Funny I wanted to add that I agree with the pars that Jussi sets up for his high calibre tournaments.
The "strokes to the green + 2" mentality is 100% from ball golf where putting is much harder. In ball golf you also have hardly anyone who plays under par for a whole event.
To put that in context, if we go for "strokes to the green +1" instead of +2, Paul McBeths best rated round ever in disc golf history (-17) would still be a +1 round... Gonna be hard to sell that to players.
Jussi does a pretty good job of setting par. Even the holes where I would set like to set par lower are on the bubble (except #13, but I can forgive any TD who wants to avoid the par 2 controversy for now). Any of the other holes could justifiably be the par Jussi set. I would just like him to step back and take a big picture look and ask if the total par of 65 really makes sense, then choose the lower par on some holes where a lower par could be justified, instead of always going for the higher par.
"Strokes to the green +1" would not be the best way to set par either, and not what I'm advocating. Again, refer to the definition in the rulebook.
Oh my god I seem to be wading into a par discussion...
Par is the next-to-last step in the de-evolution of a disc golf discussion, right before comparing someone to Hitler.
Trouble is with numbers having to be even (and not 2,8 for example which would be horrible), but they got to be something. To me par 2 does not exist really. Our local course has a downhill about 200ft hole (with a tricky sloped green though) and the next is a almost 400ft tunnel shot rising to the right at the end. Both are par 3. Yet no one would expect the scores to be same for both. Its just that the first isnt quite a 2 and the next not quite a 4. Both are good holes though and are in no need to be changed just to better hit a whole number for par.
Sure, there will be scoring variation between two holes with the same par. But, if no one expects the scores to be the same for both, should they have the same par?
Unless that tricky sloped green is so tough that an expert would lay up to avoid it, or is not able to stick the green often enough to expect it, why shouldn't that 200 foot downhill hole be a par 2?
Instead of pointing out that you both ignored the point I made and misconstrued the argument, I'll address the alternate points you've now raised.
Par is the norm, so much so that there has never been an event in our sport without it. The real issue is that TDs use par correctly in all instances but one. Par 2. They work hard using strategies laid out many times by Chuck And Steve to get par 5, par 4 and real par 3 holes correct. The one place they don't is on par 2 holes. For some reason those holes always end up as par 3s. Can't figure out why? Hmm, maybe because our culture as a whole would view them as... sub-par?
You are correct. There is no formal rule for establishing par. That is the real debate here. Should there be?
Actually, inflated pars are more a result of puffing up tough par 3s into par 4s, (and to a lesser extent, 4s to 5s) than the refusal to set par as 2 on any hole.
The formal rule for establishing par is the definition in the rules. It is based on the expected score of an expert player. Disc golf holes are too variable to have anything more formulaic or mechanical than that. And, on any course there will be a few holes where two different pars are nearly equally valid under any method.
I do think TDs should get feedback when the total par on a course used for Open play is rated less than 1000, or no one in the money was at or over par.
It would be interesting to me if someone, for one of these high-level tours only, implemented their own standard for "par" that more closely reflects that the top players are actually scoring. Rather than dealing with the entire range of disc golf events and courses, just DGPT or DGWT or NT Par.
I do think Steve Dodge and Jussi are working toward using par that more closely reflects what the top players are actually scoring. But, they haven't moved quite far enough to even get to the current definition of par yet. And that's where every tournament should be.