Today’s culture clash began in the 1960s
By Josh Woods ~
A while back I was working on a Where’s Waldo puzzle with my daughter when my mind began to drift to where it so often drifts.
Gazing at the strange assortment of people in the puzzle made me think of disc golf. It’s amazing what you can find when walking through a crowded course on a Friday afternoon, or perusing disc golf handles on social media.
Continue reading “Chapter 4: Disc Golf’s Where’s Waldo Period”By Robert H. Hooker ~
I don’t remember the exact day or year, but I do remember the exact spot where I first tried disc golf.
Hole 7, Winthrop Gold.
Roughly 10 years ago, I arrived at Winthrop with my son, an avid disc golfer. At his insistence, we stopped at the course during a weekend trip to see family in South Carolina. The United States Disc Golf Championship was to be played there in a few weeks and he wanted to take on one of disc golf’s most iconic courses. Continue reading “It’s Never Too Late to Fall in Love with Disc Golf”
By Josh Woods ~
Should we call it “Frisbee golf” or “disc golf”?
Few questions have generated more discussion among disc enthusiasts than this one. Opinions on the topic are as wide-ranging as they are divisive.
And yet, what matters most to the future of competitive disc golf is not what insiders think about these terms, but what outsiders think of them. Continue reading “Has Frisbee Culture Delayed the Rise of Competitive Disc Golf?”
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”
Disc Golf as Lifestyle Sport
By Josh Woods, PhD ~
“At least give the dog a chance to catch it first” – N.B.
“Sports is a reallllly loose term nowadays” – J.C.
“Not a real sport” – J.L.
These were just a few of the snippy comments posted on ESPN’s Facebook page when the media giant uploaded a video clip of Eagle McMahon’s 380-foot field ace at the Glass Blown Open in April 2018. By the end of June, the clip had received more than 14,000 likes, 5,200 shares, 2.3 million views and 4,000 comments. Continue reading “Rise of an Unknown Sport (Part 3)”
Disc Golf as Modern Achievement Sport
By Josh Woods ~
Defining disc golf is like describing the taste of water. The task seems at once obviously possible and extremely difficult.
The hard part involves the utter plurality of what disc golf means to those who play it. As I argued in Part 1 of “Rise,” disc golf is not one thing, but many. Like Waldo’s world, its definition depends on where you look. Continue reading “Rise of an Unknown Sport (Part 2)”
By Josh Woods ~
I have a confession. It’s terrible. I’m not kidding. It’s really bad. But here goes: At times, I’m a lazy, uninformed voter.
For one reason or another, I almost always make it to the voting booth, even for most local elections. But I rarely feel optimally educated on the candidates before casting my votes. Yep, I’m that annoying guy who’s holding up the voting line, because he’s doing last-minute research on his cell phone.
But, with the 2018 PDGA board elections coming this July, I thought I’d part ways with habit and start my research early. Continue reading “31 Interesting Things about the 2018 PDGA Board Elections”
Injuries can be rich learning experiences. When I was ten, for instance, I learned that leaping off a garage roof with a beach umbrella is pretty much the same thing as leaping off a garage roof without a beach umbrella.
Having sustained several flamboyantly unnecessary injuries, I probably shouldn’t be giving advice on how to avoid them. Still, my goal here is not to air my own wisdom, but rather to add to yours by cultivating some available resources. Continue reading ““Wow, that hurt”: A look At The Injury Bug, And How To Avoid It”
Parked 