear out #8 as I think it's a great hole with some slight modifications. I'd like for Buzz to comment here before doing so. Also, am I allowed to take a machete out there?

 

[bcbrown]

Replayed the course yesterday from the golds again.
You may want to define OB on the score card (are we playing rethrow from previous or from point it went OB?... I know there's some variance here across pro tourneys)

A few notes about the second round (I'd love others' thoughts, especially about #2,7)
#2 I tried a spike hyzer. It didn't work. I will try again with an understable disc. I still contend the distance from gold pad to basket is too long. Even a great player will not want to go hard for the 2. If it's a little closer (~50 ft) it would be close enough to tempt.
#3 Played and enjoyed... other than having to wait a bit to throw around the next-to-last mandatory so I didn't potentially murder a jogger. I don't see the issues with the last mando, but maybe it was just from how the disc landed for me.
#4 The "cut line" rule isn't in play on this hole, right? Good hole, especially when there isn't wind.
#5 is a filler hole and I don't like it, especially now I've noticed a simple hammer line.
#6 is great, but there will be many discs in the road (I'm 1/2)
#7 is simple, but good. Could make it more interesting with another tree on the right. Right now it's a little too vanilla because you just throw it as hard as you can with a virtually wide open fairway... and then you throw a wide open upshot. The answer may be to incorporate the monster tree ~300ft up the fairway.
#8 Landing zones are definitely needed. If I understand Buzz/chuck's ideology right, I think the zones need to be placed frequently enough, but also have sharp consequences for trying to push them too far. If Buzz is OK with it, I could ask Houck in the "Ask Houck" thread here on this forum. He may be able to provide some very useful feedback on how to shape it.
#9 Spike hyzer bomb for rHBH is pretty easy and sorta takes the fun out of the hole.
#10 A great hole. Options for LH, RH, BH, FH. risk and reward.
#11 ALMOST a freaking amazing hole. If I can figure out the forum rules, I'm going to make a mockup of my suggestion here (I'm also available to help do the work)
#12 A huge upgrade for this one would be to put a tall flag on top of the basket. Assuming we aren't throwing ~450 on flat land, you're probably not able to see this basket for your 2nd shot, but it becomes a lot more fun of a 2nd shot when you can actually see where the basket is without walking 50'+ up a sloped hill and trying to remember that for the throw. having the basket on a hill makes for additional skill (if you're skillful enough with the throw it minimizes the luck) to prevent rollaway.
#13 May want to split this into 2 for safety. I've been to the course on two consecutive Saturdays and thankfully there were NO players on the fields! Having people bomb that close to back yards could be an issue as well... splitting it into two would help in both of those regards (but it would remind a lot of people of the 'filler' 16 and 17)
#14 great hole, dont' change a thing.
#15 As previously mentioned, there is no fairway here. Am I missing something?
#16,17 are necessary filler holes. If there is some property room on the right, these should definitely be combined into 1 hole. You could cut out landing zones akin to what it being proposed for #8 (again, I'm available to help). Another option you may prefer is to plant two trees ~50 feet from the pad and have a mandatory through the two of them (Think Oak Hollow Open course at the lake... hole 11ish).
#18. Very enjoyable hole once you get past the 1st throw.

Buzz, please let me know where I can help.

 

[bcbrown]

Here is my mockup of #11. http://imgur.com/mTm1IzV
Green = Easy landing zones
Orange = Medium Landing zones
Yellow = What I'd expect from pros
Red = What would be a "great" throw when you include the risk of going in the junk... and should get you a stroke advantage over people in the green.
I'd propose moving the basket from the blue spot to roughly the other blue spot (exact positioning to be determined by Buzz.

Thoughts?

 

[DSmith]

The first flag marks the far end of the first zone. The first zone is from the short pad to the first flag. The second flag marks the start of the second zone. I just put them up as visual examples of where the zones are.

 

[BrotherDave]

The first flag marks the far end of the first zone. The first zone is from the short pad to the first flag. The second flag marks the start of the second zone. I just put them up as visual examples of where the zones are.

Okay I gotcha. The short tee being the "red" tee up on the bank, I presume.