Before I wrap up the seasonal notes, I just wanted to thank everyone who showed up on Week 10 . . . it was maybe 45-50 degrees, winds of about 20-30 MPH and was drizzling the entire round. If you play ...
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Before I wrap up the seasonal notes, I just wanted to thank everyone who showed up on Week 10 . . . it was maybe 45-50 degrees, winds of about 20-30 MPH and was drizzling the entire round. If you played through that, then having fun must be a high priority in your life! It was nice to have 16 people out there for sure, to share in the misery. Oh I almost forgot ., . . it was dark by our 6th hole and I had my LED lights on.
It's been another great year of leagues at Valley View. I attended all 30 of the weekly sessions and enjoyed every single one of them, even the one where I took only my 5th double bogey at VV. Valley View may not be the most challenging of courses in the world (it is no Estabrook) but it sure is fun and it has been a pretty good crowd of people looking for some disc golf fun out there. After 3 seasons of seeing people come to leagues at Valley View is a fun thing to watch. A lot of people have improved their games by coming to this fun league. Being able to throw those controlled shorter shots is a monumental part of the game of disc golf and that is what Valley View presents for us all. I know one person in particular (initials S.F.) who was so upset at his scores at VV that he nearly stopped coming to league. He ended up finishing in second in the Semi Pro Division (Secrets out . . . its Shane Ferguson) averaging better than (-7). That was a whole lot better than when he first started coming to leagues at "The View". Congratulations Shane on toughing it out . . . if only everyone else pushed through their struggles on the course and made it into a learning experience, the world would be a better place.
I will highlight some of the better seasonal improvements in a later update after I update the spreadsheets. I will also let everyone know who is getting automatically bumped up in the spring to the next division, and who I think should be in a higher division despite their scoring averages.
As always in disc golf there is a lot of talk about sandbagging and because of this we instituted a general guideline for your averages and where you should be shooting to try and maintain the integrity of the divisions (so noone can simply dominate season after season taking home more and more funny money every week). I think the averages helped to keep people honest because if they were shooting the scores that puts them in a higher division that is where they will play. I do hope this doesn't force people away who feel like they cannot contend in a higher division, but at the same time if you are coming to league simply to win funny money you clearly have your priorities out of whack. My advice to those people who feel they have hit a plateau or are unable to improve is that you can still improve, you just need to try new shots, or learn a new throwing technique. What's the best way to do this? Play with people better than you for a season and learn from them! I personally learned a lot in my first season in Open . . . I learned that a sidearm is a good throw to have in the bag . . (thanks in part to Avery Jenkins for discussing the technique, and to Brad Weber for showing me it can be a really valuable throw on 4 or 5 holes on the course) It has allowed me to make a handful of holes more regular birdies than throwing the normal turnover. I learned that Terry Miller does not like Skip Aces even if they were called out in advance.
All in all it was a great year. Congratulations to our divisional winners, Terry Miller (Open), Drew Griswold (Semi-Pro), and Chris Levandoski (Advanced). We will see you in 2012 and look forward to bumping you all up a division (yes Terry that means you too)!
After all was said and done . . . we drew for the three people winning prizes with their mulligan purchases (why does it seem the basket is going to people who barely show up???)
These prizes are completely provided to you by the purchase of your mulligans . . . so thank yourself for buying mulligans!
The winner of $10 off any Lifetime Disc Sports tournament or league entry is. . . . . . . . . . Dave Olson (We missed you the last few weeks Dave!) The winner of a Lifetime Drifit or Tshirt is . . . . . . Matt Walczak . . ..and the winner of the basket (either an Innova Treveler or an Innova Mini Disc Basket (I am jealous) is dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun Ben Lynch. Congratulations to all the winners of the raffle and the divisions, but all of you need to keep in mind . . . YOU ARE ALL WINNERS!
