So, how did you play today? Part II

[ChrisWoj]

More adventures in lack-of-warmup for me at sanctioned league, but I overcame it this time.

A week ago I played a few bad sanctioned rounds, one that will likely wind up around 930 and one that'll likely be around 945. Definitely wasn't happy with either. But both had really rocky starts while I got my hand feel, and neither had anything resembling good putting.

Yesterday was more of the same and different.

Another rough start. Another bad putting round from C1. But.... I did, for the first time in over a decade (not an exaggeration), I had a red-hot jump putting round. As I noted in some earlier posts here - I'm changing up my whole putt without doing any practice-green work, which has led to just some terrible putting rounds. I was 70% C1X at this same league a week ago, and my Sunday evening sanctioned round last week was so bad I have been hesitant to UDisc it (I should before I forget my shots).

Last night? Another bad C1X round - coming in at only 67%. A 6/9 performance, with two missed putts just inside of 20 feet and one miss from 30.

However - as noted it was great from C2 - coming in at 67%. A 4/6 performance. Including two very legit ones - a downhill death putt 45 footer with OB down the hill, and a 50+ footer uphill.

Which was awesome because it saved me from a bird-bogey-par-bird-bogey-double bogey start to the round. Sitting +2 - I took off and rolled through 8 birds with no bogeys the rest of the way to come in at what is currently a 977 rated round, and should come in around 975-980 at the end of the session. Its about right.

Progress. Bit by bit. The forehand was also absolutely blistering, and feels better than ever. Fun since I had some soreness after 3 days of golf in a row last week. I think the soreness may have been more attributed to doing upper body work two of those days along with the golf. I haven't done more than recovery lifting this week, and it feels great.

The path to Masters is clear of injury, and the changes to get back to being me are looking on point. 16 more months.

 

[Brychanus]

Mixed course with some good use of elevation on the open holes and very scraggly wooded holes.

Spent special focus on my drive form and walking it out on another big card.

I got my drives sorted out much better. I found the stuff for golf line hyzerflips all round. Accuracy was good, but precision not quite crisp enough for easy birdies. Upshot and putting game wasn't quite on but I'll take it.

I had first shot and "player 2" hyzerflip C1 edge hits left and just a bit short of the basket on a signature 441' sloping downhill hole through a double mando which was easily the coolest shot of the day. I was never able to do that before.

 

[TiltedFlipCurves]

Played a couple new 9 holers Glitch only yesterday. One popup course twice, normal and FH only cause the local shop owner happened to be there and he did a FH only round so I figured I need the practice too, and then the new AcePlace which is anything but.

Glitch skills: nonexistent

 

[ChrisWoj]

It's interesting how changing your focus can dial in everything you're doing.

I've been having a huge crisis-of-confidence issue this summer, with a lot of rounds where I've been inexplicably scattershot with my release. I haven't been able to find the right head-space at all, despite knowing the feel of the shots I want to execute. And then last week I really started integrating two pieces fully into what I was doing. It really fell into place during a sanctioned league round on Friday where I was still mentally wrecked for the first 5 holes (+2 on my home layout) before coming around with 7 birdies to get to a -5 that came in about 977 (which should hold close to that when all rounds are brought together end-of-session).


Here are the two pieces that helped break my mental funk:

1. I had been trying, since last year, and somewhat successfully, to get power back into my forehand by opening up a longer arm-swing. I noticed in slow motion video last fall that over the years my motion had become very short. Lengthening it did get me back a bunch of distance, but it wasn't consistent and it just never felt right. I realized a bit over a week ago that I can naturally lengthen the arm swing AND it is very comfortable when I go to a very low release point. The problem had not been that over the years I'd shortened up the arm swing (that was more an outcome), the problem was that over the years I'd gotten lazy and started standing up too tall while I throw forehand. By focusing on a low release point my arm swing naturally lengthens and now I'm getting power AND comfort.

2. I started integrating a jump putt back into my game. I went away from it a while back thinking that ultimately I'd really improve by working with a single swing from every distance. But I've abandoned that thought. I think that I've been limiting myself. Integrating a jump putt in the last few weeks has had immediate outcomes. On Friday I had my first "hot jump putting round" in over ten years (about how long its been since I used a jumper consistently). I went 4/6 from C2 on Friday, and then in doubles on Sunday and yesterday I went 2/5 (2/2 inside 50) and 3/7 (3/4 inside 50). The arm swing is just so much slower and easier to control than my usual C1 putt, I feel like I'm barely moving my arm at all, I just put the disc on line with chains and it gets the glide home.


So how does all that apply to breaking the mental funk?

In terms of both of those changes I've had to rediscover the feel for the shot. And that has involved spending my time reacting after the fact to how the throw feels, instead of trying to force the disc to result in the feel I want. Even as I've known inherently that you need to focus on just letting yourself throw the shot, I was trying to pigeonhole myself into a particular throwing mindset, versus a reacting mindset. Tattar actually brought up the idea in an interview posted by the PDGA in the last week, go to 1:10 -



Once I realized that my body was naturally doing as I asked on the forehand and the jump putt, where I had no preconceived notion of what my hand feel should be, only where I wanted to put the disc through the air.... the backhand and the C1 putt fell in line again. Suddenly I'm simply allowing myself to recognize whether or not the shot felt right after the fact, and the pieces fall into place.

I'll be playing a sanctioned round this evening. Hopefully I can get more confirmation that I'm on the right track.

 

[Chucker60]

Had a good day today, shot a new PB and in the process broke a scoring plateau I've been aiming for. My score was +15 (69), going under 70 for the 1st time ever - (4 pars, 13 bogeys, 1 double). Feel mostly good about how I played; one bad hole (16) kept me from going even lower, but I also had a couple really good holes to even it out.
Onward & upward

 

[ChrisWoj]

Two steps forward, one step back.

Had a round yesterday that went... badly. The rating came in at 922. But I can honestly say that most of that was the result of one shot: the straddle putt. On my third hole I had a 10 ft straddle putt for a bogey that I put into the front of the cage. A couple of holes later I missed a 35ish foot straddle jump putt, aired high. Late in the round on my 14th hole a 30 foot straddle went wide. And on my 16th hole a 10 foot straddle went off the cage. On both 10 footers I was probably more concerned with poison ivy and gave myself awkward footing.

That wasn't the step back though.

The step back was the groin. And specifically on forehands.

I showed up about 10 minutes before tee off and ran to the nearest tee after paying in to throw some drives. Went too strong with the first throws and felt a lil tweak in the groin on one of the forehands. Everything went fine, including forehands, until the 14th hole of the round. I threw a great FH with a tiny flex to 30 short, about 390 out of the hand, and it just doubled me over. I'd thrown a handful of strong hyzer forehands already without feeling it, but that one got me. And then on my 18th hole I threw another one, a park job 330 footer with some flex, and again it doubled me over.

So... I guess I'm taking a lil break from the FH for the rest of the week. Stupid of me to get out there and throw full power without warmup. Some lessons I'll just never learn.... one day it'll cost me long-term.

 

[ChrisWoj]

I played the local Friday sanctioned league at my home course, Ottawa Park, for the third consecutive week.

Related to the above post re: Tuesday, my groin was still a bit of an issue, but overall I was able to get good power out of it without aggravating it - aside from it reminding me occasionally that I gotta be careful.

But the round was more of the same, relative the last few weeks... one thing that is frustrating is that I can't get out of my own way early.

The rounds look like this... (19 holes, so front 9 and back 10)

344342422 / 3323323333 - 56 (-1)
243245222 / 2322323233 - 51 (-6)
424522323 / 3232333232 - 53 (-4)

I'd say that right now the layout plays where a -8 is a locked-in 1000 rated round. I'm just coming out so slow. The funny part is that the only week I came out early enough to do 15-20 minutes of warmup was the first one, worst score.

But that was also the peak of my game breaking down in terms of trust, where a summer of meh trust just melted into complete lack of feel for the disc leaving my hand especially on my backhand. I think that last week at about hole 7 I truly broke through, and its held pretty well since.

My C2 putting has also continued to be great for a full week now. My last 3 sanctioned rounds (last Friday, Tuesday, yesterday) I went 4/6, 2/6, 3/9. So I'm ecstatic about that. Hoping to keep it rolling next week, but no golf for me this weekend.

Unrelated to no golf, because I'm a glutton for punishment... the round was played on some slick grass, and of course I gave myself some mild turf toe. Fuck sleeping last night was difficult. Hate that. It had been a very long time since I did that to myself.

But it was still better than the 2013 DGLO where I chose to spend the event camping out in a tent during that rainy weekend and did that to myself... being stuck awake all night in a tent with turf toe on a rainy weekend is not a blast.

 

[TiltedFlipCurves]

2 more rounds over rating (ratings are due to update aren't they?) Still last by 1 not counting the DNF. Several holes were island hazards with like a 15' radius so you got punished if you didn't park your drive (or scramble). Also a couple fusion holes, couple switched baskets. It was fun.

 

[EllEstar]

We had our national championships this weekend and I was there to defend my title.

It's been a rough few weeks as I've been nursing a finger injury which has been especially rough on my forehand and putting, but my timing and mental game has been clicking and despite that I've been playing pretty well. Literally the day before the tournament I hotfixed my forehand just to be able to use it on like 4 must-forehand holes across two courses.

Day 1 we played the open, OB-laden course in steady 25-30 mph winds. I was hoping to gain some strokes here as I throw pretty far, can rely on overstable discs and am a spin putter. But it didn't turn out great, I managed to shoot above my rating and get myself into first place after one round, but it went way worse than I'd hoped.

Most of what I messed up, I realized afterwards, were easy upshots and layups from 25-150'. After executing good drives I got nervous and really didn't want to make a silly mistake so I made an even sillier one. For example, I had to go over a hill at chest height and maybe 5' down from about 50' out for an easy tap-in par on the second hardest hole, but I didn't want to leave it short so I ended up running it all the way down the hill and had a 25' uphill comebacker into the headwind.

Day 2 the weather calmed down a lot and we moved over to the wooded course, and I just told myself to play free and trust my throws, which I did. I gave myself a lot of challenging 25-40' putts and didn't make as many as I'd like, but my throwing was so on point that I ended up shooting 8 down and my best rated round ever and leaving the competition in the dust.

Today I tried to do the same. With some early struggles I was even through the first 6 holes, but then I eagled a short, but heavily wooded par 5 and picked up the pace, ending with another 8 down on almost the same layout as the previous day. As it turns out my second highest rated round ever.

Just staying in the moment and taking it one shot at a time really helped, trusting my shots and not trying to force some technique change I've been working on. My forehand was erratic and that was to be expected with me resigning myself to hotfixing it and going with a technique I wasn't used to last minute. I'm also really glad that it wasn't too windy when we played the woods courses because I love throwing the Polecat around there for short upshots and scrambles, and that's not a disc I can trust in heavy winds, even in the woods.

Tournament season is coming to an end over here, but we have some rated leagues left and I'm gonna try to keep the momentum going into next Tuesday's league, before taking a forced hiatus from competing because of work and school.

 

[Chucker60]

We had our national championships this weekend and I was there to defend my title.

It's been a rough few weeks as I've been nursing a finger injury which has been especially rough on my forehand and putting, but my timing and mental game has been clicking and despite that I've been playing pretty well. Literally the day before the tournament I hotfixed my forehand just to be able to use it on like 4 must-forehand holes across two courses.

Day 1 we played the open, OB-laden course in steady 25-30 mph winds. I was hoping to gain some strokes here as I throw pretty far, can rely on overstable discs and am a spin putter. But it didn't turn out great, I managed to shoot above my rating and get myself into first place after one round, but it went way worse than I'd hoped.

Most of what I messed up, I realized afterwards, were easy upshots and layups from 25-150'. After executing good drives I got nervous and really didn't want to make a silly mistake so I made an even sillier one. For example, I had to go over a hill at chest height and maybe 5' down from about 50' out for an easy tap-in par on the second hardest hole, but I didn't want to leave it short so I ended up running it all the way down the hill and had a 25' uphill comebacker into the headwind.

Day 2 the weather calmed down a lot and we moved over to the wooded course, and I just told myself to play free and trust my throws, which I did. I gave myself a lot of challenging 25-40' putts and didn't make as many as I'd like, but my throwing was so on point that I ended up shooting 8 down and my best rated round ever and leaving the competition in the dust.

Today I tried to do the same. With some early struggles I was even through the first 6 holes, but then I eagled a short, but heavily wooded par 5 and picked up the pace, ending with another 8 down on almost the same layout as the previous day. As it turns out my second highest rated round ever.

Just staying in the moment and taking it one shot at a time really helped, trusting my shots and not trying to force some technique change I've been working on. My forehand was erratic and that was to be expected with me resigning myself to hotfixing it and going with a technique I wasn't used to last minute. I'm also really glad that it wasn't too windy when we played the woods courses because I love throwing the Polecat around there for short upshots and scrambles, and that's not a disc I can trust in heavy winds, even in the woods.

Tournament season is coming to an end over here, but we have some rated leagues left and I'm gonna try to keep the momentum going into next Tuesday's league, before taking a forced hiatus from competing because of work and school.

Awesome, sounds like you're the 'Coldest DG Dude in IceLand' Congratulations

 

[EllEstar]

Well, I did keep the momentum going, shot my 3rd highest rated round ever at league today and places 2nd in MPO.

Funny thing is I did it mostly just by making my putts and not making big mistakes. My throwing was perfectly serviceable, but far from great.

I played with the 2nd best player in the country and I figure that if I had putted from his drives then we would've shot like a 1020-1030 rated round.

 

[sisyphus]

First time to win a C-tier in Open tonight at the one rounder at Winton Woods, and my 2nd time over a 1000 rated round. Happy to achieve this at my age (62), even if we only had ten in the division, and it's a deuce or die course.

 

[ChrisWoj]

Got back to golf yesterday, after taking off five days due to the turf toe.

I tested the toe on Wednesday with a good solid run (my running shoes are nice and springy, so I figured the toe would be okay). Since there was no pain - I decided it was ready for golf.

Sooo I zipped through a quick round on the same layout I've been playing the sanctioned Friday rounds on. For comparison, here's the set of rounds that were sanctioned:

344342422 / 3323323333 - 56 (-1)
243245222 / 2322323233 - 51 (-6)
424522323 / 3232333232 - 53 (-4)

And here's the round I played yesterday evening:

233332233 / 3322633233 - 54 (-3)

Two things got me...

1. C1X putting - The number came in at 85% but the two misses were really bad 15-18 footers, and I had an inordinate amount of 12-14 foot putts that were a bit outside the bullseye (a clear 4 strides, but really no more) to pad the stats.

2. Hole 14 - This was an adventure. 14 is a tight tunnel off the tee with an 8'-10' highceiling across the top at about 80', through an open field, uphill to 400 ft. A clear FH shape off the tee. You have to shape around a grove of pine trees from 300 to 350 and through a 50' wide gap split by a lone thick tree at 350. An OB road runs the entire right side about 25' right of the teepad. Here's my hole:

a. Drive to 50' off the pad, low skimmer that was lucky not to take a crazy cut roll OB.
b. Forehand to 40' left of the basket.
c. Bad jumper tickles left side chains, almost goes OB (15' past basket) slides downhill left.
d. No putt at all, unless I literally take an illegal stance in the road, but I try to make it anyway, throw it into branch, bounce OB.
e. Putt in from 15'.


(upon adding the image I realize a) it isn't as uphill as it feels walking toward it, due to the dip, and b) the gap is sooner than 50' short of the pin)

Just an adventure.

The funny part of it is - there are two parts of my game that have been tremendous lately: my forehand and my jump putt. And those were EXACTLY the two things that failed me on this hole leading to the 6.

But overall - you know what? I got out of the car and didn't throw scattershot garbage all over the place for once on the first 5-7 holes. So that is progress.

No sanctioned round on the layout tonight, though. A friend of mine (who has been consistently taking my money) wants to play a 10/10/10 Nassau round.

And tomorrow I'm getting to hit Independence Lake and Bald Mountain with a friend in from Canada (Brandon from Hops and Hyzer, the DGValley Live Event YouTube channel). So its gonna be a fun few days!

 

[lee76007]

Starting to transition from the summer dull drums (no wind or very little) to the wind starting to pick up. I enjoy playing in strong wind just about as much as I do heavily wooded courses which is where I play in the summer months. Our wind season in Virginia Beach runs from about now until May.

This morning at Munden Point Virginia Beach two rounds 15-25 mph for the second time this month. Trying to set up my winter wind bag auditioning a Philo Star Destroyer, and a Jessica Weese Echo Star Destroyer I will likely just keep one of them. Philo stays online, Jessica all over the place, but its early until the stronger wind arrives. I have a few flippy Star Destroyers to check out, and a handful of 13-14 speeds as well, I have until early December until the stronger winds arrive. Also played today a new light weight Star Mamba and Fission Wave repeat from last year. Hero disc of the day a Plasma Nomad had a 78-foot putt drop (range it) headwind, and a few in the 40–60-foot range.

This is my 5th wind season I'm getting ready for, and always look forward to it. My first year it scared me since there are a few water holes at Munden Point, I've seen other players avoid those two holes. I've lost about 40 discs between the two holes in almost 4 years.

Strongest wind I've played 40-50 mph, with gust up to 60. Played a handful of those type of rounds. Strongest gust according to a local weather watcher a short way from the course 70 mph with sustained wind 35-45 mph that was last season, that was insane a headwind putt that came back at me, and a 60-foot pine tree that dropped by the tee pad I had just played from as I putted out. A triple bogey, and a few doubles on holes I had always had a least a par on. All in fun, exciting to start a new wind season.

 

[zontar]

you sir, are a sick individual. I live in a windy area, and consider myself a decent player at 20-30mph, but you're enjoying wind WAY too much

 

[lee76007]

you sir, are a sick individual. I live in a windy area, and consider myself a decent player at 20-30mph, but you're enjoying wind WAY too much

Yes, I am and give me more please. 20-30 mph the majority of my rounds this winter will be at that speed. The course is 15 miles out of town, all summer in the morning just a few of us out there. This morning all the wind dig-it's were coming out, as I was leaving the parking lot was filling up. The course has a few holes along a river with nothing in the way for a mile and half to slow down the wind, and a few other accesses points onto the course. Most courses are wooded here, so it's a nice change of pace.

 

[ChrisWoj]

Whew. Absolutely got WRECKED by Vienna Park. Once upon a time my home course, I've likely had upward of 1000 rounds or partial rounds of golf there over 18 years, including entire years without a car where I'd be regularly dropped off there in the morning and play to dark. This might have been theost unlucky round I have played.

Playing the long tees...

34p34p236p23 / 432242343 - 57 (E)

My dude Nolan took $20 off me on a nassau bet. He got me on the front and overall and matched me on the back.

And lost one of my putting putters on the 7th hole. Seemed like every borderline very good drive nipped the edge of a tree and ran to either the worst spot or at best to a spot with an awful stance. A putt that caught chains rolled 18' and then down a hole into a creek. Just one of those days.

Playing Bald Mountain, Kensington Green, and one of the Independence Lake courses tomorrow. Hopefully I got all of this bad luck out of my system!

 

[TiltedFlipCurves]

Beat my rating by estimated 29 points 1st round and 84 second round. Almost had my best rated round ever but one backwards misthrow and one careless failed tapin cost me. (note to self-putt the putter even at 8 feet on the last hole of the day!). Pretty boring golf: throw the Proxy straight whenever possible, putt, tapin. (or not if the putt goes in )

 

[ChrisWoj]

Had. Me. A. Day.

I got to spend the entire day playing casual golf, just out with beers and smoke with good folk. Which was really nice, from a how did you play perspective, because it gave me time to really focus on how I'm approaching every throw.

My ol' disc dog, Halo, and I met up bright and early with Brandon from the Hops and Hyzer YouTube channel and his brother in law, and played Bald Mountain from the big tees and then both Kensington courses from the short tees. We had new people join us off and on throughout the day, including @Skamanda for a bit over half of a round on the Green course.

Bald Mountain was singles golf. Green was also singles golf. And then Blue was doubles match play.

When we got in the car at the end of the third round my FitBit app read 15.93 miles and just shy of 36,000 steps. Definitely the longest hike Halo has done. It was just shy of the most steps I've done in a day in the intermittent random years I've worn a FitBit - which happened at IDGC in April 2019.

Throughout the day I tried to just focus on what went right. Footwork, aim, thoughtfulness about the full motion, throwing to the apex... It was really supported by the fact that I was able to use a single disc all day.

I asked Brandon at the last minute if there was any chance he had a seasoned Teebird I could buy or throw. He has tons of Discraft stuff and nothing Innova, so he offered up an Athena - which I threw *all day long.* Right from my second of "two off the first" at Bald - I just kept throwing it. I would estimate 20-25 throws at Bald Mountain with the Athena.

And it is as advertised. It flies like an out of the box Teebird with a bit more high speed stability while maintaining the straighter finish, which worked perfect for me at Bald. I threw it, basically, every time I wanted a shot I could really push forward up the wooded fairway at 65-75%, and that is OFTEN at Bald. Though I did also use it on the relatively wide open 8 - just to see what I could do with it on an open rip (some headwind). When we got to Kensington I even used it on some long-sweeping finish hyzers with a fully spread out fan grip to see how hard I could push it on a shot that was mostly finishing.

Great disc.

It really supported reliability in the footwork, since I got to know what I was looking for very quickly within a limited range of release points. And as time went on I could incorporate deeper hyzers. The best drive of the day was probably a pushing hyzer to the 430' 11th hole at Bald, where I just nipped a tree keeping me out of circle.

The C1X putting was also supported. I started out the round missing on 3 C1X putts at Bald Mountain in the middle after a shaky start with some makes that hung on. But with time I caught on that the only thing really limiting me over the past few months may have been inconsistency with the timing of my weight shift. I lost track of it on my first C1X putt of the second round, but after that it was really comfortable and reliable. I think I missed only one or two more C1X putts over the course of the last 34 holes.

It was definitely nice finishing out the day with two rounds from the shorts at Kensington after Bald. We have no shots anything like Bald in the Toledo area and I haven't done field work in a few years, so it was an entire round of just trying to find that comfort zone hitting fine differences in power while stretching out the shots at ranges I just never shoot. Getting back to Kensington everything was more in my comfort zone - forehand hyzers and straight putter shots out to 300ish ranges. So it was like a reward for pushing through at Bald.

Great day. Great golf. Great folks.

 

[Brychanus]

Played standstills only working on a form issue and got back in the range of mid 900s ish local shorties golf. Upshots were back, actually landed some forehands without pain, and putts were a bit improved from the usual unpracticed mediocrity.