2015 Ledgestone NT presented by Discraft

[JohtoVillage]

I posted this on my official FB page and wanted to post here:

I have waited a few days to make an official post or statement about the 2015 Ledgestone Insurance Open so I could let things calm down. First and foremost I have to thank God for giving me the patience and perseverance to get through the week. A few years ago I truly don't know if I would have been able to do it all so that was a huge blessing. A huge thanks go to Bob Julio and Mike Wagner of Discraft. They had the foresight to invest in this event and their support was phenomenal. I have been contacted by other companies that want to be involved at their level and I just can't imagine working with anyone but Discraft as they are like a family. I also have to thank all of my staff and volunteers for helping me with the event. Most of the time I was running around trying to make 15 decisions at once and they were amazing in making decisions when I couldn't and doing the jobs I had delegated to them. Also thanks to everyone at St Jude for coming out to help at the event. We were blessed to be able to give them a check for $20,000 so that is truly the best part of what we were able to accomplish.Thanks to all of the cities and park districts that stepped up to help as well. We couldn't have done it without the City of Morton, Morton Park District, City of Peoria, Peoria Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, Sunset Hills Golf Course, City of Eureka, Illinois Central College, Washington Park District, Kennel Lake Sportsmen's Club and the Peoria Park District. I want to apologize to the AM players for how long it took for you to get your merchandise at the end of the event. I will work on devising a strategy and plan to make sure that's quicker next year. As for the now infamous Lake Eureka temp course, I want to say that the course was designed to be extremely challenging and to make players think on every shot. I wanted to design a course like the US Open in ball golf. I am still evaluating the numbers, but I do know the course didn't play the way we anticipated on some holes and so I do apologize for this. It was not my intention to make anyone suffer and lose a bunch of discs! We will look to adjust that as we move forward while keeping with the vision I have for the property. Thanks for reading!


On a side note, I hope to have some kind of statistical analysis done soon. However, as I look at the initial numbers, it does appear that the only holes that did not play how I intended them to play were the following: Hole 6 (Bridge Hole), Hole 9 (Water Tower), Hole 10 (Volleyball Court), Hole 13, and to an extent Hole 17. The rest of the holes played how I designed them and how I expected them to be played. Holes 1 and 8 played fairly easy, but I wanted players to have a few easy deuce holes to ease the stress of the hard holes.

 

[bhadella]

Congrats and a big thanks for all you did for our sport and St. Jude.

Honestly, the changes to the island holes (6, 9, 10, 17) are easy to install. Just increase the size of the greens a bit to both encourage people to attack them (in the case of 6, 9, and 10) and making the upshots easier to hit if you layup. 17 just needs a spot to layup to.

 

[JohtoVillage]

I think 17's landing zone is okay except for maybe a little bit on the right hand side to give lefties more room. I think I would also move the basket a little more to the right so we see some more deuces.

 

[bhadella]

Oh, and a huge thanks for getting so many great special edition Discraft discs out. Loving my Cryztal FLX Zones and Ti FLX Buzzzes.

 

[bballr4567]

I think the only hole that was overly harsh was the volleyball hole. The green was very small and it had a downhill slant which led to many discs going OB. I wonder how many birdies that hole actually gave up.

 

[bogeyfreetilinfinity]

I wouldn't change the final nine at all. maybe adjust some of the temp course holes for the fourth round with some more forgiving lay up options. But being able to gain what, 5 strokes on pmb over 9 holes, where else could you see that?

 

[JohtoVillage]

I wouldn't change the final nine at all. maybe adjust some of the temp course holes for the fourth round with some more forgiving lay up options. But being able to gain what, 5 strokes on pmb over 9 holes, where else could you see that?

I was going for exciting, but I didn't want to see scores in the double digits.

 

[Dr.Smooth]

It was a pleasure to watch the final nine. Water, wind other ob challenges made for great spectating!

Thanks for attempting to improve DG course design raising the bar for both players and those who enjoy watching a good show on line far away from my arm chair.

It looks like the next step is getting somebody like an auto manufacturer to put a car up for grabs. They would both help sponsor the event and give the car away for promotion.

Maybe I dreaming but it looks like you're not that far away.

 

[peabody]

John, thought it was a bit strange to watch but very exciting. The bridge hole was only disappointing when they had to lay up. John E's throw was awesome and I wish all the other guys would have "gone" for it.
Fantastic job and a great tourney.

 

[bogeyfreetilinfinity]

I was definitely in shock watching the pdga live scoring. But like they say, "you gotta break a few eggs to skin a cat". Right? Are hole scores posted anywhere on the web for the whole field?

 

[teemkey]

I was going for exciting, but I didn't want to see scores in the double digits.

I totally agree Nate.

I'd like to see a good shot required for a lay up, a superb shot to run it, and a drop zone between the lay up area and the green. Walking to the drop zone would allow the player some time to think about their next throw.

But you've probably heard too many enough suggestions already ...

 

[teemkey]

Oooops, make that "a drop zone between the lay up area and the tee."

 

[Pbmercil]

On a side note, I hope to have some kind of statistical analysis done soon. However, as I look at the initial numbers, it does appear that the only holes that did not play how I intended them to play were the following: Hole 6 (Bridge Hole), Hole 9 (Water Tower), Hole 10 (Volleyball Court), Hole 13, and to an extent Hole 17. The rest of the holes played how I designed them and how I expected them to be played. Holes 1 and 8 played fairly easy, but I wanted players to have a few easy deuce holes to ease the stress of the hard holes.

Great job again sir, and thank you for all the awesome work you and the rest of the volunteers did! It was great.

I think you hit the nail on the head with which holes didn't play great. For one, I think the birdie needs to be more gettable (and more tempting too). A little bigger/easier green area does a bunch of good things. For one, it give the players even more temptation to go for the 2, which is a good thing. It also means that those players who do lay up will have an easier upshot. I'm sure it really sucks to lay up to get your par, then miss the very small green on your second shot and be screwed.

I was going for exciting, but I didn't want to see scores in the double digits.

I don't think that's 100% on you. particularly on the holes you mentioned. If someone wants to get aggressive and go for the 2, then refuses to take their medicine and just keeps chopping wood trying to hit that green because they don't want to "loose a stroke" by laying up, that's on them.

 

[DiscFifty]

I was going for exciting, but I didn't want to see scores in the double digits.

As a spectator and player, I'll take hard pars resulting in occasional bogies and double bogies any day compared to another easy birdie hole.

 

[OB Four]

I read a few pro comments/complaints about the temporary course, and I can definitely understand where they're coming from.

But to me, I thought it was awesome. I've read or heard so many comments about how to make the sport more difficult for the top pros because it's become too easy for them, I know it wasn't the goal, but when pro's are taking double digit scores on a single hole, I thought Nate accomplished the goal of making the game harder. I thought for people familiar with the game, that this would be really exciting to watch and see how they handled the extreme punishment for taking risks and the possibility for anything to happen. I loved it honestly, I mean stroke and distance for as much as it was used, might've been excessive, but these days there's not too many physical layouts these players can't dominate. I thought he made it difficult in the only way it could for these top pro's, force them to rely more on their mental game and strategy over their physical ability.

On a side note, anyone know what happened to Jared Roan and why he DNF'ed?

 

[JohtoVillage]

I think you hit the nail on the head with which holes didn't play great. For one, I think the birdie needs to be more gettable (and more tempting too). A little bigger/easier green area does a bunch of good things. For one, it give the players even more temptation to go for the 2, which is a good thing. It also means that those players who do lay up will have an easier upshot. I'm sure it really sucks to lay up to get your par, then miss the very small green on your second shot and be screwed.

Thanks for all of the comments guys.

One thing I will say is this: if I adjust green sizes I will make the layup areas smaller. I want to encourage people to be more aggressive. For instance, on hole 9 (water tower hole), I will definitely do something to that green to make it easier to get to. However, I will also make the layup zone smaller to encourage people to go for it in the first place. If I make the green bigger and keep the layup zone the same, we may still just have too many people laying up.

 

[BionicRib]

Any numbers on hole 12 at kennel lake Nate? I was impressed with that layout a lot. The back nine was definitely harder than the front. It seemed that most people either deuced 12 or took a 4. Was that the intention? Personally I think that island was a bit small considering the low ceiling around the green. Thoughts?

Again I will admit I wasn't expecting much from the temp courses but I really liked that one. I almost think it could have been made a little tougher.

 

[JohtoVillage]

Any numbers on hole 12 at kennel lake Nate? I was impressed with that layout a lot. The back nine was definitely harder than the front. It seemed that most people either deuced 12 or took a 4. Was that the intention? Personally I think that island was a bit small considering the low ceiling around the green. Thoughts?

Again I will admit I wasn't expecting much from the temp courses but I really liked that one. I almost think it could have been made a little tougher.

I haven't looked at those numbers yet, but I was wanting score separation there and I think we got it. We had some deuces and we had a lot of 4's so that was what I was going for.

 

[Cgkdisc]

I haven't looked at those numbers yet, but I was wanting score separation there and I think we got it. We had some deuces and we had a lot of 4's so that was what I was going for.

That's a design failure any time the number of 3s on a Par 3 is not the largest percentage of scores. The early hole 17 at USDGC had this unfortunate two hump distribution with mostly 2s and 4s with few 3s. This was determined to be a weak design feature among experienced designers which was eventually fixed with later versions of this infamous hole. Now, there are more 3s than 2s or 4s providing a smooth versus jagged risk/reward challenge.

 

[JohtoVillage]

That's a design failure any time the number of 3s on a Par 3 is not the largest percentage of scores. The early hole 17 at USDGC had this unfortunate two hump distribution with mostly 2s and 4s with few 3s. This was determined to be a weak design feature among experienced designers which was eventually fixed with later versions of this infamous hole. Now, there are more 3s than 2s or 4s providing a smooth versus jagged risk/reward challenge.

I think we had a lot of 3's as well but as I said, I have not fully looked at the numbers yet.