By Josh Woods ~
One of my best friends almost died from a disc-golf addiction.
He and I had recently discovered disc golf and were still in the honeymoon stage. Some days we’d play three rounds in the high hills of West Virginia under the hot summer sun.
Old men trying to relive their childhoods rarely ends well. This was no exception. Continue reading “Who Gets Hooked? The Demographics of Disc Golf Involvement”
Results from the 2017 Parked Facebook Study – Part 1.
By Josh Woods, PhD ~
In early 2017, we collected the first large-scale random sample of disc golfers and estimated the size and characteristics of the organized disc golfer population in the United States. The results discussed in this post will appear in the International Journal of Sport Communication early next year.
If you haven’t read my last two posts, consider taking a look at the theory behind this study and the method we used to explore it before plunging into the findings below. Continue reading “A Demographic Portrait of Disc Golf Land”
A new method for studying the sport
By Josh Woods ~
I’m not a fan of phrases like “close, but no cigar” and “close only counts in horseshoes.”
They make it sound like close is a bad thing. As if anything short of first place, anything other than perfection, anything besides certainty is a grave defeat.
Even Reese Bobby’s celebrated absurdity – “If you ain’t first, you’re last” – was debunked by Reese himself at the end of Talladega Nights.
Black-and-white thinking doesn’t work well as a sports mentality, and it’s even worse for science. Scientific research never leads us out of the grey, not entirely. At best, we merely increase our confidence in fundamentally questionable propositions. Continue reading “What We Know and Don’t Know about Disc Golf”
By Josh Woods ~
I’m thrilled to announce that the initial goal of Parked is finally gaining traction.
I’ve been working on academic research on disc golf for two years. I just received word that my first peer-reviewed journal article on disc golf will be published early next year in the International Journal of Sport Communication. Continue reading “A New Study Estimates the Size and Demographic Characteristics of the U.S. Disc Golfer Population”
Parked 