I played my once a year fun PDGA sanctioned event. Do to logistical issues, I ended up on a card with some dude and his girlfriend who had traveled from out of town. I was fine with it. It rained hard the entire day. We generally had fun.
Hole 10, he ends up buried in a bush and backed up to get to his disc. He asks if stance is OK, I took a perfunctory look, and said yes, go ahead.
Hole 16, i am one stroke ahead, he is pushing super hard by this point because he wanted to win. Starts making obnoxious comments, which I asked him to stop. So my disc ends up buried in a bush.
I back up to my disc, trying not to move many branches, but it was impossible not to move some to get to my disc. I ask if my stance is OK, and he insists my stance is illegal because I moved branches with my torso. Insists that I needed to approach my disc from behind, and not from the front. At this point I knew he was just working me and trying to use the rules to his advantage. So I step out and ask him to point me to the rule that indicates which direction i need to approach my disc from. There was none, but he still insists without any solid reasoning that my stance was illegal. He finally says, go ahead, but its an illegal stance. There was no one else on the card to ask for a second opinion. I was not going to throw under those conditions, so walk back and ask the card behind us. They had no idea and said to take a provisional.
Either way my stance offered no advantage one way or the other. I was going to take a 5 anyway. So I go back, take a stance that resulted in a minimal amount of bush being disturbed. I took my 5, he tied it up. I parked my drive on hole 18 to take the win.
Afterward, I ask the TD for clarification on the rule. He said it is up to the card to decide, but that given the circumstances and our description of the situation, he saw no issue with how I originally approached the disc. The other guy steps into the conversation and is still insisting that I was trying to take an illegal stance. Naturally this lead to more conversation, and after further insistence on his part, I told him he was being very unsportsmanlike and over the top competitive. It's situations like this that made me step away from competitive disc in first place.
So am I right in interpretation that I am allowed by rules to take a stance that results in a minimal amount of movement of the obstacle, and that once I take a stance, I can not intentionally hold back any part of the bush with my arms, etc.? (He insisted that since my torso was touching branches, that I indeed was intentionally holding back part of the bush, which seemed like a huge stretch) Since the TD agreed that my stance would have been OK, to me that should have been end of conversation.
Hole 10, he ends up buried in a bush and backed up to get to his disc. He asks if stance is OK, I took a perfunctory look, and said yes, go ahead.
Hole 16, i am one stroke ahead, he is pushing super hard by this point because he wanted to win. Starts making obnoxious comments, which I asked him to stop. So my disc ends up buried in a bush.
I back up to my disc, trying not to move many branches, but it was impossible not to move some to get to my disc. I ask if my stance is OK, and he insists my stance is illegal because I moved branches with my torso. Insists that I needed to approach my disc from behind, and not from the front. At this point I knew he was just working me and trying to use the rules to his advantage. So I step out and ask him to point me to the rule that indicates which direction i need to approach my disc from. There was none, but he still insists without any solid reasoning that my stance was illegal. He finally says, go ahead, but its an illegal stance. There was no one else on the card to ask for a second opinion. I was not going to throw under those conditions, so walk back and ask the card behind us. They had no idea and said to take a provisional.
Either way my stance offered no advantage one way or the other. I was going to take a 5 anyway. So I go back, take a stance that resulted in a minimal amount of bush being disturbed. I took my 5, he tied it up. I parked my drive on hole 18 to take the win.
Afterward, I ask the TD for clarification on the rule. He said it is up to the card to decide, but that given the circumstances and our description of the situation, he saw no issue with how I originally approached the disc. The other guy steps into the conversation and is still insisting that I was trying to take an illegal stance. Naturally this lead to more conversation, and after further insistence on his part, I told him he was being very unsportsmanlike and over the top competitive. It's situations like this that made me step away from competitive disc in first place.
So am I right in interpretation that I am allowed by rules to take a stance that results in a minimal amount of movement of the obstacle, and that once I take a stance, I can not intentionally hold back any part of the bush with my arms, etc.? (He insisted that since my torso was touching branches, that I indeed was intentionally holding back part of the bush, which seemed like a huge stretch) Since the TD agreed that my stance would have been OK, to me that should have been end of conversation.
