First I will start off by saying that I have been waiting a decade for a World Championships to be hosted in Kansas City. They showcase some of the best courses in the country and it is centrally located which gives more players the opportunity to attend. I was very prepared and focused to play well; it had been my best season to date and I wanted to make it all worth it. I came into this World Championships the most mentally prepared than any Worlds before. This was my year; it was my turn to win.

The 2009 Disc Golf World Championships started off at the Blue Valley Disc Golf Course, which is deemed to be the Longest Disc Golf Course in the world, measuring 11,049 feet with a par 66. It is a challenging course with multiple Par 4′s and 5′s throughout its rolling hills and well-manicured fairways. I really like the design of the Blue Valley course and really appreciate that the course designers incorporated many par 4’s and 5’s as well throughout the course. That is something that I have always believe makes a total course, when there are several holes that require 2 to 3 excellent placed shots in order to score well on certain holes. It offers the same concept and intentions as golf and I believe that it will soon be the standard in course design in our sport. It is by far my favorite course that we were playing at this year’s Worlds because it was difficult to play for most and it fit into my strength of really airing it on almost every hole, allowing me to play very aggressively throughout the entire course.

It was a rainy, overcast day with the feeling of excitement in the air. I had the opportunity to watch players start out with the earlier tee times, as I got a late morning tee time giving me plenty of time to play some warm-up catch with Nate Doss in the parking lot. We also got the chance to throw some holes on a smaller 9 hole course that was installed on the property perpendicular to the massive Blue Valley Course, with some great up and down hill shots to get the feel of the elevation before heading for our rounds.

I was really excited to start this year’s Worlds, it had been my best season thus far and I really wanted to make a statement with a strong finish, looking to best my 3rd place finish in 2006. I was looking forward to the round but wishing that the rain would eventually let up; it’s not like I needed any other factors to contribute to an already taxing round on one of the most challenging courses in the world. I was just looking for a break in the weather.

In the 1st round I had a slow start with par on the first 2 holes and was looking for something exciting to happen to get me fired up, waiting for such a moment is sometimes self initiated to really get things going. I blasted a pair of huge uphill shots on hole 3, getting a 50 foot uphill look for an eagle 3 on the difficult par 5 that I was more than prepared to hit. I smashed the huge eagle putt to get rolling and the feeling of taking over this round hit me. I continued to birdie the following long downhill par 4 and then experienced a birdie putt spit-out on Hole 5 due to the wet chains – it was a putt that would have stuck on a dry day. I shook it off and realized that I had well over 100+ holes to go in this week-long competition.

I then continued to birdie a majority of the holes throughout the first 14 holes to get to 10 under, making lots of big drives and long putts as the rain started to dissipate. It was all clear sailing from there on out. I smashed chains for Ace on the 400′ downhill Hole 15 which lead to a drop-in birdie. I was really feeling it this round, and it was time to finish in style. I scored an easy par on Hole 16 and a routine birdie on the par 4 Hole 17 with a solid upshot to the pin. On the tee of 18, I tried to forget how I was shooting and what score I was actually at, which was not the easiest thing to do at this point. I threw a massive drive over the trees that set up another giant shot up the hill on this long par 5. It was now time to make a critical decision, but it was not a time to get greedy after playing such an aggressive round, so I made the smart play of laying the next shot up for the stress-free birdie to finish the round with a New Course Record of 53 (-13). I believe that that Course Record will stand for a long time.

It was exactly the statement that I wanted to make in the first round of Worlds, putting me exactly where I wanted to be – on top of the Leader Board to start. I relished the fact that I just shattered the old Course Record by 3 strokes and still felt that I could have shot better, even though the conditions were less than ideal, but it didn’t seem to affect my strategy for play on that course or my shot execution throughout that round. A few strokes at minimum, but that round still bested the rest of the field by 3 stokes overall, making it known that I was there to play, with Coda Hatfield sitting in 2nd shooting a 56.

The 2nd Round was an early 8 am start held at Rosedale Park, and it would be the only time that we would get to play this course as well. The Rosedale Course consists of wide open fairway shots for the most part with some woods, but what made the course challenging was that it was designed on a prominent elevated bluff that features steep drop-offs that punished errant shots. It was not the most difficult course in the World Championships, but it is a course that you have to score well on in order remain in a top position in the tournament. Plus we only got to see this course once and had no chance to get redemption on any of the holes if we missed them.

It was a slow start as it was very early in the day, and the long grass was completely soaked from all of the rain from the day before. The wet conditions also lead to many of the putting greens that were in the woods being surrounded by a slippery mud that seemed to cover the entire area around the baskets. I was driving great but only capitalized on a few birdies on the wooded front of the course. I picked up the pace a little on the wide-open back 9, where there was more opportunity to score. I finished by scoring birdie on 3 of the last 4 holes to shoot a 49 (-5), which was the 3rd hottest score, with a 47 by both Doss and Ulibarri being the best of that round. I was satisfied with my mediocre round knowing that it didn’t hurt my starting position as I increased my lead to 5 strokes after 2 rounds heading into Thornfield.

The 3rd round was held at the Thornfield Course way South of Kansas City – a newly designed private course that was installed just for Worlds. It was a challenging course with a great mix of wooded and open holes; it had lots of tight, long drives off the tee followed by very technical putting greens. It had a variety of some par 4′s and 5′s that made the play a little more difficult, but it also had a few holes where it was almost better to opt to throw over the top of the trees instead of trying to take on the unreasonable fairway. It was again one of the courses that we would be only playing once, meaning that you had to play it great the first time because it was going to be the only time.

We had a late afternoon tee time starting at 2 pm, giving the players a lot of time in between our morning rounds at Rosedale – maybe almost too much time for most. It is sometimes difficult to get going again where you left off the morning round even hours later that same day, but it was Worlds and I needed to bring it at this course. I got the pleasure of playing with my good friends and past World Champions – David Feldberg and Nate Doss – and my good friend Paul Ulibarri. We were all looking to put on a show. I was on fire out of gates, picking up birdies on several of the early holes on the front. I really thought that I was starting to separate myself from the pack when I chased down a huge 70′ footer for Eagle on Hole 5 soon after watching Doss knock down the same putt from about a foot to my left. The entire group scored an Eagle on the hole and we were all looking to play exceptionally well this round. I made another huge 50′ footer for birdie on the extreme hyzer around the corner on Hole 13 and scored birdie on 2 of the final 5 holes to finish with a 50 (-10) for the round. I increased my lead to 7 strokes after the first 3 rounds and felt great about my first 2 days of the World Championships.

It was an amazing feeling to be in the lead by 7 strokes, but I tried not to really think about the magnitude of the event. I just wanted keep extremely relaxed when not playing and keep to my game plan that got me to the position that I was at. Its difficult not to think about the end result, but in reality, the tournament was not even at the halfway point. I knew that if I played the aggressive game that I know how, I would be tough to beat throughout the week.

The 4th round commenced at 8 am the next morning at one of my favorite courses in the country, Waterworks, not because of the length or difficulty of the course but because it has such a unique layout. This course is described as having many trees with lots of elevation changes, some of it quite extreme. It has a good combination of long, open holes and short, accurate ones. Waterworks is a beautiful park with stunning skyline views of downtown Kansas City and the Missouri River. I really enjoy playing this course because it offers lots of opportunity to score and rewards some uphill power drives; thankfully we would have another chance to play this course during the Semi-Finals round as well. It is definitely one of the marquee courses that we played during the World Championships and has always been a staple to many of the KC Wide Open tournaments of the past.

I also love the start of this course off Hole 1, and in my opinion it is the best starting hole in Disc Golf. It is a giant sloping hole over a valley with the basket sitting down to the left on an extreme downhill grade at about 550′ with the beautiful cityscape of downtown Kansas City in the backdrop. I started the round by throwing a tremendous shot and skipping down to the pin settling about 35′ feet away. I nailed the downhill death putt to start off the morning the right way. I was ready to really get things going as I shredded the front 9, shooting a dominant 5 under par to extend the lead. I showed no signs of letting up on the elevated back of the course, and I really took control of the round. I shot a 4 under with a bogey on 14; it was only my second bogey of the tournament. This was one of my best rounds that I have ever shot at Waterworks to finish with a 45 (-9) for the hot score along with Josh Anthon off the 2nd Card. I played great throughout the round and again extended my lead to 9 strokes after 4 rounds, and there was no looking back at this point….or so I thought.

The 5th round was our first round at the Cliff Drive course. I had actually practiced that course more than any other course that we would play throughout the week at Worlds. The course plays around the old municipal reservoir and is one of the highest points in Kansas City. It features a great mix of long open shots and some technical wooded holes, and this course also has lots of Out-of-Bounds areas on the Back 9. It’s a challenging course but it all comes down to throwing the shots when it counts most. The round was supposed to start at 2 pm that afternoon, so we made sure that we got there at least an hour before to get in some warm-up holes. But due to a back-up on the course that afternoon, our round was postponed until 4 pm which actually meant that we arrived 3 hours before our round even started.

The waiting around that afternoon didn’t help with my focus and meant that it had been over 5 hours between the end of our first round in the morning and the start of the second round that day. I was definitely prepared for that course, but on the first 9 holes of the round my shots didn’t seem to pan out for me. I felt that I was trying so hard not to lose strokes when I had been playing to gain strokes on the field in previous rounds. I tried to keep it together on the longer second half of the course where I got the chance to open up on some distance shots, but I didn’t capitalize on some of the shorter holes coming down the stretch. It was definitely a lack of concentration, and I realized that I was not as focused as I had been in previous rounds due to the length of the day and the heat.

I approached the tee of Hole 17 thinking of ways to salvage that round, trying to forget about the total lack of focus and to stop trying to play off other players’ shots. Hole 17 is one of the most difficult holes on the entire course; it requires a perfectly placed drive and a very skillful upshot coming into an extremely slanted green with a drop off hill to the left leading straight to OB. I watched all 3 players before me throw some long roller shots down the hill ending up in great looks at the approach to the pin. I decided after watching their shots that I would divert from my original game plan and opt for the roller shot as well, but my shot took a few errant bounces and took an immediate right, rolling straight out of bounds. I was then left with about 180’ to the pin, and I went with a forehand shot and had the misfortune of having my approach shot hit next to the basket and taking a long roll down the hill OB. I then missed the putt and carded a 6 on the hole, my largest score of the entire tournament, giving a few of the players on my card 3 strokes on that one hole.

Out of frustration I missed the following upshot on Hole 18 to bogey out the round and scoring by far my worst round of the World Championships (What was your score for the round?). I soon realized that some other players, besides the ones on my card, had made incredible moves to the top cards as Josh Anthon made up 7 strokes during that round and Matt Orum made up 11 strokes on my lead by shooting a Course Record 45 (-9). I still remained in the lead by 2 strokes, making it even more of a highly-contested event from there on out.

That round proved to be the most crucial round of the tournament, a round that made me realize how truly bad I wanted to win despite giving up a sizeable lead to the rest of the field. My good friend and current World Champion, Dave Feldberg, had told me a story following that round how he had also lost the lead during the 2008 World Championships during the 5th round as well and still went on to win despite having to overcome such disappointment. I took that story to heart, and was not going to let that one round affect my play the rest of the tournament.

I tried to shake that round, but I only became angry when I thought about giving up such a lead to the rest of the field, because 2 strokes is not as comfortable as the 9 strokes that I began the round with, knowing that I had to play that very same course the next morning. I had another long talk with Nate Doss after the round, and he tried to calm me down telling me that I now had two choices at this point: I could let that round affect the rest of my tournament and let it quite possibly cost me the World Title, as it was exactly what the other players chasing me wanted to happen, or I could come out the following day and play like the Champion that I knew that I was, proving my power and strength to the entire field. I chose the second option as I knew that this battle was far from over, and I was sure that I wanted to win more than anyone.

As I came out for the 6th round the following morning, I was ready to fight for what was rightfully mine. It was another early 8 am start out at the Cliff Drive course, where I still had thoughts of what had transpired the previous round and was not about to let that happen again. I needed to score on many of the holes that I had let pass me by the previous afternoon. These were not difficult holes, but it was challenging to get putts on some of the holes sometimes. Although I had a better start to the round, Josh Anthon was making every putt that he faced. It soon became a very close battle between Josh and me, with Matt Orum right on my heels. After holding the lead for the entire tournament, Josh soon tied it all up on Hole 8. Josh then took the lead on the very next hole with a Birdie on Hole 9. I then tied him up with a Birdie on Hole 10 and regained the lead on Hole 12. We continued to trade off the lead through a series of holes on the back, and Josh regained the lead yet again on Hole 15. He was playing great and gained another stroke on Hole 16 before finishing with an amazing 46 (-8). I finished the round with a 50 (-4), which was 6 strokes better than the previous round, but Josh ended up edging me out by 4 strokes on the round to take a 2 stroke lead in the tournament.

Again, I felt disappointed that I had given up the lead because I wanted to win from start to finish, but no one ever said that it was going to be easy. It was going to be a battle until the end, and I was more than ready to take it on. It was our only round of the day before having to play the Semi-Finals at Waterworks the following day, so we went back to house to relax for the afternoon. As I sat back in the hot tub trying to contemplate how I was going to retake the lead, I realized that I needed to get back out there and practice. Nate and I waited until the late afternoon heat slightly dissipated, presenting an ideal afternoon for a practice round out at Waterworks. We went out there and threw multiple shots on every hole for the entire round, which gave me the opportunity to really dial in many of the shots on the holes that I would be playing the following morning.

The 7th round, which happen to be the Semi-Final Round, began early Saturday morning at Waterworks – the same course that I had played well at the first time through in the 4th round shooting a 45 (-9) and had diligently practiced the afternoon before. This was going to be the round for me to regain the lead and take back control of this tournament. I played very conservatively to start, just keeping pace with Josh as he was still carrying over his great play from the previous 2 rounds, and his putts were still on point. I was definitely very aware of where I was in the match between us, but didn’t let it really affect my play. I got 1 stroke back on him in the first 5 holes leading into Hole 6, where Josh made an errant drive that kicked immediately right down a steep embankment. This was probably the most challenging hole on the entire course, not because of the length of the hole, but because it was sometimes difficult to make it down the fairway without getting in trouble. Josh was experiencing just that as his disc landed way down the hill on the right side of the fairway with nothing left for a shot as he attempted to pitch back to the fairway for an open 3rd shot. But not this time. It took him 2 shots to make it back to the fairway and another to get to the green, giving him a 25′ to save a 5. He missed the putt wide left and his putter fortunately came to rest on the side hill and avoided rolling back down the hill. He dropped his putt in for 6, while I played the hole perfectly, carding a 3 to go from back by 1 stroke to in the lead by 2 strokes. The tides had turned at just the right moment, and now it was time to take control.

We continued on as I capitalized on many of the holes that I had practiced the day before, scoring a few birdies on the remaining holes on the front, but Josh kept pace throughout that stretch. The battle continued onto the back as I really started forcing some huge shots in order to score. We traded off birdies until he made an amazing throw on the epic Hole 14, absolutely parking the hole for birdie. He then birdied 3 straight coming down the stretch to finish the round, while I continued to miss putts on that same stretch of holes, to give him again a 1 stroke lead going into the last 2 holes. I didn’t panic in any way and knew that I would have another opportunity to get back in this match.

I sat back and watched as Josh took the tee on Hole 17, only to witness the door swing open as he pulled his tee shot wide right into the street OB on the drive. I quickly took advantage of the situation by driving a shot to land uphill from the hole and hitting a downhill 25’ footer for birdie. As he surrendered 2 strokes and bogeyed the hole, I regained the lead. I am very much a believer in the power of momentum, especially during a battle such as this, and I felt everything change dramatically. Going into the Final Hole 18 of the Semi-Finals, which is an extreme uphill shot, I knew that I needed to take full advantage of my power and reach this hole to finish the round. I smashed the drive off the tee, leaving me a difficult uphill 18’ footer. He threw his tee shot short on the hill and missed his putt for birdie to finish. I took my time, knowing that this putt could make all the difference, took a deep breath and sank the putt to take a 2 stroke lead shooting a 46 (-8), taking all the momentum going into the Final 9.

So I had over 3 hours to prepare for the Finals as every division had to play their Final 9 on the very same course that they had set up at Blue Valley that I would be playing later that day. I wanted to get to there early just to calm my nerves a bit and give me ample time to stretch and warm up before the Finals. Nate, Val and I definitely walked the entire course hours before the Finals started just to be prepared for many of the holes that we never played during any of the previous rounds. We were unfortunately not allowed to throw any of the holes because there were other divisions playing their Final 9’s at that time. But the Final 9 layout seemed really basic and not too difficult, so I really didn’t need to throw the holes in order to know what to throw.

The Final 9 had been set up in such a way so as to incorporate the first 3 holes on the Blue Valley course, the next 5 holes being very short holes, and the final hole finishing at the main stage where the Awards ceremony was to take place. It was very spectator-friendly layout with lots of room for a gallery to navigate without being in the way of the players on a majority of the holes. It was a layout with a large variance between really long Par 4′s and very short holes, all holes where there could be a great change in scores. It was going to be a battle until the end.

Val started her round with a 16 stroke lead over Des Reading going into the Finals. Reading then had a 12 stroke lead on Nicole Frazier for 3rd. Valarie had more than secured the win throughout a phenomenal week of play and was playing a Victory Final 9 where she could really show off her skills to the crowd. She gained 9 strokes during the Semi-Finals shooting a 1017 rated round and she averaged an amazing 992 rating throughout the previous 7 rounds, a round rating that dominated the entire Women’s field at the World Championships. She ended with a 14 stroke win in route to her 3rd Consecutive World Title remained the Best Female Disc Golfer in the World. It was now my turn to hold up my end on the deal and win as well. It was my turn.

The Men’s Finals started soon after Valarie dropped her last putt. I couldn’t believe how excited I was to play in another Worlds Final 9, my last one having taken place in 2006 in Augusta, GA. My idol and newly inducted Hall of Famer, “Crazy” John Brooks announced this year’s Finalists, Josh Anthon, Cale Leiviska, Matt Orum and myself. I could feel the intensity building and the rush throughout my body as the names were announced as we all stepped out on the teepad of the first hole of the Final 9.

I started with a tremendous drive on the 803 ft Hole #1 just to get the nerves out, but threw my upshot wide on the approach. I lost a stroke to Josh on the very first hole as he threw an amazing approach to score a birdie 3. We then both scored par on the 2nd hole to keep my lead at 1 stroke. I then took advantage of the distance of Hole #3, which measured 696’ and played uphill the entire way as I made a huge second shot and hit a long 30’ footer for 3 as Josh struggled to score a 5 on the hole. I then regained a 3 stroke lead. It was the start of the Final 9 that I had hoped for, and I believed that I was just going to take a victory lap into the final 6 holes.

I remained in the lead by 3 strokes as we both scored par on the next hole across the water, and I was feeling like I had this tournament all wrapped up at this point with just 5 holes remaining in the event. Unfortunately, things from that point on did not go as well as planned when I chained out for birdie on the short uphill Hole #5 while Josh got a stroke back on that hole. I somehow changed my game plan at that point in the match, electing to throw the next downhill straight shot a bit short instead of opting for the high percentage sidearm spike shot that would have carded me a birdie on that hole. I took another par as Josh continued to birdie that hole as well, cutting the lead to 1 stroke yet again. I seemed to lose focus quickly at this point, but it didn’t seem real. In my mind, there was no way I was going to lose, no matter how many holes he birdies. It was still my time.

I then left the next drive short as well and missed the putt out of pure frustration as Josh birdied to tie me up going into the last 2 holes of the Final 9. I lost the lead as Josh had just reeled off 3 straight unanswered deuces on the shortest holes of the Final 9; it was too unreal that I had let this happen. I could have birdied those holes blindfolded. The stage was now set in front of a gallery of 1500+ spectators and it was all coming down to who wanted it the most. We both birdied the short uphill shot on Hole #8 as I nearly missed hitting the basket for Ace to really finish in style.

The last and final hole of the Final 9 was a long 480’ across an asphalt road with an island green, the awards stage to the left side of the island and the basket in the center for all to witness the final putts. It was the hole that I wanted to birdie so very badly, but unfortunately left the shot short right side, only to toss up a last chance birdie effort in hopes to win in regulation as Josh made his par putt to stay tied. I walked off that hole more pumped than ever, screaming “Let’s Go!” I wanted to end this battle as quickly as possible.

We both walked back to the starting hole and commenced a playoff, only the second playoff for a Men’s Open Title in PDGA History. It was going to be a show for the ages. We made our way to the teepad followed by an increasing number of spectators; the gallery increased to 2000+ as we walked by Tournament Central. I told Josh before we started the playoff, “Whomever wants it the most and deserves it the most is going to win today!” I wanted this more than anyone the entire week; I wanted this more than anyone in the World.

This playoff for the World Title was the most intense battle in Disc Golf that I have ever been a part of, yet the pressure seemed to turn into a deep feeling of intensity. We both started out with pars on Hole #1 as I threw what seemed to be an errant upshot which nearly stayed in bounds – I thought that I may have lost the tournament when I shanked the shot wide right. But fortunately, it stayed in play somehow. We both squandered opportunities on the first hole to win, so we proceeded. I made a good shot on Hole #2 leaving me a downhill 35’ foot putt for the win, and Josh threw his drive wide right and was forced to lay up on the treacherous side hill green. The thought of winning rushed over me as I contemplated just ending the tournament right there, right then. I looked over at Feldberg and asked him if I should run this putt, but got back a simple shake of the head which signified an obvious “No.” I took his advice and laid up the putt, to the obvious disbelief of many that watched. But because of there was a great possibility on a missed putt of hitting and rolling away, there was still a chance of losing and it just wasn’t the time for such action. I also didn’t want to take that chance, especially considering that we were going into the next 2 holes which happened to be the longest holes of the Final 9. I liked my chances, plus Josh had taken a bogey 5 on Hole #3 the last time, so the pressure was placed on him at that point. We both played the next hole well; I missed a long Eagle putt and we both carded easy birdies on the difficult uphill hole.

I could feel the intensity kick up a notch as I seemed to be almost running the course, always ready to throw the next shot. We both threw decent shots on Hole #4, leaving Josh with a routine approach which he placed about 20’ to the right while I had a really demanding approach around a group of trees between the basket and me. It was the moment of truth, this is what I might consider the most clutch shot that I threw the entire Final 9. I asked my father and caddy at the time what I should throw, especially in the conditions of a left to right crosswind and everything on the line. It was a demanding shot either way, but I didn’t like the chances of throwing the hyzer shot to the right under some branches with a crosswind that could push the shot to the ground short of the basket. The sidearm route was definitely the longer and more difficult of the two options, but it had the left to right crosswind helping to bring the shot back to the basket. We agreed that I should throw the sidearm – which I barely threw around the trees and almost hit the basket from my angle – as it skipped 20’ uphill looking back down toward the basket. We both hit our important birdie putts and moved to the next hole.

The next hole, Hole #5, is a low ceiling uphill shot that played around 300 ft with the elevation and wind conditions at the time. I threw my Blue Champion Firebird high and wide right but it fell short of the pin, and I could not believe how it seemed to drop right out of the air. Josh stepped up and threw a very similar shot but slightly lower that never faded back toward the basket as it drifted right to about 40 ft. pin high on the side hill.

It seemed as if every shot increased with importance as the playoff progressed. It was coming down to it; I could just feel it. I could not bear to watch as Josh lined up his long uphill putt and sailed his putt chain high, left side with no chance of going in.

I then approached my disc, which seemed to be a lot further away from the basket than when I saw it from the tee. It was about an 18 – 20 ft. slight uphill putt. I stepped away from my lie and took a deep breath, because I knew that this was my time. After 140 holes throughout the week, it was my chance to end the playoff. I gained my composure as I started to go through the motions, envisioning myself in the back yard putting, just making this same putt like I have done thousands of times before. I was just trying to make everything else disappear, the distractions and the people, and it was just the basket and me at this point.

I promised myself that I had to commit everything that I had to this putt, extending and reaching for that basket. I remember everything up to the point when I released the disc, and it was about half-way to the basket when I knew it was in. Time had frozen for that split second, and when everyone erupted, I let it all out right there as I let out a victorious roar. Val came running up and was the first to hug me as she leaped into the air and I caught her. Feldberg and my father were next, as I hugged them both at the same time. My mother could not stop screaming as she ran in circles beating on my arm. I picked her up and twirled in place, giving her the biggest hug that I could give. She is a Three-Time Disc Golf World Champion herself and knew just how it felt at this very moment. I could feel the emotions from everyone that got to witness and experience everything that Josh and I had just displayed. It is a World Championship that will be remembered for years to come.

It felt so surreal. I couldn’t believe that it was all happening at that moment. It was something that I have dreamt about since I was young, to become a Disc Golf World Champion. It made it extra special to win alongside my sister Valarie to become the first siblings to ever to be World Champions. She said during her Victory speech that she would give all her World Titles to see me get this one this year; that meant so much for me to hear that and know how badly she wanted to see me win. It meant a lot to me that my family and friends could be there with me, to support me throughout the week and celebrate victory in the end. It is something that has changed my life from that day forward, because it was my turn and I believed that I could win no matter what went down throughout the tournament. I knew that I was going to win the entire week because I wanted it more than anyone out there. It was my time and I knew it all along.

I had been told since I was young that I was destined to win a World Title. So many people truly believed it, and yet it took me years before I could actually realize it. I have had all the skill and all the ability to win; it was about putting that all together to make it happen. I really think the main reason was that I believed I could do it and I played fearlessly the entire week because I wanted to win so badly. I wanted to be a World Champion more than anything, and it was meant to happen through sheer will and determination.

Some think that winning the World Championships is everything, but winning the Worlds this past year is just a stepping stone for things to come. Because great things happen to great people and to those who want it most, with all the passion that they contain. You just got to believe.

Thanks to Pete Cashen for putting up the entire crew throughout Worlds. Thanks to my idol, “Crazy” John Brooks for inspiring me to play my best. Thanks to the amazing tournament staff that made the 2009 Worlds so incredible. Thanks to all of my Sponsors whom have always supported me and that make it possible to do what I love for a living. Thanks to Valarie for being an unbelievable sister and seeing the greatness in me long before the actual result; it meant more than anything for us to win the World Championships together. Thanks to my parents, Leroy and Sharon, whom have shown me the way, throughout life and in Disc Golf, I am grateful for everything that they have given and taught me. Thanks to all my friends and family that have supported me throughout the years and helped to make this dream of mine a reality.

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What a year! 2008 has gone down as my most successful disc golf season to date. I played in 28 PDGA Tournaments with 20 top 5′s and 9 wins (32% Winning Percentage), including 2 National Tour Wins at The Greater Tulsa Open and The Vibram Open and 5 Supertour Wins including an A-Tier Trifecta to finish off the year down South at the Corpus Christi Open, Oklahoma Open and Veterans Park Open. I kept my cash streak alive cashing in every tournament I played in 2008.

I have played more tournaments in one full season (46 tournaments in 2002), but this year I traveled more tour miles than any other year, accruing 80,000+ travel miles throughout the 2008 disc golf season (trust me it took some time to add up all of those miles). The distance I traveled is comparable to circling the planet 3.2 times with an average of 216 miles a day for the entire year. And that statistic doesn’t even take into account all the miles I walked on the golf course week in and week out. I calculated that I flew 60K by plane including some huge trips to Japanese and European Majors. The other 20K consisted of ground miles that I collected from driving the Tioga back and forth across the country including multiple trips with various friends to many tournaments throughout the year. I have never heard of travel miles throughout a disc golf season that compare to those numbers, please let me know if you have ever heard of anything comparable. For my efforts I led the PDGA Tour Points for the 2008 season.

I set my personal longest recorded throw at 695 feet (212 Meters) at the Big D in the Desert in Primm, NV this past April. I later tied my personal distance record of 695 feet at the World Disc Games Overall Event at the field of UCSC in Santa Cruz, CA this past July. I got to see my sister, Valarie, set the Women’s World Distance Record at 485 feet (148 Meters) – it was an amazing throw in the hot California desert. I also threw my longest non-official distance throw of 840+ feet in practice the afternoon before the actual Distance Competition the following day. With that throw and with many throws since, I now feel that I have a legitimate shot at breaking the World Distance Record at Big D in the Desert in 2010.

As far as other stats, I shot 6 Course Records including some huge rounds during my biggest tournaments of the year. I shot some scorching 2nd rounds at both The United States Disc Golf Championship and The Vibram Open to post 1085 rated rounds. I continue to get closer and closer to winning the prestigious USDGC, and I am confident that it will soon be mine. My highest rated round was my final round at the 2007 Memorial with a 1090 round rating to finish the tournament, which is still my highest rated round in my career to date.

I finished the year winning one-third of my events played and claiming $32,345 (2nd in PDGA Cash) in earnings. I played tournaments worldwide and claimed my first 2008 PDGA Points Title with 20,573 points. I remain to be currently ranked 4th in the World with a 1030 Player Rating which ranks at 10th in PDGA Ratings as I enter in to the 2009 disc golf season.

Full 2008 Tour Stats: Click Here

I got to witness my Sister, Valarie, and my best friend, Dave Feldberg, win World Titles this year in Kalamazoo, MI this past August. I also witnessed first–hand as my other best friend Nate Doss, held me off to claim his first USDGC Title. It was great to be a part of it all and very inspirational to see drive and hard work finally pay off. It makes my desire and passion to fulfill my biggest goals increase as I now see it as being very possible as year after year I have gotten closer to winning another Big PDGA Major. Now I want a Worlds and USDGC title more than ever.

Thanks to all my friends, family and travel companions throughout the year that have made my world travels possible and my disc golf dreams a reality. Here’s to an amazing 2009 season!

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After a long trip across the country following the USDGC, Steve Mills and I made a trip down to the great state of Texas to play some late season tournaments throughout the south. We stayed with our good friend Robbie Bratten at his apartment in Houston. We planned on staying there throughout the week and traveling to the tournaments on the weekends. I had planned to play a few Supertour events in the coming weeks such as The Corpus Christi Open, The Oklahoma Open and The Veterans Park Open. I had been looking forward to this trip for a long time, it was set to be an amazing time, I would not expect anything less.

The first tournament was the Corpus Christi Open in Corpus Christi, Texas, way down south – maybe the furthest south I have ever played Disc Golf – almost an hour from Mexico. Robbie, Steve and I rolled into town on Thursday night to be prepared to play all day on Friday. We stayed with Robbie’s cousin John Cook who plays Fullback for the Corpus Christi Arena Football Team, quite impressive but very understandable by his size and strength. He could probably play Pro Football in the NFL. We practiced the longer course in the morning and planned on playing doubles with Robbie on the shorter Ingleside course during the afternoon round. When I mean short, I mean really short – 12 of the 18 holes were short, spike hyzers over these small trees with one hole over 400 over water. Needless to say, we scorched the course with a 40 (-14) to tie for first place with Matt Hall and Erik Soete.

On the first day of the tournament, we played the shorter course for the first round. I shot a 47 (-7) that remained 3 strokes off the lead of Michael Olse, who shot a 44 (-10). We then played the longer course for the second round. I came out on fire and needed to make a move being that this was only a 3-round tournament. I played really solid and shot a 53 (-10) on 21 holes to best the next best score by 5 strokes to gain the lead by 3 strokes over Bratten going into Sunday. The third and final round on Sunday was held at the longer course consisting of the original 18 holes. I played really consistent but not great, missing some pretty routine, easy birdies on the back 9 to shoot a 45 (-9) to win by 6 strokes. Eric McCabe made a late surge the last round shooting a 43 (-11) to finish in a tie for 2nd with Devan Owens. Michael Olse finished 4th and Robbie Bratten finished with a strong 5th to round out the top 5 places.

We then headed back to Robbie’s place in Houston to rest up and play a few of the local courses throughout the week. Mills and I started a routine of working out in the morning and making use of the hot tub while Robbie was away during the day at school. It was great disc golf training and we dedicated an hour a day to putting in preparation for the next upcoming event in Oklahoma.

Robbie, Mills, Soete and I packed up the truck and left Houston Thursday afternoon. We arrived in Tulsa, OK really late Thursday night and made plans to stay at Mike Conner’s house located across from hole #17 at McClure Park. It was one of the best host locations on tour and couldn’t be any more convenient with the players meetings, the last round Sunday afternoon and the awards ceremony all in the same place right across the street. The Oklahoma Open consisted of 4 rounds on 4 courses: Blackhawk, Redhawk, Devillio, and McClure. I had played both Blackhawk and Redhawk during the Greater Tulsa Open National Tour event earlier in the year. We practiced 2 of the 4 courses (Blackhawk and McClure) on Friday and left the other 2 course for warm-up practice before each of the remaining rounds.

On Saturday morning we had a players meeting unlike any other as “Big Dave” played the national anthem on electric guitar. I would expect no less from a Twisted Flyer event. The tournament rounds started on Blackhawk where I played really solid coming into the last couple of holes, then sitting at -7 coming into the last 4 holes (16 thru 1). I scored a par 4 on the long, difficult hole 16 and then proceeded to miss birdie on the short hole 17. So I was still sitting good going into holes 18 and 1, which were great birdies and pretty routine par 3′s if the drives are off. My drives were just that, and I ended up with bogeys on both of those holes to finish 50 (-4) instead of -8 if I would have birdied the final 2 holes. So after 1 round I had a 2 stroke lead which kept the competition closer than I wanted. We then went on to play the easier Redhawk course that offered many more birdies and chances to go real low. I shot a mediocre 50 (-4) while Hatfield and McCabe each made up a stroke with 49′s (-5) and Robbie Bratten came in with the hot round at 47 (-7). Sunday was shaping up for quite the battle until the end.

The 3rd round started out at Devillio and Coda Hatfield was within 2 strokes heading into his other home course aside from McClure. All I had to do was remain in the lead going into the final round and see what happened down the stretch. I came out of the gates on fire, scoring -6 on the first 13 holes before cooling off. That’s when Coda took the opportunity to put the pressure on, shooting -4 on the last 5 holes and taking 6 strokes on me in the last 6 holes. He finished like I started and closed the gap to 1 stroke off the lead going into the last round. Like I knew it from the beginning, it was all going to go down during the final round at McClure.

So going into Coda’s home course leading by a stroke about to enter into the windiest rounds of golf that I have played all year long, it was going to take some great play to hold off Oklahoma’s best disc golfer. I could see that he liked his chances and like I said, it was going to be a battle. We both came out scoring birdie on the first 2 holes and I took advantage on hole 3 with another birdie as Coda took an unlikely bogey. I maintained the lead throughout the front 9 and played consistent on the back as Coda continued to display his great ability to make long putts. He kept it close going into the final hole, still 1 stroke back. He then threw an unfortunate drive off the tee that clipped a light post and carried across a park driveway and safely down the fairway in bounds. I sensed the chance to close the door on this tournament and played aggressively down the middle setting up a great chance at birdie to finish it out. Coda had a tough approach and could not get it close enough. He was then forced to run a 60 footer to put the pressure on, but came up short. I had an easy lay-up shot to the pin for the win. Hatfield retained 2nd place with McCabe finishing 3rd, Devan Owens 4th and Robbie Bratten holding on to 5th. With this tournament I remained undefeated this year in Oklahoma with a previous win at the Greater Tulsa Open. Thanks to Joe Rotan for running a premier Supertour event and I plan on coming back to defend my title. We all stopped for dinner and made the long trek back to Houston that night.

Mills and I spent another week in Houston playing some other local courses and preparing for another weekend of disc golf in Arlington, Texas at the Veterans Park Open. We played a really nice course in downtown Houston with some great views of the city skyline from almost every hole on the course. A definite must-see on disc golf travels through Houston. We left for Arlington on Friday morning and with a slight detour on waiting to pick up Matt Hall on the way through, we arrived at Veterans Park with enough time to get in a practice round before heading Brian Mace’s apartment for the night.

The tournament started on Saturday morning on the shorter of the 24-hole layouts. I played great shooting a 60 (-12) to lead the tournament by 2 strokes over Eric McCabe and Miles Seaborn, and Steve Mills shot one of his best rounds of the season with a 63 (-9) that was rated at 1013. The 2nd round the course remained in the same layout but for some reason I didn’t play as well due to the wind picking up for the afternoon round or the 48 golf holes that we ended up playing in one day. I shot a 62 (-10) to remain in the lead by 2 strokes over McCabe while Coda Hatfield shot a 60 (-12) to move up to within 3 strokes of the lead. So it would be another “Texas Shootout” heading into the 3rd and final round on Sunday.

On Sunday morning they moved all the pins to their longest locations to make for the VPO Championship layout. I was more than ready for the challenge. The final round lead card consisted of Eric McCabe, Coda Hatfield, Nolan Grider, Robbie Bratten and myself, setting the stage for some great competition on a really challenging course. I played really aggressively on the front 12 holes and remained in the lead by a single stroke over McCabe. He made some clutch birdies to gain 2 strokes down the stretch to force me to turn it on the remaining 5 holes as I got a few strokes back to still hold the lead by a single throw.

It all came down to the final hole (yet again back to back weeks). It was a unique hole out to the corner of the park at 420′ with a small Out of Bounds rock wall surrounding the entire backside of the green within 20′ of the basket. The preferred shot is a roller and McCabe had this shot dialed. I have had trouble with this hole throughout the weekend carding pars both times; McCabe had the definite advantage coming into this hole and had a chance to tie it up if I failed to birdie. I decided to throw a roller this time, to trust it to stay in bounds for the closer and the win. The shot came out hot and headed right for the pin, within 3 feet to the left cruising right past and heading for the small raised wall separating the green from the OB. It hit the wall with great force, shot into the air, hitting the wall on the way down to fall back in bounds by a foot. McCabe had to chance the same shot and put pressure on me to make that putt. His shot did the very same thing, rolling by even closer to the basket, hitting the rock wall and barely staying in bounds. McCabe stepped up to his 20′ and made it, forcing me to hit my putt. I stepped up to an 18′ putt with a consistent head/cross wind that caused me to take a little more time on the putt. I went through the motion and knocked it down for the one stroke win to cap off the A-tier Trifecta in the 3 consecutive tournament weekends throughout the South. It was a hard-fought battle until the end, and McCabe played great to force the win on the final hole of competition.

It was an amazing 3 week tour all made possible by lots of people along the way. Special thanks first and foremost to Robbie Bratten for everything from a place to stay throughout the tour, travel to all 3 tournaments and for all the great times that we shared day in and day out enjoying what Texas had to offer. Thanks to John Cook in Corpus Christi, Mike Conners in Tulsa and Brian Mace for providing us with a place to stay throughout the tournament weekends, it saved us a lot of money and made for a great time. Thanks to Steve Mills for being a great travel partner throughout the 2 month tour from USDGC Doubles through the VPO, you played well and had multiple finishes in the top 10 for the first time at some good Supertours. He learned some valuable lessons along the way and now understands that being a Professional Touring Disc Golfer is not easy. And last but not least, thanks for all the tournament directors of those events that made arrangements for me to be able to attend their great Supertour events. I had a blast the entire time, played some great golf over the 3 week span to an average round rating of 1033 and made $3520 for the 3 Supertour victories for the A-Tier Trifecta.

Next Tournament: Tupelo Bay Open – Myrtle Beach, SC

12/03/08

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On Monday morning following the USDGC Doubles event, the Clash DVD crew drove out to Hornets Nest Disc Golf Course to finish the Clash taping that we tried to complete on the previous Friday but couldn’t due to the rainy weather. Billy Crump organized the competitors for this video – Barry Schultz, Eric McCabe, Brian Schweberger, Michael Johansen, Kevin McCoy and myself for the first of its kind – Worst Shot Doubles at Hornets Nest. It was formatted to be random draw for partners, and then both players on each team were to throw and the worst shot would be determined by the other groups. The play continued shot for shot until both players on the team made the putt to complete the hole. Yes, both players have to make the putt which is very difficult especially if your partner is a great putter – and that adds to the pressure.

We all flipped for partners and here’s how that went down: Schultz got teamed up with McCabe, Schweberger paired up with Johansen and I got the pleasure of being matched up with my good friend Kevin McCoy. The teams were solid. No matter how everyone got paired up it was going to be quite the battle on a tougher course for a worst shot formatted doubles. It was going to take some amazing play to beat out the Schweberger/Johansen team, which I considered to be the favorite considering that you could pair up Johansen with just about anyone to be a great team for the fact it was his home course. He knows these holes better then everyone combined. I made jokes about that the entire round.

So the show was about to begin. One thing that came to mind was that I was teamed up with the only player that did not play doubles over the weekend and I was concerned about how well he knew this particular course considering how long it has been since he has played it due to him starting a family and having a child in the last year or so. But rest assured – it’s Kevin McCoy, no matter how long it has been, he can always play well and he makes up for that by being a phenomenal putter.

I don’t want to ruin the story line of the DVD for everyone, but let me say that it was a battle throughout the entire round. It’s unlike any other doubles round because you could not rely on your partner to make great shots; a majority of the pressure was placed on yourself to perform or in many cases not mess up when it matters most. It is a very exciting video that plays with the players throwing skills, shot making abilities and a solid, calm patience to enable the best doubles team to become victorious that day. Look for the release of the video sometime near Christmas, like always I will keep everyone posted.

My parents, Leroy and Sharon, arrived that night into Rock Hill to attend their very first USDGC ever. I was glad that they could make the trip down after all the years that they have heard what a great tournament it was. I took them by the Innova East Factory on Tuesday morning to look through some discs and other rarities that you can get from the factory, including browsing1000′s and 1000′s of discs. I love going to factory when I get the opportunity once a year. We spent nearly 3 hours there. All of us went out to the Winthrop course later that afternoon to get in a Team Jenkins practice, just me and the family, never would have thought. It was great to show them the signature holes and the great landscape on the USDGC course, holes that they have only seen on video up to that point. It was a great practice day at the US Open.

We attended the Tournament Players Meeting that night, where they awarded the Golden Rake to deserving members Bill Jacobson and Lisa McDaniel for all of their hard work and continuous support of the USDGC year in and year out. The Tournament Director Jonathan Poole gave a brief history of the event and recited a very inspirational speech that I took to heart, hanging on every word. This was going to be my year, I could just feel it. They then began to call out the First Round Tee Times with groups starting at 7 am, keeping players on the edge of their seats and crossing their fingers that they get an 11 am or later tee time when the grass is dry and when it is warmer out. I got hooked up with a 9:20 am tee time, early enough to get out there before any kind of wind starts up but late enough where I don’t have to warm up in the morning fog. We all then collected our annual USDGC Players package, where we each received a really nice Huk Lab sweatshirt, a personalized t-shirt and caddie bib and a clear 1st-run Boss all contained in a custom USDGC graphics cooler -some of the nicest players packages that we get all year.

The first round of competitive play started on Wednesday morning. I got out there about 2 hours early to ensure a complete throwing and stretching warm up with enough time to get in a solid half hour of putting. I would rather have too much time on the practice field then not enough. Plus I throw lots of shots to make sure that I am ready for longer shots that I will be throwing during the round when each shot counts for so much. I was feeling good, but not as pumped up as I usually am for the start of the USDGC, not sure why. I approached the tee at the designated time and my Father was there to caddy for me every step of the way.

I came out of the gates on fire carding birdies on 2 of the first 3 holes; this was the start that I was looking for. I came into hole 4 sitting 2 down and looking to finish out the front 9 way under par. But I think that I may have looked too far ahead. I threw a bad sidearm off the tee and had to lay up where I would have a great look at throwing the spike over the trees for a par on the par 4. I threw the spike but I guess that I did not account for the tighter OB surrounding the trees around the green area. The shot hit the top of the trees and rolled back into the OB. No need to worry at that point, I just needed to throw in up there for a putt to walk with a bogie, but instead I decided to throw the shot a bit long to avoid another OB and missed the putt coming back, scoring a 7 on the hole. That quickly moved me from 2 down to 1 over in the matter of one hole, unbelievable. That was the hole that changed my thought process for the entire round and made me realize that this was for real. I cannot take any of these shots for granted. Never.

I played a pretty consistent front 9 carding birdies on the next 4 holes. I had some bad breaks as well as some bad rollaways to score 2 over on the back 9, including 3 bogeys and 2 doubles with 5 out-of-bounds throws to shoot a mind-numbing 67 on the course par 68. I could not believe that at that moment I had just carded a 1 down during one of the largest tournaments in the game at an event I have been waiting for this entire year, with everything short of a miracle I basically just shot myself out of any chance of winning the US Open. I had more OB’s the opening round then I had the entire tournament last year, and it was by far my worst round that I have scored there in years. It was almost too much to take at the time. All that I could do was take out my frustrations on the distance fields for the USDGC Distance qualifier.

I arrived down at the fields feeling absolutely crushed, but still knew that everything that happened out there was my doing and I was the only one that could bring it all back. It was all on me. I showed up at the qualifier a little early to watch some throws and get some great wind reads. The wind was better than most years; it seemed to be mostly tailwind at times. I was the 12th player to throw and that I did – really far. My first 2 throws were decent, but nothing to get me qualified as of yet. The 3rd throw was a smooth turn-around that caught perfectly and flew out the entire length of the field and then some to take the top qualifying spot at the time at approx. 660 feet. Now that’s how you take out some aggression. That made me feel just a little bit better about the day, but not completely. We went back to the hotel to prepare for the round that I had to face the following day.

This was going to be the day where I could change it all, and I kind of had to in the position that I was sitting in the tournament. I was currently in 43rd in the tournament and there was nowhere to go but up, way up. This day of warm-up was a lot more intense; I was throwing better then the day before and I had more motivation. I had something to prove. I had a great 4-some to start the 2nd round and that always means a lot to have good friends on the same card. It keeps me easy-going and less stressedWe approached the starting tee and I was ready to do this the right way.

I birdied the first 3 holes to start the round and thought nothing of it, I was on a mission. I soon approached my nemesis hole from the day before, good old hole #4. I played it really, really safe and walked away with a conservation par, saving 3 strokes from the first round. Off to a great start. I proceeded to shoot a consistent, clean front 9 going 6 down. I now had my work cut out for me as I approached the fierce back 9 that can destroy all those who do not respect it, in short it contains some of the hardest and most difficult holes on the entire course. I threw all of my shots precisely and on the mark to all of the locations I wanted to land off the tee. I then proceeded to make a bunch of solid putts on 10, 11, 12 and 13 to go 4 down with an eagle on 12. I played out the rest and birdied 15 and 16, with a par on the island green of hole 17. I had played the round mistake-free and laid up the tee shot on 17 just to insure an OB-free, bogey-free round. So a par was just fine at the time.

Hole 18 is a difficult birdie but a pretty standard par if you can keep all of your shots in bounds, and that’s exactly what I needed to do, play it safe and finish the round. So I picked the safest shot that I could choose on such a difficult tee-shot, the sidearm plays perfectly into the side hill ideally giving a great look at a comfortable approach shot and hopefully a birdie. Except for this time, the shot flew great off my hand and landed just where I wanted it but the misfortune of disc landing on a side hill caused it to stand and roll down the hill OB. This round was not to be as planned. I marked the stray shot back in bounds and threw the approach 15 feet from the basket to save par. It was everything that I could ask out of a round as I played absolutely perfect going into the last hole to shoot the New Winthrop Gold Course Record at a scorching score of 55. Just what I was looking for, an unbelievable round that went as planned shot for shot, hole for hole. I only made a few mistakes that I could have capitalized on, but I could not ask for much more after the round that I shot the day before. I was not to be outdone, but Nate Doss made claims to the course record as he came into the clubhouse with an amazing 55 as well. Two of the best rounds ever shot on that course during the very same round, I could have never imagined that to happen, it was meant to be. So now that I was back in the hunt to win it all, I felt a little more at ease with my position in the tournament. I moved up 40 spots in just one round and I was now just 6 strokes back of the lead.

It was now time to regain my UDSGC Distance title from 2006 against some of the longest throwers in the game. The top 5 qualifiers that made it to the finals were Jussi Meresma, Robbie Bratten, Garett Gurthie, Linus Astrom and myself. The event was held at this huge outdoor soccer complex the size of 3 fields in the evening under the lights, which made for an epic showdown on this cold autumn night. The first round consisted of five shots each with each player taking their longest recorded throw before moving into the final round of five throws. The longest throw of the 10 throws was to be determined the winner. The first round I had unleashed some great turnaround distance shots but none of the discs that I threw seemed to fly out the way that they did the day before due to the cold temperatures and the slight wind. I led the first round with a mediocre 507. Gurthie threw some great shots in the second round to push us into a throw-off for the tie at 507, Bratten at 592, Astrom at 477 and Meresma at 453. Gurthie and I were both granted 5 more shots to determine the Distance Champion. I have been thinking about this event all year long and this was the time to regain my title. I was throwing some of the biggest, longest shots of the night, so it seemed, but because of the conditions of the night the discs just didn’t seem to fly no matter how hard we threw. There is definitely something to be said about the physics of disc flight when the air temperatures are less than ideal. I could not believe that the longest throw up to that point was only 507 feet after we both qualified with distances of 660+, it was unreal. Gurthie threw a couple great shots during the sudden death finals to edge me out for the second straight year. He is a great distance thrower and he definitely proved that as he claimed his deserving title as this year’s USDGC Distance Champion. I congratulated him and I look forward to many more head to head distance battles in the future.

The 3rd round started on Friday morning; it was my debut to the prestigious lead card with Nate Doss -20, John E. McCray -16, Barry Schultz -14 and myself -14. I came out of the gates scoring a birdie on 4 of the first 5 holes with a lone bogey on 3 after an errant shot that strayed out of bounds. I ended -3 on the front 9 holes, falling another stroke off the lead but gaining strokes on the rest of the card totie for 2nd. I played a conservative, safe back 9 with birdies on 16 and 18 to finish it up to shoot a -5 for the round. I shot a total of -8 to score a 60 for the round to remain in solo 3rd but taking 2 strokes off the lead to remain 4 strokes back. Wait this is confusing. You said you shot -5 but then said you shot -8. Be more clear that you meant -3 on the first nine and -5 on the back nine to finish -8 for the round with a solid 60. It was all going to come down to the last and final round.

This was the round that was going to change everything. This was the closest that I have been to a USDGC title going into the final round and I was more than ready to put on a show. The scores for the lead group were Nate Doss -26, Ken Climo -23, Myself -22 and Paul McBeth -21. It was going to be a battle until the end, and everyone on this lead card had a chance to win on a course this fierce where strokes can be given on any one of these holes. Whoever made the least amount of mistakes was going to win it all. It all comes down to this: playing on the lead group in the final round of the USDGC, with every shot counting for everything. I came out on fire parking Hole 1 and then proceeded to birdie 5 of the first 7 holes with a lone bogey on hole 5 due to an errant tee shot that forced me to play out the rest of the hole safe to avoid going out of bounds. I ended up shooting -5 on the front 9, going on to hole 10 still remaining 4 strokes behind Doss and pulling into solo 2nd past Climo. It started to heat up on hole 11 as I threw my approach within 40 feet and waited for Nate as his roller approach into the green barely made it back in bounds. He then proceeded to have his first putt rim out and roll to within in inches of OB. His second putt for par again rimmed out and rolled down the hill and towards OB to stop within inches. I stepped to my 40-footer, knowing how bad I needed it to catch him. I lined it up and cashed it for birdie in front of the giant gallery. Doss then stepped to his pressure putt 28-footer and cashed that for bogey. I moved to within 2 strokes with 7 holes remaining; this was the time and it all came down to these final holes.

I threw a pretty routine drive on the long par 5 hole 12, and lined up a long 430+ approach with a line-drive Excaliber that took a huge skip past the pin and rolled out just outside the circle. Doss then stepped to his approach to throw an amazing hyzer that settled with 15 of the basket. I lined up the eagle putt with the slight head wind and left it an inch low to leave me with a drop in birdie as Doss got a stroke back with a standard eagle 3. We continued to streak through the next couple of holes as Doss played great and took one stroke per hole as he birdied holes 13 and 14 and scored a par on 15 to take back a 5 stroke lead going into the last 3 holes, almost too many strokes with that many holes. There was only one thing to do at that point: I had to birdie out and see what Doss would do on Hole 17. I still had a chance. I then birdied the 391 foot hole 16 with a massive sidearm hyzer that spiked within 10 feet for the drop in.

It was all going to come down to Hole 17, which happened to be a lot less frightening this year compared to last for the fact that the player was not charged with a stroke penalty for an OB shot, it was only considered a BunCR and the player would just re-throw from the tee until a shot landed safe inbounds. So Doss would have to miss the island green 5+ times for me to tie him going into hole 18. I stepped to the tee and threw a Whippet-X sidearm and it cut rolled back to the pin on impact for the drop-in birdie. Doss then threw a smooth putter shot that settled down safely on the green and inbounds. He laid up the upshot and scored a par on the hole to pretty much seal the deal. I made a great tee shot on hole 18 and got up and threw an accurate approach into the pin. I was asking Schweberger as I walked up the 18th fairway what the 2nd card did for the round and if I had to run the putt if left with a longer downhill putt. He said that I had no worries and I had a secure 2nd place by 4 strokes over 3rd. Doss played out the hole super safe and conservative with a lay-up shot that he slid up to the pin. I stepped up to my 15 footer to claim 2nd place yet again for the second straight year. Doss dropped in to assure the victory as the gallery exploded with applause. It was a memorable moment that I will not soon forget; it was a battle until the end and a much deserved win for my good friend Nate Doss. It could not have happened to a better person in the world, he played like a Champion all week long.

I had an amazing time as always at this year’s United States Disc Golf Championships, it still remains one of my favorite tournaments year in and year out. This tournament will be mine someday; it will be my passion and the reason for my drive to be the best. Who knows how it would have ended if I had started this year’s first round just a little better, I want it more than ever now. It was even better to have my parents present at the event this year and my father caddying for me all four rounds made it even better. I wanted to win for them so bad, but they were still amazed how it all finished in the end. At least they got to see me own the stage and dominate at the Showcase Distance Finals over Winthrop Lake, quite the show for those that know. When you leave a tournament like that, you just can’t wait to get back. It will be a tournament that I will dream about until I once again get my chance to win it all. Until next year……………………………

Next Tournaments: The Texas/OK Tour – Corpus Christi, OK Open and VPO

11/18/08

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So I arrived in Charlotte, NC on Wednesday night before the start of the USDGC Doubles Championship. I made the 8 hour drive down from Ohio with my friend Steve Mills and pulled up to Billy Crump’s house to spend the weekend. Feldberg, Climo and Schultz just arrived that day as well, early enough to get some rounds in at Winthrop Gold, Renaissance and Honests Nest in preparation for the Doubles event. The Doubles Teams were Feldberg and I, Schultz and Schweberger, Climo and Brinster, and Orum and Barsby to name a few. It was due to be a super competitive doubles competition on some technical Carolina courses.

Thursday we made a trip out to Wintrop the very next day to get in a solid day of wind practice in preparation for the doubles and for the singles later on the following week. It might have been the most wind that I have ever experienced on that course, making hole 17 one of the hardest holes ever just trying to land a shot in play anywhere on the green. The ropes seemed the tightest that they have ever been on many of the holes making the course at least 2 to 3 strokes harder in my opinion with a lot of the OB’s closer to many of the downhill slopes and surrounding many of the baskets.

On Friday, Billy Crump made arrangements to record a Worst-Shot Doubles Clash out at Hornets Nest but it was cancelled that morning due to mass amounts of rain that we experienced throughout the night into the remainder of the next day. Not the kind of weather that you want to worst shot doubles in, we also did not want to damage the expensive video equipment. We put off the video until Monday morning so that we could show the course at its best in better conditions.

The USDGC Doubles Championship started on Saturday morning at Hornets Nest in the downpour rain. Some teams decided not to play due to the weather and due to the amount of teams that actually signed up. Climo had to pull out of the event due to a hip injury and did not want to risk hurting it worst with the start of USDGC the following week. So Brinster teamed up with Ken “Tank” Franks that morning to join in on the action. The rain soon let up after the pre-round warmups.

The first round we started off playing an alternate shot format on Hornets Nest, being one of the tighter woods courses on tour. We played pretty consistent only missing a few drives and putts throughout the round, it that placed us in 3rd place after the first round of play shooting a 52. Michael Johansen and Jeremy Koling were leading the pack with a 47.

The 2nd round was played out at Renaissance Park, a great combination of wooded to moderately woods holes with a few shots to open up on throughout the round. That round was a straight up best shot doubles format and we were paired up with Disc Golf Legends – Stan McDaniel and Joe Mela. It was a Stan McDaniel designed course, so he knew that course better then anybody and it definitely showed as they shot a 51 for the round. We edged them out during the round shooting a mediocre 50 with lots of missed opportunities. Johansen and Koling shot a 50 as well to retain the lead with Will Schusterick and Kris Orrick shooting a 50 to move up to 2nd place 4 strokes off the lead. We remained in 3rd place still 5 strokes back going into the 3rd and final round at Winthrop Gold.

The 3rd round was held at the Winthrop Gold (USDGC) course, which for those that dont know, it is one of the most challenging and most difficult courses in the world. It has lots of of par 4′s and 5′s, with lots of open holes but also lots of OB on every hole. Trust me, its as good as it gets. We were paired up with McDaniel and Mela for the final round, what a pleasure, we could not ask for a better pairing for a doubles event. The doubles format for this round was best disc, which is a format where both players play the hole and best score between the two is then recorded. So it gives lots of opportunity to score well and it was probably the best format for us especially on this course where we have the most experience as compared to the teams ahead of us.

We battled through the first 5 holes only shooting at -3 down at that point, we didn’t start to really heat up until the back 9 holes where we birdied 7 of the last 9 holes to shoot a solid 57, but we both knew that it was probably not going to be good enough with the strength of some of the teams out there. We saw the lead card absolutely tearing it up, but no one was to say what they were shooting at the time. At the end, Schultz and Schweberger shot an amazing 54 to come back to take the temporary one stroke lead on Feldberg and I until Schusterick and Orrick came in the clubhouse with a solid 56 to hold them off for a one stroke win. So we finished 3rd place 2 strokes off of 1st and 1 stroke off of 2nd.

Congratulations to Kris Orrick and Will Schusterick for being the 1st Annual USDGC Doubles Champions!!!

It was a great weekend and we played some great golf on some challenging courses. I know that we should have shot a lot better the first couple of rounds on the wooded courses especially on those layouts. It was not exactly what we expected but they played great and totally deserved the hard fought win. Thanks to the Bill Jacobson and Charlotte Disc Golf Club for hosting and running this Annual Doubles tournament. Looking forward to next years USDGC Doubles event.

USDGC Singles Coming Soon…………………………..

10/28/08

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So we arrived into Boston after returning from Sweden where we spent the last two weeks on the EuroTour. The Swedish tournaments were amazing and had some consistent finishes in both the Stockholm Open (5th) and the Scandinavian Open (4th). Our good friend Tim Walsh picked us up and provided us with a place to stay with his family throughout the weekend.

On Thursday (July 24) I celebrated the big 3-0 and spent the day playing doubles designed for the top four players in National Tour points in attendance at the tournament. Dave and I were the obvious doubles team along with Schultz and McCabe being the other team. The tournament then organized a doubles qualifier where Sprague, Olson and Pete Johnson became the final team as a triple team. They all threw tee shots and then were allowed to choose the best shot and that player was then not allowed the following shot. It preceded on from that point until the hole was finished. We played a stableford doubles points format where the teams were awarded 10 pts foran eagle, 3 pts for a birdie, 0 pts for a par, -1 pts for a bogey and -2 for a double bogey or worse. Long story short, Dave and I played decent but due to that type of format and limited chances at eagle placed 3rd. We still walked away with some appearance fees and enjoyed our time getting another practice round in before the start of the tournament.

The Vibram Open tournament consisted of 3 rounds of 18 holes on the Maple Hill course at the location of the MSDGC (Marshall Street Disc Golf Championships) on three consecutive days. The course consisted of a huge tee shot on Hole #1 600+ over the famous Maple Hill pond. It had lots of technical par 4′s in the woods and it opened up on the back nine with some longer field shots that set up for lots of great birdie attempts. It ended on an epic Hole #18 550+ uphill with an island green that either forces the player to go for the eagle or lay up for the par, lots of risk-reward opportunities on every hole.

On Friday I had an early start and prayed that it would not rain much like the previous days of torrential down pour showers. I played a consistent opening round with 5 birdies and one bad hole that tested my patience in the middle of the round with a 5 on a par 3. I finished the round with a solid 56 to soon be surpassed by a new course record score of 54 shot by Feldberg. Val had a tough opening round shooting a 71 putting her 5 strokes off the lead to start.

On Saturday I was fortunate enough too a late tee time and take some time to catch up on some well deserved sleep. I got to the course early enough to watch as Val, Dave and Tournament Director Steve Dodge got interviewed by a local news crew for a sports piece on disc golf. I continued to warm up and was ready to play a much cleaner round then the previous day, there were strokes that I left out there in the first round that I wanted back and I was determined to get them. I started the round shooting 4 down after 6 holes and 7 down after 10 holes. I was on record setting pace and tried not to think about it at any time. I missed putts on #11 and #12, recording pars on each. I then shredded the remainder of the course with birdies on 5 of the last 6 holes with a missed putt par on #17. I crushed the tee shot on the uphill #18 to set up for an easy layup shot for birdie to finish the round. I ended up shooting the new course record of 51 rated 1085 with the 3 missed putts which would have put me well above an 1100 rated round. It was nearly a perfect round and by far the best round that I have shot in a while. It felt amazing making all of those shots and playing like I know how to play, solid and consistent throughout the entire round.

That round put me in the lead by 3 strokes over 2nd place and 9 strokes over 3rd place, it was setting up to be an amazing final round on Sunday. After the round we headed over to a golf driving range down the road for a long drive contest that displayed not only distance but accuracy as well. They set up three throwing stations and a 700′+ rope down the middle of the fairway to measure the accuracy of the shots. The throws were recorded for their distance and subtracted half of the distance from the line for the total distance. I by far threw the farthest shot of the competition but it was far from being close to the line. Henry Childress from Innova won the event with Robbie Bratten placing a close 2nd. The tournament also hosted a putting contest where the qualifying players were judged but the creativity and presentation of their showcase putting skills. Our gracious host, Tim Walsh won the putting contest with a back-flip off the table putt to take the title. It was a great event to watch with lots of high-flying putts and a putting demonstration I have never seen before. I can not wait until I see the video, it was awesome.

On Sunday I came out feeling refreshed and ready to play that challenging course. It was Feldberg, Adam Olsen, Paul Ulibarri and myself on the lead card for the final round. It was really close at the 3rd and 4th spots where there would be a battle for at least 5 people throughout the round, as for the top spot it was only a battle between Dave and I for the win. We started at a great pace and quickly separated ourselves within the first 6 holes making it a race to the finish throughout the front nine. I played solid throughout making very little mistakes and keeping a great birdie pace. I had gained few stokes after the water hole on #8, leading by 6 stokes at that point with 10 holes to play. I never looked back as I tried to hold composure and finish the task that I set out to do. I had heard halfway through the round that Val had made up the 3 stroke deficit going into the round and was leading by 3 strokes going into the last hole. For all of those that know, it is usually either one or the other that win during the weekend, it has been a rarity that both of us win on the same weekend. On all of my victories this year Val has taken losses for some odd reason, its a karma thing where we tap into each others energy and there is only so much for the both of us. But is was going to happen.

I missed a few opportunities down the stretch to birdie and finished really solid leading by 9 strokes going into the last hole. Feldberg secured 2nd by 6 stokes earlier in the round and was just having fun with it as he whistled along after every tee shot and putt. I threw a great tee shot up to the middle of the fairway and tried an aggressive sidearm approach to the island green but unfortunately threw OB and missed the putt. I waited until everyone finished out the hole and tapped out to take the much anticipated victory winning by 7 strokes over 2nd and 13 strokes over 3rd place. It was my second National Tour event victory of the year with another win at Tulsa, OK earlier in the spring.

It was a Jenkins National Tour Sweep. We have won B-tiers and supertours together before, but this was our first NT victory together. We kept the Marshall Street tradition alive by taking a victory dive into the Maple Hill pond. Throughout the years I have seen other players play amazing rounds on there birthday, I have only ever got an NT ace on my birthday a few years back in Minnesota. It was an amazing birthday weekend that I will never forget and a present to myself that I felt I really deserved. I can not wait until the Vibram Open DVD comes out sometime this fall, I will keep everyone posted on its release. Thanks to Steve Dodge for hosting one of the best tournaments that I have played all season, he is setting the bar and raising the level of National Tour events. Thanks again to the Walsh family for opening their home to us throughout the week and providing us with some relaxing accommodations. And a special thanks to Tracy Bratten who came all the way from NYC to caddie for me all weekend long, I have been victorious at every tournament that she has been in attendance.

I will play my best at this upcoming World Championships, looking for another Jenkins Sweep.

Next Tournament: The PDGA World Championships – Kalamazoo, MI

8/6/08

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We cruised down with the parents and led the caravan with our friends Chris Barbo, Rob Nitzsche and Mel Martin, down to Kentucky on Thursday. It gave us the whole day to practice both courses on Friday to prepare for the tournament. The first course was a past favorite, Banklick Woods, a course that I have not played in over 9 years, back when I won a huge Supertour there playing Advanced AM, great memories on that course. It has a great mix of open to wooded holes with some great elevation changes and a few holes with steep drop-offs with OB water past the basket. All in all a pretty solid course, on a course such as this there was a chance to shoot -24 with every hole being reachable by the majority of the field, a true birdie-fest. Not saying that it was a short course by any means, but there was a great potential to go really low if the putter was hot for a round or two.

The Pros started out at Banklick Woods on Saturday with 2 rounds of 24 holes. The weather was decent, but the threat of regional showers had us carrying our umbrellas the whole day. At a tournament such as this I was lucky enough to have my good friend Derek “D-Bonn” Bonner drive down from North Detroit to caddy for me the entire day. I started off the first round great, taking birdies on the first 3 holes, but I came into a drought on the some of the wooded holes to follow. There were so many chances for birdie on every single hole, so I picked up a few in the middle of the course and a few more toward the end of the round to finish 65 (-7), not good. David Cox and Matt Blakely had shot the hot rounds with 60 (-12) and 61 (-11) to start the tournament, I had some work to do.

At the start of the second round, the rain started and the wind picked up as soon as 2-minutes was called, definitely not a good sign at that point. I struggled through the second round and just could not get anything going, I could not believe all the birdies that I was leaving out there on such a course. I also knew that if I was not scoring, someone out there was probably tearing it up. I finished the second another 65 (-7) and with a total of -14 on 48 holes. Blakely came in with the hot round of the tournament thus far with a great 57 (-15), giving him a total of -26 for the day, leaving me 12 strokes back. I could never imagine being back by that many shots on such a course after 2 rounds, I was more then frustrated and very angry at that point, I could not have played any worst.

As I was walking up the hill to turn the cards in I noticed a guy setting up a Guts court right out front on tournament central, he was just waiting to get some practice in and he came to the right place. For those that don’t know, Guts is a sport played between two teams of one to five players each. The objective is to be the first team to score 21 points. To start play, each team lines up facing each other 14 m apart. Play is accomplished by a player attempting to throw the disc toward or at the opposing team and within the reach of at least 1 player of that team, in such a manner that the opposing team cannot make a clean catch. Scoring is contingent on the success or failure of the throwing team. A good throw, without a catch, results in a point for the throwing team and a bad throw results in a point for the receiving team (gutsfrisbee.com). A very interesting sport, a favorite of mine for the fact that I get to throw a frisbee as hard as possible at someone and try to have them catch it, gotta love that. He was there to have players throw at him, what better place then a disc golf tournament.

As I stepped up, Brad Schick shouted “Avery, Light him up”, and I did just that as I really started to unleash some shots on the bulls-eye shirt that he was wearing. He probably caught 3 or 4 of the 50 shots that I threw his way, but throwing into the head-wind was causing a lot of the shots turn over quick, keep in mind that I was throwing 119 gram frisbee. The head-wind was tough to throw into to but it was helping him out because it was slowing down the shots as they were coming in. I had him switch so that I would take the tailwind side and now I had the wind at my back. I started by not throwing as hard and giving him some good practice shots to the body and then picked up the shot speed. Then I started to unleash so 360-turnarounds and at that point he had no chance of catching any of them, he got his hands on a lot of them but was just unable to hold on. He actually had to switch from baseball batting gloves to work gloves because of the toll the discs were taking on his hands. I was more then impressed that was holding up to the abuse, but was always eager for more because thats what Guts is all about. It turns out that he was a past Guts World Champion and it was an honor to gun some shots at him. No better way to uncork some of the frustrations from the golf course. It was a long night thinking about how I was 12 strokes back of the lead, but anything was possible at course that we were playing next.

On Sunday morning I was ready to finally start playing some good golf. The second course that we were playing was Idlewild, a course that I heard about for years from lots of people that deemed it one of the favorite courses that they have ever played. It lays out at a total 8220 ft with 10 of the holes being over 400+ feet with many holes being par 4′s and 5′s for a total par 72. This course is definitely one of the most difficult courses that I have ever played but not for all out distance but because shot placement and positioning was so crucial on this type of course. Although a few holes really gave me the advantage of going over the top and cutting the corners to avoid placement shots and laying up on holes, I hate laying up. Some of the holes had slight elevation changes and lots of different turning fairways that made you really work and manipulate the disc through some tight gaps of many of the par 4′s. It was definitely my kind of course, a course where you had to throw big when needed and throw clean drives and upshots in order to score, a battle against par.

I went out there on Sunday morning looking to score, not knowing what was considered a great score. I played solid on the par 4′s and 5′s, always looking to beat the par for the hole and take advantage of the distance shots when possible. I scored on a majority of the par 3′s and went bogey free in the 3rd round to shoot the best round of 64 (-8) beating the whole lead card. The leader shot a 70 (-2) giving me back 6 strokes and cutting the lead in half, now being 6 strokes back on tough course such as Idlewild, sign me up. It felt like a decent round but I knew that I could have played much better and felt like I could have easily scored in the 50′s with corrections on a few of the most difficult holes. I moved up to 3rd place at -22 joining the lead card of Matt Blakely -28, Bill Themm -22 and David Cox -21 for the final round. And I being the only Innova player in attendance, I had to represent.

The 4th round started just as the clouds moved into town and delivering a non-stop rain that continued throughout the entire final round. I just kept to the game plan, didn’t let the rain effect me and I was set to battle back a amazing comeback. I started off gaining a stroke back on each of the first 3 holes narrowing the lead to 3 strokes, feeling the lead was in reach. I kept the pressure on but it was going to be a hard fought battle to get back into this one. I gained another stroke along the way after a series of birdies and pars by both Blakely and I after the front 9 and only 2 strokes back at the half way point. Hole 10 was 610 ft in length with a huge dog-leg right where most players lay up to the corner at 280 ft. They then line up 90 degress to the right to throw through a narrow fairway to the basket at 320 ft over a hill to the left. I skip all of that hassle and throw a huge flex over the top to the right and try to get one to plane out for a look at eagle or an easy upshot for birdie. The rest of the group laid up and tried to throw the fairway, but not all successful, I took an easy 3 and gained the strokes back to tie for the lead. It was now time to gain the lead and did just that on the next hole carding a 3 while Blakely had some trouble off the tee and produced a 6, giving the first lead of the weekend. From that point on I did not look back and ran through the course never changing the game plan and continued in attack mode throughout the remainder of the round. I was on a mission, I played solid throughout the rest of the round trying to score at every chance possible and finishing strong down the stretch. I ended up shooting a course record 58 (-14) winning by 4 strokes after starting the day 12 strokes back, quite the comeback and definitely my best to date. Blakely was a true sportsman the entire round and congratulated for my play and course record after the round, he finished second for the weekend.

I had a blast in Kentucky all weekend hanging with my family and friends. It was great to play some sweet courses and it felt even better to pull off the comeback and come out on top at a PDGA Supertour. I wanted to thank Rob’s good friend Hutch for putting us all weekend long, good times out on the farm. Looking forward to coming back to Kentucky again to play their amazing events.

Next Tournament: Steady Ed Memorial Master’s Cup – Santa Cruz, CA

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The distance qualifier was soon to follow the rounds on Weds. as the usual suspects where present to try to de-throne me as the two-time defending USDGC Distance Champion. I was definitely pumped up this year to throw some giant shots and show them how it is done when we take it to the showcase throwing display over the Winthrop lake on Saturday after the last putt is dropped by the champion. I was throwing some brand new star wraiths that I had picked up the previous day at the Innova east coast factory. I got a few good ones off, but nothing huge and qualified in the 4th spot as they were taking 8 throwers to final the following night under the lights.

The second round tee time allowed to receive some well deserved sleep as I did not need to arrive at the course until at least 11 am to start to warm up, giving me a solid 2 hours before my round started. I began my warm ups by playing catch with disc golf legend David Greenwell and his finely tuned 8-time KC Roc, no other disc flys so true. It is definitely my favorite way to warm up and prepare before a round, its good for the touch and accuracy of your throws. I also do a bunch of longer throws and sidearms on the fairways of the Winthrop University golf course. Eventhough their is not a bunch of wide open shots without the possibility of OB, but you have to be ready to go big when opportunity strikes. I played an agressive front nine with 5 birdies and then played really conservative back nine, trying not to make mistakes where I had during the first round. I recorded a 2 under on the back playing safe shots on 17 and 18 to finish out with a solid OB and bogey free 60 to put me right in the hunt. I was then sitting in third one back of Doss and two back of Climo for the lead going into round 3 on Friday.

I was showtime later that evening as we rolled out to a huge outdoor soccer complex nearby for the USDGC Distance Finals. It is hands down the best locaton for throwing huge distance drives, it always creates an amazing experience. Due to a pretty consistant rain that kept up during the finals it did not provide the ideal conditions for footing, release or disc flight. I thought for a second that they might not still go through with it because of the conditions, but nevermind that I am always ready to lauch some drives no matter the case. We were each given a series of 5 throws in each of two rounds for a total of ten throws. Garrett Gurthie was the current leader before I had thrown and it was up to me to overtake the lead. I really did not get any of my throws to fly out due to the rain and slippery footing when I tried to plant to throw. I still ended up supposedly 3 feet short due to inconsistant lazer measuring system. I say that for the fact that at that distance lazer finders are not the nost accurate way to measure disc distance because for those that know the finder can give you a series of different measurement especially at distances over 500 feet. Still pretty aggrevated I threw a second round of throws that measured the furhtest for the round but did not compare to the first set as far as distance. I got edged by a controversial measurement, a measurement that is taken as a tie or a push in sactioned distance contests. I got denied on a throw off due to time constraints and other issues. Sure who would not want to take a win in distance against me, I will see to it that it does not happen again. It still really bothered me throughout the night, but I intended to use it as fuel and motivation to give it all that I had to go after what I set out to do all season long, win the USDGC.

The start of Friday morning started out like it did every morning prior to that with a solid warm up and some catch with Greenwell to dial in those accurate shots. I was more pumped then ever before to get out there and play the 3rd round. I shot great on the front with a 5 under and had only on bad hole on the back nine. It is the most grueling of holes on the whole Winthrop Gold Course, 888 as they call it, Hole #13. It is a make you or break you kind of hole with lots of trouble and OB everywhere, a kind of hole that is best played super conservative with the only goal being to staying in bounds on every shot. Definitely not a hole to overlook and for some reason I thought that it was a great time to get aggressive after going OB off the tee. I tried to force a sidearm shot to a pin high landing zone to be followed by a great upshot to finish with a par 5 and not lose more then 1 stroke to the field or at this time in the tournament, Ken Climo. I preceded to go OB on that sidearm and was forced to score a 7 instead of the ideal par on the hole. I birdied 2 of the last 5 to finish the round with a could have been 61, putting me 7 back of the lead of Climo after shooting a course record 56, 2 strokes over Feldberg and 3 over Randolph going into the final round.

It was still possible for me to win this tournament, but it was no small feat granted that I was attempting to catch the best player to ever play the sport of disc golf. I was also limited to only 18 holes and back by 7 strokes, but at this course any thing is possible. A player is able to lose 2 or 3 strokes on any given hole depending on the difficulty and OB potential. I was reluctant to get Climo to agree on a friendly split on the payout, but that definitely made that clear that that was not going to happen, it was worth a try. The time was now as my sister Valarie was on the bag as caddy for the round, she has a way of keeping me focused and lightens my spirits on the course by not allowing me to get to frustrated after not so perfect shots. She played an amazing tournament finishing in front of at least 50 of male competitors, it made her realize that she is definitely a world class player on the toughest courses in the world, I am to proud. It was showtime as we stepped out to our 1:30 pm tee time, all eyes on us. Climo, Feldberg, Randolph and myself in the lead card final round at the 2007 USDGC, it was time to some incredible golf and energy seemed to flow from the surroundings, the excitement increases. I played somewhat aggressive on the first couple of holes trying to make up some crucial strokes on the lead. I shot a solid 4 under on the front nine increasing my lead over 3rd place and realizing at that point that it was going to take a little more then a miracle to catch Climo now, but I was in a comfortable lead on those that were trailing me. I was still 7 strokes back and we were playing heads up going into the back 9. He was absolutely in the zone like I have never seen before, he could do no wrong, he was on fire. He continued to birdie every hole from hole 9 to hole 17 with a drop-in eagle from 3 feet on hole 12. He was proving to me that he is still the best in the sport. I played a great back recording a 4 under going into the final hole. On hole 18 Climo had a decent 12 stroke lead and I could go nowhere up by 6 strokes on 3rd, it was his victory lap but he was after more then just the win, he had to birdie out to shoot the new course record of 54 which is unheard of. I played my drive and upshot right down the fairway. Climo then took an aggressive upshot toward the pin to ensure a birdie finish, except that this time he got an unfortunate break as his disc hyzer skipped OB wide now leaving him with a 35 foot downhill death putt for par. He second guessed it for coice of the right decision and laid the shot under the pin to shoot back to back course records. I tapped out giving him the go ahead to putt out for the victory, claiming his 5th USDGC Open Title. He was destine to win that day and no one could have topped him this year, he playing some truly amazing golf and I felt honored to witness it all. At that moment I felt physically and mentally exhausted, completely drained but yet my day was not finished, I still had to throw in the Distance Showcase over the Winthrop Lake.

The Distance Showcase is the most exciting distance exhibition with a huge gallery of USDGC fans and loud music to pump up the competitors. I am was the two-time defending champion so I was in charge of the music for this year’s event. The Showcase consisted of Garrett Gurthie, Johannes Hogberg, Robbie Bratten and myself. I was there to prove who the furthest thrower after that debacle during the distance finals, it was showtime. We were all handed stacks of brand new Pro Destoyers in which we all autographed before we sent them over the lake. They had the music slamming and the crowd was really getting into it, its the beat feeling in the world. Its about 500′ to get a shot over the water and about 625′+ to get one over the road. I preceded to throw 2 over the road, keeping that consecutive over the road streak alive. I believe that only Markus Kallstrom, Ken Jarvis and I are the only ones to ever clear the street, its a pretty amazing feat. It was an incredible showcase giving me a second chance to prove my point in a distance contest.

This years USDGC was spectacular and gets better every year. Its well said as quoted by Nate Doss – “Its as soon as leave, you can’t wait to be back”. As always I await another chance to win a US Championship, until next year.

Next Tournament: Moccasin Lake Open Supertour – Clearwater, FL

11/2/07

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On Tuesday before the event, Billy Crump has organized a best shot doubles event to be played on the Winthrop Gold Course. The teams are: The 12-time world champion Ken Climo teamed up with the current world champion Nate Doss, the defending USDGC champion Barry Schultz teamed up with the best european player Markus Kallstrom and myself teamed up with the 2005 USDGC champion Dave Feldberg as Team Oregon. Risky shots and very agressive play is going to produce some exciting disc golf all captured by four person camera crew for a future USDGC DVD. I will be sure to post when that video becomes available. Stay tuned for more updates from this years USDGC…………………..

10/1/07

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On Friday before the Stockholm Open, Dave and I played in the Swedish Doubles Championship against the best players in Sweden. It was a two round tournament on a medium to short length course with lots of opportunity to score birdie, playing modified best shot. It is a variation in which you may not take the same players drive more then twice in a row. When that does happen you are then forced to take the other players drive on the next hole. We shot a 13 under the first round due to a poor decision on whether to take one the drives, which resulted in us missing the last three holes of the first round. This score tied us up with Anders Sward and Markus Kallstrom, the three-time defending champions, along with Linus Anstrom and Erik Bostrom also at 13 under bringing on a 3 way tie for the lead. We came out the second round scoring birdie on the first 7 holes and the defending champs hanging with us the whole match. Through a tough stretch of holes we gained a one stroke lead going into the final three holes. They were forced to take Anders’ drive on the very long 16 hole and Markus then hoisted in a 60’ footer from downtown to tie up the match. Feldberg then chained out for ace after calling the shot to regain the lead, we remained tied going into the last and final hole. On the 18, Markus was forced take his drive as he gunned for the tight, narrow fairway using a firebird with too much heat, leaving it 35’ long in the rough. Dave and I placed both of shots within 35’ with Dave’s at 25’. They then missed on both putting attempts out of the woods and I stepped up to final putt to seal the deal. We claimed our first international doubles title as we were crowned the 2007 Swedish Doubles Champions, even though Anders and Markus were given the trophies because we were not from Sweden. It was all fair being as they were amazing competitors and played a tight match all the way til the end, it was great to play in such a different environment, meeting lots of new friends. Thanks to Markus Kallstrom and his family for his hospitality and putting us up for the week during the tournament and the wonderful breakfasts and dinners that his mother prepared for us.

The opening round of the Stockholm Open at Jarva Disc Golf Course started with the many of the local favorites such as Jesper, Markus and Linus making the top couple of cards along with Dave and I. Jesper was playing some great golf as he jumped out to the early lead after Saturday’s play. Brigitta took the lead over Val and Burl after the first two rounds. That night Val, Burl, Dave, Markus and I went out to an amusement park in downtown Stockholm along with Anders Sward, Daniel Strandberg, Jesper Lundmark, Brigitta and the rest of Team Sweden. We roamed the park as a giant group, going on every roller coaster they had to offer, it was a blast. Just as we were about to leave, we played a number game where I won this giant candy bar looking box that contained over 40 “Plopp” candy bars which lasted the remainder of the Eurotrip.

On Sunday we finished up the third and final round before the final 9 to finish the tournament. During the round, I shot very well and I moved up into mix in place spot with Jesper leading, Feldberg in and Emil Isaksson in going into the final 9. Brigitta was still in the lead followed by Burl, Val and local favorite Ragna. I enter the final 9 back by 6 to the lead and 3 strokes to 2^nd, so I had some ground to make up in 9 holes. I increased my separation on 4th as I came up with some great throws starting the catch on Feldberg in until I tried to go big on one of the longer par 4’s and gave some strokes back to the field. I was then tied with Emil for 3rd, it was time to go big and I did as I birdied the par 4 on the 8th hole, then sealed it up with a par on the final hole to take solo. Jesper played a great tournament and held off Feldberg for the Stockholm Open title. The gallery was very energetic and involved throughout the finals; we put on a great show. Birgitta held on to 1 win with Burl placing second, Val placing 3rd and Ragna finished in front of her hometown crowd.

We all said our goodbyes and thanks to the tournament staff as we packed up everything into our good friend Espen’s car in route for Norway on a 6 hour drive. We planned to hang out for a week to rest and relax before the European Open the following week. I would have to say that Norway is definitely the most expensive country that I have ever been to due to high oil reserves and increased income rates. To give you an idea, big mac, fries and a coke cost around $17 US on the conversion, with beer costing $10 – 12 US a pint, gas cost around $9.50 a gallon and coffee cost $5. It was not the products were of any better quality, they just cost way more but the food was really good and definitely worth it. So we partied every night as we went out a lot to some great bars and clubs in downtown Oslo spending “krongies”. The rest and relaxation we were all looking for. We took off for Tampere, Finland the following Monday to get there early enough to get some practice in. Thanks to Espen for letting us hang at his apartment all week long as he took vacation from work while we were there in order to show us around and party, it was an experience that I will never forget.

Val, Burl, Dave and I first flew into Helsinki and took a 3 hour bus ride into Tampere to check into the Sokos Ilves hotel located in city center. It was one the best hotels that I have ever stayed at provided by the generosity of Jussi Meresma the European Open tournament director. I roomed with my good friend Nate Doss for the remainder of the trip. We arrived at course that afternoon to get in a round that day and prepare for the Presidents Cup to be played on the Wednesday before the start of the actual tournament; we were greeted by Jussi’s wonderful parents and many of the local players. The course was medium to long in length with a good variety of wooded to open holes offering plenty chances for birdie on many of its long par 4’s and shorter par 3’s. Team America was ready for this year’s competition against a hungry Team Europe whom was defeated on their home turf the previous year.

Team America consisted of Ken Climo, Nate Doss, Dave Feldberg, Valarie Jenkins, Carrie “Burl” Berloger, Terry Roddy, Dana Lawton and myself. It was the same team as the previous with the addition of Terry and Dana to the team as Jussi wanted to add two masters to each team in order to expand the field of players for more competitive action throughout the day. Team Europe consisted of Jesper Lundmark, Timo Pursio, Markus Kallstrom, Anders Sward, Brigitta Lagerholm, Angelica Frantz, Christer Kohler and team captain Hans Teggliback. The Presidents Cup is the most prestigious team events that I have ever been a part of due to the professional announcement of the teams and the media press conferences along with embroidered team shirts that the players receive prior to play.

The Presidents Cup began with the players playing 9 holes of straight stroke play with the winner receiving 4 points for the win, 2 points for 2nd, 1 point for 3rd and o points for last in the group. The groups were randomly seeded in the Open division with the women’s and maters grouped together. Throughout the front 9, Team America jumped to a huge lead winning a majority of the stroke play points, needing only 4 wins in match play. The next 9 holes consisted of straight up match play, as the players were randomly seeded and played against a player on the other team in their respective divisions throughout remainder of the event. Team Europe regained many of their points lost in the previous matches as they played with their backs against the wall and fought with vengeance down the stretch. In the end, with key wins on the final holes, Team America was victorious again with Burl being named MVP with her clutch 50’ footer on the final deciding hole to clinch the title. She was the recipient of this year Presidents Cup, which she will display proudly until next years competition.

The European Open began the next day with the excitement that every large PDGA major brings forth. I have been looking forward to this event for a long time, it is one of the best competition events that we get to play all season long. I managed to shoot a decent score the first round to move into 3rd and get a spot on the lead card with Climo jumping out to an early lead along with Brigitta in the Women’s division. The leads changed throughout the next few days as Feldberg and Burl regained the positions that they had held the previous year and Climo then regained the lead after 3 rounds of play. I dropped to the top of the second card going into the final round on Sunday along with Finland’s greatest player Timo Pursio. The last round we were definitely pulling for each other as we were both gaining strokes on the lead card throughout the round, we continued to cheer each other on. I had a bit of a rough finish to place 5th in the tournament as I passed Jesper off the lead card, but then I was passed by Markus as he shot the best round all week long the final round to edge me by a stroke. Climo took home the title in the Open division with a 6 stroke win and Burl regained her European Open title. Congrats to the winners. Thanks again to Jussi and Visa for putting on an amazing, professional event; a tournament I will never miss for years to come. I know that I should have played been throughout the week but due to Nate, Val and I staying out every night partying at various bar and clubs every night until 5 in the morning it made it difficult to get enough sleep at night, but trust me it was well worth it. Nate Doss is hands down one of the funniest people that I have ever met; he had me laughing in tears every single day. I had a blast hanging out with our Finnish friends and experiencing everything that Finland had to offer. I cannot wait until we return to Europe next year for the Scandinavian Open in Sweden. For all of those who have not been to Europe to play Disc Golf I strongly recommend it and hope that everyone will consider it, an experience that will last a lifetime.

Next Tournament: The FullThrottle Challenge at Solitude Mountain Resort – Salt Lake City, Utah.

9/27/07

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