The Rise of Disc Golf: A Greener Alternative to 'Ball Golf'
by Tim McGee, Helena, MT, USA on 03.31.08
Golf as an American sport is in decline. According to the National Golf Foundation and the Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association the number of people who play 'ball' golf has gone down from 30 million to about 26 million in the past 8 years. A New York Times article this year points to time as a critical factor. Walter Hurney, a real estate developer and golf aficionado said:
“There just isn’t enough time. Men won’t spend a whole day away from their family anymore.”
Disc Golf however has been on the rise. Named the fastest growing sport in America, in the past 30 years an estimated 12 million people have played the game. The Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) has around 12,000 members, and disc golf courses are popping up in every state.
Created in the 1970’s, disc golf has inherited much of its lingo and rules from ‘ball golf’. The difference is that instead of a ball and clubs, disc golf uses a flying disc. The goal is to throw the disc from a tee, across a fairway to a ‘hole’, which is usually a suspended metal basket (as shown in picture). The player with the fewest strokes or ‘throws’ at the end of the game wins. Yet that is where the two sports begin to part ways.
"My dad can't understand why I don't play golf,” said Chris Aruin, the club secretary of the Richmond Disc Golf Club in an article this week from Eastern Progress. “He knows I like nature, but a golf course is fake nature. This is the real deal."
Indeed, Golf courses can require tremendous upkeep, resulting in high ‘greens fees’. Disc Golf courses by contrast are adapted to their surroundings. An empty lot, a wooded park, or any other underused area of land is a potential disc golf course. All you need is a place to stand, a disc and a basket. In creating a disc golf course there is no need to water, fertilize, or change the landscape.
Take a walk in the woods along a disc golf course, and you might not realize you are in the middle of a playing field until you hear ‘FORE!’ and the sound of discs bouncing off of trees. The PDGA website serves as the primary gathering place on-line for disc golf information and has a comprehensive directory of disc golf courses.
Disc golf inherently has a low environmental impact, and the PDGA Environmental Committee works to organize potential impacts of existing and proposed courses. However, for such a green sport there is little in the way of ‘green’ gear, certainly an opportunity the entrepreneurial TreeHugger audience could fix.
From personal experience I can guarantee disc golf is just as challenging as the more traditional game. And with the low price of entry to courses (most often free), and inexpensive gear to get started, the game fits into any budget. Getting outside with the family for a game of disc golf is something everyone can participate in; it is easy to do, easy on the budget, and easy on the planet.
So, pick up a disc and give it a go. Don’t forget to learn more tips about going green in the outdoors with TreeHugger’s handy guide for How To Go Green: Outdoor Sports. Disc golf action image credit goes to formatc1.
:: PDGA
:: New York Times
:: The Eastern Progress
Folf is sweet.
yeah. pretty much... frizbee golf is awesome.
"All you need is a place to stand, a disk and a basket."
You don't even need the basket. A 'hole' can be pretty much anything. For example if a 'tree' is used as a 'hole', all one would need to do is hit the tree with the disc.
So really all you need is a place to stand and a disc. Of course a friend to play with would also help
My first exposure to disc golf was 15 years ago when I worked a summer at Yellowstone NP. We had two courses, the "official" course laid out by the employee services people. No baskets just trees, posts and trashcans for holes. The other course was the "unofficial" wilderness course laid out in a nearby valley. Holes were old stumps and rock out crops. We had to contend with Bison, "floating grass" (where water collects under the grass creating a waterbed like effect) and hot springs. Probably wasn't the safest thing we ever did. We used to joke we had hazards that could kill you on that course. I came back to Michigan and no one had ever heard of the game, now there are courses everywhere. I love playing and often combine a round with some bird watching, no course I have ever played compares to playing in Yellowstone however.
Well good luck with that.....
Of course regular golfers are not usually the type of people who play frisbee golf, so don't expect to see a decrease in golfers due to rising popularity of frisbee golf.
I think traditional golf is boring, overpriced, a total bore, and environmentally detrimental.
Disk Golf? Now that sounds like my kind of game---I already love to toss the frisbee around at the beach, so my qualifications are already there! I love how one can set up a "course" anywhere, and with minimal environmental impact.
Now there's one neat-o idea! I may just have to try to set one up myself this summer! Thanks!
My boyfriend has been playing disc golf for about 5 years now & i cannot say enough good things about it! I tried playing, but found just walking with him was more enjoyable to me. Our local course here in Baltimore is part of Druid Hill Park, and the regulars are some of the best people. I think that the reason that the park is in such great shape is because of the disc golfers. We all pick up trash & hold great pride in keeping our city park feeling like the great outdoors. And of course, i hug the trees that get hit by discs!
Disc golf is great! I hope they re-edit this post with the correct spelling of 'disc'. Envisioning people throwing around floppy diskettes is pretty funny though.
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Writers Note:
HA!
You haven't lived till you try to putt with a 3.5" floppy.
Thanks for the help. I think I caught all the 'disk errors'. - get it?
:-)
Just wanted to point out that the proper spelling is "FORE!" (not "FOUR") when shouting out a heads up for an incoming disc.
Good post though, thanks for writing that up.
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Writers Note:
Yes.. but it's FOUR or even BINARY when throwing a 'Disk'...little known fact I just made up. I need to get out more...
Thanks for the help.
Speaking of the need for more entreprenurial Tree-Hugger gear for disc golf, our acclaimed 18-hole Lucky Mud disc golf course on 40 acres in the middle of nowhere is a spanking example. We love to share our paradise with avid players. The entreprenurial part is THE INN AT LUCKY MUD. Our bed and breakfast is a green lodging in the remote Willapa Hills of southwest Washington State. We are so into disc golf. The course, aka Club Mud, wanders through hills, over ponds, and into mature woods, all tended by avid players. We are the greenest of the green, as in "rain forest." I guess I could go on . . . .
For those of you looking to start up with this sport the PDGA has a full course listing on their web site. You can usually find a course within a few miles of wherever you live.
This sport is especially popular with the boys as we all love to throw things, but it also teaches patience and persistence as we have to learn to become accurate with our throws. Disc golf, besides being good for the environment, is also good for the soul!
Many disc golf clubs also host work party days where club members get out and pick up trash, remove invasive non-native vegetation and help control erosion on local courses.
I can't wait for the day when I see the PDGA finals on ESPN!
Baskets are for the unimaginative, and an entirely unnecessary non-green element to the game. Half the fun of truly green Frolf is calling a completely crazy new hole each time. Players call holes in rotation. Doing that, you don't even need an official course, and can play anywhere. That is how we do it in Central Park, in New York City, anyway. Big, old cemetaries also make great Frolf courses, just don't aim for tombstones (it dings the disc and is disrespectful) and avoid mourners.
Anyone wanting a game in Central Park email me at hrothrekr@gmail.com.
Nice to see this article. Disc golf is sustainable in more than purely environmental ways. Its devotees reflect all walks of life and wildly varying economic situations - just one more part of the fun. As is the fact that the objects of play - the discs - become objects of art.
We have a "club" at DiscGolfersR.us on disc golf and sustainability. Anyone is welcome to come over and join in with our larger community of 4,000+ disc golfers.
Oh, BTW, one more bit of information: I am convinced, and am working on ways to be able to show it convincingly, that in the US there are more 18-hole rounds of disc golf played each year than there are 18-hole rounds of ball golf. Interesting thought, eh?