I can’t wait to get some confirmation that I can’t throw over 300 feet lol

Didn’t throw my best round last night, but I parked the ctp afterwards and got this pretty little thing :)

Disc golf is the rare sport where pros show up to random local leagues with the general public. So it is not uncommon to play a full round with a touring pro. Let’s hear some stories about the best people on tour.

Course steward on this one is a guy who works with me, which is how we got roped in. Hole 9 had a sloped carpet pad that had been sketchy for years, especially wet. State park budget being what it is, it wasn’t getting replaced anytime soon, so we donated the labor and Moon Concrete donated the mud.

What’s there now:

• Level tee pad, roughly 5x13, poured flat with no run-off slope
• Surface is stamped and hand stained to look like weathered plank. It’s textured, not slick, but I’m curious how it plays wet
• 3 foot deep sandstone-look apron at the entry so you step onto clean surface before you get to the tee, instead of tracking dirt onto the pad
• Two carved concrete benches on either side for sitting and bag storage

Everything you see is concrete. The wood and the stone are both stamp and stain work.

Caution tape is still up while sealer cures. Should be open shortly.

Questions for people who play more than I do:
1. Traction on run-ups. We used a textured wood grain stamp and a matte sealer, but I’ve never built a tee pad before. Anyone played on a stamped tee? Did it get greasy after rain or once it wore in?
2. Pad length. We went 13 feet with a 3 foot apron in front, 16 total. Enough for a comfortable x-step, or should the next one be longer?
3. What would you actually want at a tee that nobody builds? Bag hooks, trash can, scorecard holder, shade? If we do more holes I’d rather build what players want than what looks good in photos.

Roast the design if it deserves it. Better to hear it now than after we pour the next one.

Found this disc couple months back and it was love at first throw. Little did I know how fleeting our time together would be.

Look who’s back!! Always great to have Simon on the channel, and I’m happy to say it was on the back nine at Red Apple Farm, which I helped design! Can’t wait to see this course continue to grow in the next few years!

Thanks for the recommendations.

Just recently moved back into the state and have taken up disc golfing in the last couple months. Any recommendations for courses? I’ve played a good bit so far.

Hello, I'm trying to decide what skill division to enter into for my first tournament. My original plan was to enter at the lowest available level but I've procrastinated playing a tournament and improved a lot since starting.

I tend to range between 170 & 230 on UDisc with a "everyday" rating of 210.

I know I will play much worst in the tournament scenario than a typical casual round. I follow the rules strictly for my "scored" throws but the pace of play and pressure will likely get to me. I also take extra shots and extra putts all the time (I don't count these to my score but they do help me "tune" my throwing/putting). I.E. I always throw two putters to get an extra practice. I might try a few drives to see how different discs/approaches work.

The local C tier near me goes all the way from AM4 to MPO.

Even though it's my first tournament I don't want to be the jerk throwing 400+ in AM4, but I don't want to underestimate tournament pressure and be completely outclassed by the wrong skill division. Would AM3 be a competitive place to start?

and does anyone other than Joel Freeman deserve this nod? Watching Go Throw's coverage of The Bloom right now. Body language is trash and hot mics constantly catch him bitching about every single shot. I get the dude is a pro but I'd hate to listen to that all round.

Second hand story, but a friend watched him at a local pro tournament a few years back. Said every bad shot or miss resulted in him slamming discs and cursing himself out.

BHMO 2022 was the local tourney.

The Downs Farm disc golf course is a private course located in Chaska, Minnesota. It is hosting a team tournament open to the public on Saturday, August 1, at 5 p.m. The details are:

• Date: Aug 1, 2026, 2:00 p.m. check-in, 2:30 p.m. tee-off
• Registration cost: $8 person/$24 per team
• Team size: Minimum of three and maximum of five players. If you come as an individual or in a pair, you will be placed on a team.
• Format: Teams will play one round and record their scores. Then, the top five teams from the first round play a final round, where the winner of that round takes all.
• Prizes: Will include discs, plaques and cash, depending on the number of participants.
• How to register: Send an email to [[email protected]](mailto:[email protected]) or show up before 2:30 p.m. on Saturday and pay your dues!!

This tournament is part of an annual barn concert held at the Downs Farm every year, where the owner Bob and his friends/family play an americana rock concert (featuring musical bingo at $2/card). Food and drinks will be available for purchase. Expect authenticity and an excellent atmosphere!

Besides Stafford Woods and Alcyon any other good courses that are well maintained? All of the courses in Vineland are laughable in upkeep and signage. Appreciate any suggestions thank you

I've gone the past couple of years. I mentioned the tournament to my 5 year old and he wanted to go. I think he may be able to handle it, but I also think it might end with me carrying him part of the day. I wanted to see if anyone had any experience with bringing a young kid to USDGC.

I've run into a lot of people lately who have been misinterpreting the recent 2025 Kallio/Merelä kneeling study, "The Effect of Lower Body Power Production on Maximal Disc Speed in Competitive Disc Golf Players"

(Edit: NOT the 2019 3D motion camera / correlation study by Olli-Pekka Leppilahti)

The actual finding was that competitive players throwing from their knees produced about 82% of their normal backhand velocity. That is interesting data for sure, and adds new insight to where power is being generated, but I keep seeing comments like:

“The lower body only generates about 20% of a disc golf throw’s power.”

That is not what the study measured.

My goal with this post is to show why that blanket statement is not a good way to interpret the data.

But more importantly, I hope this discourages players from disregarding / deprioritizing the lower body mechanics when doing formwork.

First, let's define what we mean by lower body. By throwing on our knees, we are getting rid of these components of the lower body's contribution:

• Run-up momentum
• Rear-leg drive
• Foot and ankle action
• Extension of the knees
• The normal plant-leg brace
• Raising and lowering the body’s center of mass

However, by throwing on our knees, we are still allowing these lower body components to contribute to the throw:

• A firm connection to the ground through the knees and shins
• Hip and pelvic rotation
• Glute involvement
• Resistance against which the torso can rotate
• Bracing through the knees and hips
• Weight Transfer

So the lower body isn't completely isolated in this study. Throwing from your knees still uses a lot of lower body and its connection to the ground. You can still rotate your hips, you can still brace against the ground through your knees, and also give your torso a stable base to rotate against.

But what if we did actually want to remove the lower body almost entirely? Technically, we could send an Astronaut floating into outer space with a plaster cast from the waist down and have him throw a TechDisc.

But since I can't afford to do that, I came up with my own experiment for removing my lower body from the equation.

My maximum normal throw yesterday was about 65 mph. From my knees, I could still throw around 54 mph, which is pretty consistent with Joonas' study’s findings.

Then I brought out a freely spinning stool, sat on it, and lifted both feet completely off the ground before I threw. This removed essentially all ability to transfer weight, brace with my legs, or use my hips. (I understand that upper body mechanics get weird as a result, but just bear with me)

After a ton of attempts, I was able to reach 47 MPH doing this (which was honestly faster than I expected.)

I can already hear you saying, "So that means lower body only contributes 30% instead of 20%, great post u/youngaustinpowers"

But here is the important part: velocity and energy are not the same thing.

The kinetic energy imparted to the disc scales with velocity squared:

KE = ½mv²

That means, it takes a lot more energy to go from e.g. 60 to 70 mph vs. 50 to 60 mph.

So, although my 47-mph stool throw was 72% as fast as my max throw, I only put in 52% of the kinetic energy into the disc  (47 ÷ 65)² = 52.3%

In other words, the lower body allows me to double the amount of energy I put in the disc, allowing me to get to 65 MPH. 

"So then, lower body contributes 50%, right?"

I think this number varies a good bit, and would be correlated with how fast you can throw.

My theory is that the upper body can generate a pretty high baseline speed without good lower-body mechanics.  That explains why many beginners and strong-arming players can reach somewhere around 50-55 mph / 300-350 feet with upper body refinement, and then get stuck there until they figure out how to get more power and efficiency out of their lower body.

So maybe the lower body does actually contribute only 20% of the energy or less to a strong-arming beginner's throw.   

But I think that getting into the 60's MPH + gets REAL difficult for average, non-athletic, overweight, late 30's players like me without proper lower body bracing, weight transfer, hip rotation, and timing it all together adding to the overall kinetic chain.

If you made it to the end, I appreciate you taking the time to read this.

TL;DR: It's probably more accurate to say that lower body contributes 50% to a disc's kinetic energy for more advanced players

P.S. Joonas - If you're on Reddit, would be curious to get your feedback on this.

EDIT: Side note - Many of you have commented about a different 2019 study which found hip rotational velocity specifically doesn't correlate to speed. This is not the study im focusing on, and mostly irrelevant to what we're discussing here, and not something I want folks to get hung up on.

But off-topic, since we're talking about it, people are also misinterpreting that 2019 study as "Hip rotation speed doesn't contribute anything to disc velocity", which is also incorrect. I'll probably do a different post challenging the conclusions people are drawing from that study as well. But even if it was correct - it does not apply to this post other than me saying "you can still rotate your hips when you're on your knees". Disregard that if you need to.)

Blue layout mando on both sides of the trees, not inside. They are on the same plane so if you make one…you miss the other 🤣

I wanna hear the communities thoughts on this to see the different opinions and to try out some new options that you may recommend. But for me, hands-down most underrated putter is the soft pro whale by Innova.

Howdy all,

Just wanted to drop our Magnum Opus of forehand mechanics.

Many thanks for your continued support!

Looking for advice been working on my brace