Wednesday Weekly Starts This Week!

Join us for our first Wednesday Weekly of 2007 this Wednesday, May 2. I think 5:30 will give us enough time before the sun sets. Random dubs. $3 donation to the course.

Bring some bug repellent. The ticks are out. Learn more about the bastards.

How can I prevent diseases spread by ticks?
Ticks generally cling to plants near the ground in brushy, wooded, or grassy places. The edges of woodlands and leaf litter are high risk areas. The ticks, which cannot jump or fly, climb onto animals and people who brush against the plants.

Boo Hoo, It's Raining Again

Spend 12 minutes of your life learning the basics of throwing a midrange shot. Then when it stops raining, get out there and practice, fool.

I thought the elevator throw was pretty cool and look forward to trying it. Extra points for naming the NEFA member in this video.

Interest is Growing; People Are Playing

Going by the location of readers of this blog, emails and calls I've gotten, and people I have met on the course, it looks like our course is filling that disc golf black hole between Worcester, Amesbury, and Boston. That makes us happy.

Devens is going to explode this summer. We are planning on installing two more baskets (maybe this weekend if the rain holds off) and bringing our metal total up to 16. Tee signs are in the works and more directional signs are too. We can't wait until we can announce that the course is officially open! Soon, though, very soon.

If I didn't have to work I'd be out there every day making the course better and better. Stinking responsibilities getting in the way of my disc golf! Bah!

Today's Devens Treasure

I found this beauty Saturday - an old Schmidt's beer can. According to Victory Brewing, Schmidt's was pretty popular in the Philadelphia area up until the mid-80s when the big boys destroyed them.

From the Victory website:

The Christian Schmidt Brewing Company closed in 1987 after 127 years of operating in Philadelphia. At it's height of operations it employed over 1,200 people and produced 3.5 million barrels of beer in the early 1980s, and distributed in 20 states. The family-run business made hay with their solid and clean Schmidt's Beer, but then were baited into battle with national brewers who wanted their home turf of Philly. It was a short and ugly war of attrition as Schmidt's was forced to fight on the attackers' terms as the nationals made actual beer quality a secondary issue behind image, through advertising.

Doors closed, brewing careers ended, and memories of the "good old days" withered like the flavor of a fashionable light beer.

We're A Little Disappointed

My Earth Day rant:

Nut and I played a very fun round late Saturday afternoon, but were disappointed at seeing the litter popping up on the course. Granted, it is not a lot, but the fact that it is there is just plain rude and disrespectful to us volunteers that have worked so hard to make the course for others to enjoy. Sure, a drink bottle has been know to fall out of a bag from time to time (it's happened to me), but one on two different holes is hard to believe. Plus we found a trail of Starburst wrappers dropped along the course with the main wrapper being left on one of the last holes. We're also finding cigarette butts too and that just is not cool. Butts are litter. Period. Pack it out.

Granted, we are thrilled that people are playing the course, but seeing bits of trash no doubt brought in by golfers is disheartening. Keep the Hill beautiful! Don't litter.

On a happier note, we met Brian and Hilary who came down from Derry, NH to check out the course. It was great to see some more NH players attacking the Hill. Thanks for playing, guys. Hope to see back again soon!

And on an even more happier personal note, I spanked my personal best by 4 with a 58. Must have been that first bit of warm weather. :-)

Change of plans

Sorry, I can't make it now. Have to work. Hopefully I'll get out there late afternoon. Bummer.

Weekend play?

Anyone headed to the Hill this weekend? It's going to be gorgeous out (finally). I wonder how she's held up with all this rain and wind?

There's probably a river flowing down Hole 5's fairway; at the very least it'll be pretty muddy, along with the walk to Hole 1.

Email, call (978-387-3664), or comment here if you plan on playing. I'm shooting for Sat. after 10 but am not 100% sure yet.

Join the rest and play tomorrow!

Looks like the course may be "busy" tomorrow. Nut will be out there with his brother, and a few guys from RI just called and said they were headed up in the morning.

With such nice weather predicted before this next batch of crappy weather, who knows who else will be out there. That's great to hear. Made my day.

Unfortunately, I'll be at the dog factory helping run a seminar all weekend and won't be able to play. :(

This is hole 14, the monster of the Hill. Par this bad boy and call yourself a man. Go ahead. Do it.

Get Pumped About DG at Anytime Fitness!

Another generous Devens business has signed up as a Birdie sponsor -- Anytime Fitness! They are just up the road in the shopping area next to the gas station. Thanks very much, Valerie!

Anytime Fitness is open 24/7, so if you have the urge to pump some iron at 2AM, they can help! Also check out Ask Captain Running Man for an entertaining Q&A on exercise-related issues. I especially liked the question from Ms Beer Belly.

• See their commercial.

Future Bag Tags?

Jim Bobka whipped up a Devens DG bag tag prototype this week and gave it to me yesterday before our round. Wow! Are they friggin' awesome, or what?! Love the camo!

Jim has started making trophies and tags for other New England courses and showed us some of them yesterday. Boy does he do good work! I especially appreciate how he made this custom one for me. Thanks very much Jim!

If you are a course director or TD and would like Jim to make something for your course or tournament, he can usually be found lurking on the NEFA message boards or you can email him.

Sunny Saturday

Yesterday Ultimate Pete, Nut, City Boy Rob, and Jim Bahhhhhbka joined me for a round. It was a beautiful day - sunny, cool, and crisp - and was a great way to spend my birthday. We didn't keep score, but I think we were all pretty happy about how we shot. Pete has really improved since we last played. He is definitely getting more snap and distance on his drives now. Good job!

Hole 1 didn't start off too well for me though. After a pretty nice drive through the gap into the woods I nicked a tree and went way right. I had a decent, but tough second shot and let one float through several trees. It made it through and landed just out of sight. I smiled and thought, "Nice! I'll have a chance at par." As I bent down to get my bag, I heard Pete and Jim laughing. I looked up and saw my disc rolling, rolling, rolling down the Hill away from the basket over to their first drives about 100 feet from where I had just thrown it. Ouch! Evidentally the Hill doesn't believe in birthday presents! Jim said that after the disc landed, it slid on the snow, caught an edge, and started it's nasty offroad adventure. Not nice. I ended up with a 5!

Pete, Nut, Rob, Jim

Pete, John, Rob, Jim

Play Sat, 10:30AM

I am meeting Pete and possibly a few others Sat, April 7 at 10:30 for a birthday round or two. Will probably be there most of the day playing and cleaning up where I can (darn snow), so come anytime. Call me or look for a note on my blue pickup truck to find me.

There's also an Easter Egg Hunt on Devens at 11AM, so watch out for the kiddies!

That's a lot of golfers!

I wonder if MA could handle this many golfers for a weekend tourney? What caught my eye was the last quote: "Here in Bowling Green, we can be at eight to 10 courses in 25 minutes.” Wow, that must be pretty nice!

Bigger and better

By OJ STAPLETON, The Daily News, ojstapleton@bgdailynews.com (full article)

With more than 730 players in this year's Bowling Green Amateur Disc Golf Championships, there's plenty of things that could go wrong.

But thanks to plenty of advance planning, the first two rounds of the tournament went off without a hitch Saturday.

“Everything went off exactly on time - despite having all those players,” tournament director Larry Bledsoe said. “With all the feedback I've been getting, pretty much everybody is ready to come back for next year.”

The tournament has experienced huge growth in recent years; this year's 734 participants is nearly 200 more than last year.

In 2001, the tournament had just 246 disc golfers and it has grown steadily ever since, becoming the biggest two-day event sponsored by the PDGA.

Tim Knaul, a local disc golfer, has played in the tournament since 2003 and has seen the growth firsthand.

“Even the first year I played it - it was still pretty big and there was a lot of players in my division,” Knaul said. “Even back then, when I was playing against 150 people, it was still the biggest tournament around. It's always been awesome in my mind.”

In the past five years, the field has more than doubled, thanks in large part to simple word of mouth.

“It was almost like a domino effect,” Knaul said. “People play this tournament and then go back home and tell their friends, ‘Hey, I played in this really great tournament.' The last few years, I think it's mainly grown because of word of mouth.”

But the number of attendees isn't the only difference the tournament has seen.

Local disc golfer, Josh Dobelstein, has played in the tournament in 2001 and said the intensity of the competition has grown.

The fact that the Bowling Green area has so many quality disc golf courses has helped the amateur championships morph into such a big event. Last year was the first time the tournament expanded to make use of eight different courses.

“You can go to a lot of bigger cities and they're going to have the same number of courses that we have,” Knaul said. “But you have to drive across town to get to them. Here in Bowling Green, we can be at eight to 10 courses in 25 minutes.”