Glow golf

[Crawdaddy]

Whats the concensus on playing at night? I personally love to play Glow and my course is great for it. We started our regular Friday Nght Glow last night and it is a small way to earn a little club fundage. $2 entry $1 to winner $1 to the club. Glow is just way too much fun. Any responses?

[ERicJ]

Never tried it....

[timg]

Never tried it either.. I'd imagine errant shots would be tough to find at night even with glowing discs.

[WillA]

We play an object course at the University quad at nite. It's very well lit so you don't really need Glow discs.

[Three Putt]

I used to play in a league at a pitch and putt. Two rounds of 18 starting at 6:00 p.m. Even on the longest days of the year, we were lucky if we got it all in before dark. Late in the fall we would play the whole second round in the dark. It was a park sanctioned event, so we were OK to be there. In the winter in was not OK for us to be there, but the Rangers did not work the parks in the winter so we played random draw doubles every Thursday at regular league time in the dark. The park also had a glow tournament every spring and fall. With all that going on, I've played hundreds of rounds of glow golf.

Back then there were no LED lights. We HAD to get glow discs to play glow golf. Fortunately Avairs and Rocs are easy to get in glow plastic, and thats really all you needed at that course. A buddy of mine used to buy these hand-held florescent lights at Walgreens and keep them in his car for sale so it was easy for us to get something to take with us to activate our glow discs. Another buddy found some black light bulbs to put in them that did not light up as bright to help us avoid being noticed by Rangers, neighbors and/or cops when we decided to visit another course "after hours." I lost a good Gazelle one time when the cops appeared right after I threw my drive...we had to scramble to get out of the park and left the discs we threw behind. When I came back the next morning I couldn't find any of them. I've always wondered if the cops found our discs and kept them.

We also had an all-night disc golf marathon one time. We were playing one Saturday night and a guy got toasted..I'm not sure what he was on, but he was on something. Anyway, we were trying to keep him from going anywhere, and the only thing that worked was telling him we were going to play one more round. He finally passed out at around 4:00 am. Since we didn't have to baby sit him anymore, we went out to play one more round! The sun came up before we finished that round, and when we got back to the pavilion the guy was awake and seemed OK to drive home. I forget if we played five or six glow rounds that night, but the glow discs definitely got a work out!

I'm kind of old to be running from cops or hanging around with guys tripping in parks these days, but back in the day we had some great times playing glow golf.

[John Merhi]

The little LEDs have made my 15-some glow disc collection completely obsolete. With the LEDs, it's easier to find plastic at night than it is in the daytime.

Glow is fun, but for me it's a Standard Time thing. Once Daylight Saving Time hits, glow season is officially over. I play lots of glow, but have yet to play any glow from Apr-Oct.

[Amorybulldog]

I agree with the standard time thing. We play here at night in the winter. You don't want to be on our course after dark this time of the year, skeeters have been known to drag off small children and feast on them. They are bad enough during the day let alone at night. We played so many rounds once in winter that the windshields were frosted when we got done. LED's, flat batteries, and clear duct tape are the way to go. You can play with any or all of your discs regardless of make or mold. Fortunately for us the cops are cool here, they don't mind us being out late on our course. As for errant shots and difficulty, I have tied my personal best on my home course at night from the same tees. I shoot as well or better at night sometimes. Have one night ace, very cool. It was a skip, saw it dive early then up and just get snagged out of the air by the chains. How many of you keep a light on the basket or shoot it blind. We play both ways depends on the mood. We light the basket for 30 secs or so then off goes the light. Love me some night golf when it is cold.

[Crawdaddy]

I agree with the Standard Daylight vs. Daylight savings debate, but then that is why we throw on Friday nights. No one has to get up early Saturday morning, unless it is self inflicted, eg. kids to the game/practice, tournament road trip, etc. Currently, it doesn't start to get dark until sometime after 8pm. Our park is technically closed at 11pm Mar-Oct., 10pm the other days, and we have the support of the community(including police). The cops have even sat in the parking lot and watched as we toss the plastics as part of their "patrol".
LED's are a god-send. I still stick to using them on candy plastics only as you can see thru 'em, other types of plastics need to be lit up on top & bottom and that means 2x the lights, 2x the cash for the lights.
Here at Creekside, we have modified deck torches and attached them to the chastity belt pole to light up the baskets (& it looks REALLY cool). A little tiki fuel and you have a re-usable basket light. Just be sure to fill the canisters well before the round and use your non-throwing hand to handle the cans. Nothing worse than tiki fuel on your throwing hand unless your looking for that early release slip. Let the night lites fly!!!

[John Merhi]

How many of you keep a light on the basket or shoot it blind.

We play strictly blind. Some of us tend to be a little too strict about it. Using a flashlight to illuminate the basket is totally verboten, and I can see that. But some guys get upset if you pull out a flashlight to find something in your bag because the light "constricts my pupils, man".

It's true, if you don't use any source of light throughout the night, your pupils will dilate and you will see better.

Since we don't use any light at all, I'd personally rather play under a full moon than a new moon. New moon can make it tough to see the basket (although it's easier to find glow plastic under a new moon). Playing under a full moon is practically like playing in sunshine. A full moon can make it tough to find glow plastic though. Of course in the age of LEDs, glow plastic is now obsolete.

[Crawdaddy]

As I stated in my last post, we light up the baskets in 'modified for Discatcher' tiki torch holders.
We have played blind in the past, playing mostly from memory, and true enough it is fun to throw from memory; I just like watching the LED's on the discs spin round-n-round. ;o)