For the love of the sport. A place for DG enthusiasts to share their thoughts.

Posts tagged “introduction

Intro to the DiscRaptor

Posted by discraptor


Hey guys and gals, just thought I would do a quick post to introduce myself and what I hope to bring to the Dogleg community.

My name is Justin, I’m 27 and currently live in Seagrove, NC with my wife and Hoover my 5 year old Lab/Coonhound mix. I’m currently a photojournalism student with a concentration in sports photography and hope to translate that to bringing the sport of disc golf to the masses through photos. Outside of disc golf my interests pretty much peg me as a nerd, LOL! I’m a huge music fan, mainly heavy metal, but do enjoy music as a whole to a degree. My favorite bands include: Machine Head, Pantera, Amon Amarth, Battlecross and Testament, but the list is quite more extensive. I’m a big tech guy, specifically custom PC builds. I’ve built the last 4 PC’s my wife and I have owned and recently started getting into case modding as well. Art is another big passion of mine. I do everything from pencil drawings to acrylic and spray painting, and yes I do disc golf related work. One project I have going at the moment is trying to figure out a way to do LED paintings that can light up!

I was introduced to disc golf last summer by a buddy of mine, Dex, who I’ve known all my life. He called me up one day and asked me to come down to the park near his house and try it out. I had heard of disc golf before, but never gave it much thought as a sport that would interest me. I am a former baseball and football player used to really challenging sport; I just never thought of disc golf as something I’d enjoy. Well, I get down to the park and my buddy is out there with a bag full of discs. He explains the rules to me, shows me the basics of a BH throw and tells me to let it rip. The disc went 50 ft then hard left into a tree. Needless to say, as a former athlete, I was less than pleased when he put his shot under the basket 245 ft away. I’m not one to give up easily, but looked at Dex while just shaking my head. Dex has been playing for a few years, told me I just had to get the mechanics of the throw down first and that distance would come with playing/practice. The next hole was almost the same story, I threw a disc maybe 75 ft this time, but Dex again parked it at 300 ft. This went on for another 5 or 6 holes and I became increasingly frustrated. That’s when it clicks in Dex’s head, since I’m a former Shortstop and 2nd baseman, maybe I would have better results from a FH throw. He shows it to me, hands me a higher speed/more stable driver and says rip it like you would if you were gunning out a runner at first. It clicked. I put that muscle memory to work, put all I had into the throw and let it rip down the fairway. The disc was parked 5 ft from the basket 315 ft away, my jaw dropped. Watching a disc I had thrown sail that far, that fast, it was like a rocket leaving my hand, and I was hooked.

Since that moment I’ve dedicated my game to driving FH. I drive FH for distance, control, as well as anhyzer now. I will throw close to 95% of my drives FH and probably 80% of my upshots. The FH drive just feels so natural and smooth to me. I seem to generate much more power and snap with far less effort throwing FH as well, but the best thing about it is that is doesn’t hurt my shoulder like a BH drive does. My baseball career ended in High School when I tore my labrum on both the front and back of my shoulder, my family couldn’t afford the surgery to fix it, and they are still torn now. This causes my shoulder to pop out of socket when exerted too much.

Those are the main reasons I’ve come to Dogleg. I want to spread the knowledge I’ve gained over the past year about driving FH and playing disc golf with injuries. I found Dogleg through Twitter and immediately emailed JT when I saw I could join and help contribute. I don’t see a lot of information out there right now about FH driving and disc selection. I hope to help anybody that I can with disc reviews from a FH player’s perspective and any throwing tips I can give. I also want to share what I’ve learned over the last 10 years about conditioning and strengthening joint injuries for recovery, preventive methods and how to translate that into a routine to help with both distance to your drives and overall health.

I would also like to share any disc golf related pieces of art or projects I work on if anybody is interested in seeing them.

I look forward to contributing and talking with the Dogleg community, as well as spreading the word about Dogleg around the NC disc golf community!

-DiscRaptor


Just an intro to get started.

Posted by chrissmithspresence


Honestly, I am a little bit awe struck to actually be writing on Dogleg. My plan is to just go with it and enjoy the ride. I would like to think that writing some of my experiences may help someone out there or possibly encourage them to take a chance and try something new.

I am going to start with a little bit of background information about myself. My life is not all throwing plastic in the park, even if I would like to pretend that it is. I have actually only been playing disc golf for a few years.

I was born and raised in the central part of Michigan. I grew up the son of a teacher and thought that everyone had summers off. I was crushed when I got my first “real job” and realized that it lasted all year long. Can you imagine how good you would be if you could really play disc golf all summer?

I have a tendency to get things in my head and obsess about them relentlessly. The current addiction is disc golf (which helps explain why I am writing this intro). In the past I have been the director of our local youth soccer league along with coaching and reffing for over ten years. I was really into running for a while and even completed a marathon (I am still signed up for an ultra at the end of this summer but I don’t think that it is going to happen). Now I am organizing a disc golf tournament. I will post more about that in upcoming articles.

When I was a kid, my siblings and I used to play a game that we called frisbee golf. We would pick a tree and see who could hit it with a frisbee in the least number of throws. Then we would throw from that tree to another one. I didn’t know it was a real game. I just figured we had made it up.

About five years ago, my mom bought my brother and me each a starter set from Innova. I remember wondering why they looked so strange and then going out and playing our old way around my brother’s house with our kids. I found out that there were actual courses and dragged my kids and co-workers around playing with me. Then I found out that we have a local club and they play regular rounds. I played a few rounds with them and I was hooked. I will be starting my third year of league play this year and I am planning to branch out and play a lot more courses this summer.

I consider myself an average disc golfer. I am really good at my home course and not so good anywhere else. I can throw a 350’ drive standing still but I have no form or accuracy when I move my feet. I know that I need to improve my putting to improve my game but I haven’t committed the time to it yet.

In researching potential sponsors to donate prizes for my upcoming tournament, I noticed that Dogleg was willing to let people contribute to their site. I feel like I have learned a lot about the sport and organizing a tournament and I would like to share it with anyone willing to read about it. I know that I will continue to learn as I go, until after my tournament is over and I plan to post along the way in the hopes that it will help someone else.

Well, that’s it… I want to thank Dogleg for the chance to share my thoughts and ideas with their readers. My first post on Dogleg. I promise the next ones will have more information that you can use.


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