A Whole New Way to Play Golf

The goal with Disc Golf is to throw your disc into the basket

With the concentration, subtlety and accuracy of pros at the Masters, disc golfers are driving, putting, backhanding, “hatcheting” and otherwise coaxing discs that resemble Frisbees into baskets for nine or 18 holes. Some are in it for fun. Some are seriously competitive about it. Others are addicted to its many nuances, special equipment, and techniques.

At Disc Golf ranges, like the ones in Charlestown’s Ninigret Park and Willow Valley in Richmond, you finesse your disc to a chain target, from which it must fall into a basket. There’s distance involved, usually 200 to 400 feet. While a hole-in-one (an ‘ace’ in disc golf terminology) is not unheard of, it’s very rare. You must get your disc into that basket using fewer throws than your opponent, just like strokes in golf.

The sport requires strategy. Winning is about technique, not arm strength. There are different kinds of discs and different ways to throw, plus considerations like disc stability, wind, elevation and whether you’re throwing uphill or downhill.

There are Disc Golf professionals who live off the sport’s big competitions, sponsored by disc companies. For them, scoring a disc under 60 feet from the basket is a mere formality. You can check with disk golf pro Greg Wintrob on that, the RI reprsentative of the New England Flying Disc Association (NEFA). Greg ran two tournaments in Richmond last year, and would like to expand venues here, given New England’s penchant for the sport (there are about 25 courses in Worcester alone).

Modern Disc Golf began as ‘Street Frisbee Golf’ in California, circa 1959. Soon ‘Frisbee Golf’ tournaments sprang up on Newport Beach playgrounds. The sport spread out, and came east. By 1975, the Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) was formed, which oversees the standard rules of play in nearly 3,000 courses in the US and over 4,000 globally.

Here’s how Disc Golf works: You make your initial drive from a concrete tee pad. You must release the disc while on the pad, although you can run up to it and step off after release. After that, strict rules can kick in, especially in competition. Beware of foot faults, falling putts, two-meter and out-of-bounds rules. Common courtesy dictates that you yell “Disc!” before you drive off the tee.

Golf discs are smaller and heavier than traditional Frisbees, eight or nine inches in diameter, weighing between 90 and 180 grams. There are typically three categories: drivers, mid-range discs and putters. There are two basic throwing techniques, backhand and forehand (or sidearm), but “The Hatchet,” “Thumber,” “Roller,” “Baseball,” “Grenade,” and “Overhead Backhand” also come into play.

Disc Golf depends on natural elements to challenge players: trees and shrubs are obstacles. Elevation changes on every hole. As with “ball golf” (traditional golf to disc golfers) each course has a personality. But mostly, “People just go out there to have fun,” Greg says.

Drop by the public course in Charlestown’s Ninigret Park. “Pick up a disc,” as Greg puts it.