2011 Old Settlers B tier

[dan howard]

geez Dale you have really harshed my evening mellow.  I think you can safely assume nothing except that you threw a disc you shouldn't have and you are willing to make public accusations that you can't back up with a bit of evidence.

And seriously, the only positives were the disc and the player's pak???

Here's some positives for ya, buddy... Ahh the list just kept getting longer and longer, for brevity's sake I'm just leaving my two favorites.
Two rounds of golf with a fun course layout that changed a lot in between rounds. Nice use of alt pins and pads I thought.  Another thx to those who moved the baskets during their lunch break.
And of course it's always fun to get the privilege of spending time with a great disc golf community doing what they love!
 
Thanks to everyone who came out and made for a fun day of Disc golf in Olathe!

[Dale W]

geez Dale you have really harshed my evening mellow.  I think you can safely assume nothing except that you threw a disc you shouldn't have and you are willing to make public accusations that you can't back up with a bit of evidence.

Here are the two possibilities of what happened to the disc:  1) A panhandling kid ( he was asking my group for discs as we approached hole 1) got it  OR  2) One of the women on the card following Cooper took it from where he left it.   My son was in the group following the women and it wasnt there.  You tell me which is more likely.  As for the whole disc discussion...I admitted my fault and role in this. 

And seriously, the only positives were the disc and the player's pak???

Here's some positives for ya, buddy... Ahh the list just kept getting longer and longer, for brevity's sake I'm just leaving my two favorites.
Two rounds of golf with a fun course layout that changed a lot in between rounds. Nice use of alt pins and pads I thought.  Another thx to those who moved the baskets during their lunch break.
And of course it's always fun to get the privilege of spending time with a great disc golf community doing what they love!

You are correct.  In my aggrivation over the trivial events of the day/tournament experience, I did lose sight of the overall picture.  It WAS a nice course and alot of work has been put into it both before and during the event.  Plus any day spent with many good people PLAYING is a good day.  Thank you for reminding me of that. 

[Tom]

Dale,
 
 I'm sorry you had a bad experience.

 It was a pretty slow couple of rounds, but beleive it or not, I have played even slower rounds in tourney play before. Almost any tourney that fillls up will have back-ups.

 The ROF is usually just done to keep the players occupied while the cards and payout are being totalled. I know my card (and we are old guys) had been in at least 25 minutes before they started the ROF. Again, sorry you had a bad experience missing out on the ROF. 

 I don't think a player made off with your disc you left. I'd guess the bike kid grabbed it. If you come out to league Monday, I'll have a new driver of some sort for ya.

 I think if you continue to play PDGA events, you'll discover yesterdays event was better than average. I know most of my crew (especially Cade who ACED!) had a good day, and I had fun too. 

 I want to say thanks to all that came out to play. Thanks to the DD crew, Adam Searle, Clay Houser, Chris "Smitty" Smith, Jeremy Kindy, (and I know I forgot at least one) for doing a great job as always, to Andy Lewis, Deano, Jack Lowe, and G-Money for helpng move baskets, and to Cindy for spotting, feeding us, and helpng with check-in and payout.

 

[The Bird Father]

From what I read from Dale's posts there is one thing that could have made your day better....PAY ATTENTION....don't screw around till the last minute.....a ton of hard work does into every tourney and all you had to do was come out and play....next time maybe you can appreciate the tourney better if you HELP!

[Cooper]

I don't think this'll be too useful but when I found the disc it was while I was warming up, maybe 15 minutes before the round? There were other guys on the teepad throwing which is why I just assumed they had thrown one while I was walking up and I hadn't seen it and it had gotten into the tree. If it were during the round I would have definitely picked it up and kept it until the end and tried to reunite it with its owner after the round.

All that being said, it could have been bike kid, or it could have been a player with no sense of courtesy.

[phisherman_77]

dale,  i mean this in the nicest possible way, but your expectations are way high.

i think that with time, you will discover that KC's tournaments, particularly DD's, are always very well ran.  sure, sometimes ghost cards happen.  sure, sometimes the waits at every hole are long.  try playing something like bowling green.  when i played there, there were 10-15 minute waits on every hole, every round, all weekend.  over 700 players.  it was a mess.

i think it's a matter of perspective.

for the record though, i like what andy said, instead of complaining about the tournament, go start planning your own to run.  make the players happy.  it's tougher than you think.

[dickthediscparker]

To be fair to Dale, having a "ring of fire" or event for the players when all the players can not be there due to a round going a bit long isn't fair.  I think he has a valid point.  Though loosing a disc isn't the tournaments fault.  The slow round sucks too but you will experience that more often then not.  Though I agree that once a tournament is full it is full, I think allowing people to play is nice as well.

And let us not jump on Dale and tell him to volunteer.  I think he is giving his honest opinion of the day.  He's new to this so he will have a fresh perspective. Some of us who have been a round a while may be just accustom to things being off.  We can always be better.  Let's make sure we are still at least keeping an open ear to what people say and maybe we can at least attempt to put on the best show possible.  DD isn't a volunteer staff btw.  He can expect certain things.  But thanks to the volunteers that did work to move baskets and get the tournament off the ground.

[Cooper]

Thanks to everyone involved for running such a great event...

just next time order some better weather

I kid, DD + The Butlers + The Throlatheans = Great Time

[Dale W]

I want to thank everyone for their comments.  As I stated at the beginning, I am new to large tournaments.  This was my second one.  I am still learning how they run and what to expect.  I want to reply to a few things and then I will butt out.

 I don't think a player made off with your disc you left. I'd guess the bike kid grabbed it. If you come out to league Monday, I'll have a new driver of some sort for ya.
 

Thank you, but getting the disc replaced wasnt my intent.  I will get a new one.  I was mostly venting on that issue as I have returned close to 10 discs this year that I/my family have found and have yet to have one returned to us (9). 

for the record though, i like what andy said, instead of complaining about the tournament, go start planning your own to run.

I may just do that in the future.  I actually have some ideas on that already.  First, though, I want to see some tourneys from a players perspective.

[phisherman_77]

yeah, that's just the breaks with lost discs.  i've had more people call just to gloat that they had my disc, rather than people calling to return one.  and trust me, i've lost discs all over KC, emporia, columbia, st. louis, des moines, the list goes on and on.

and as far as running your own tournament goes, i can understand that you're wanting to see the player's perspective.  it's good that way.  but there are a lot of players that tend to just nitpick and complain about what they didn't like, instead of concentrating on the positives.  running events takes a lot of people, time and energy and there's not always a lot of willing souls around to supply those things.

in any case, welcome to disc golf! we're glad to have you.  as you play more tourneys (particularly outside of tourneys run by DD or kansas city folks) i think you'll realize that we have it pretty darn good here and there is plenty of fun to go around!

[smitty]

Thanks KC for allowing DD to come to town and  run another great event. I don't think that a ghost card was such a great idea either. Ghost cards work well on courses that aren't drive and putt. Olathe is for sure a drive and putt kind of course.

Dale, sorry about the lost disc. I know your pain. I don't know how many I have found but I am sure that I could count the ones returned on my fingers. That is the way it goes. I always say I hope the good guys find it.

As for the Ring Of Fire. The main purpose for it was to give the people hanging around something to do. It wasn't going to happen at all the way the sky was looking. Then it did and we gave out 3 extra shirts and a hat to the double winner. Ring of Fire was actually replaced with the win your card get a hat idea the second round.

Thanks again to all the KC golfers for coming out. Huge thanks to Cindy Butler for being awesome, and you can come on tour with us when ever you want. Biggest thanks to Tom and his crew of local Olathe golfers for moving baskets and getting everything ready for the event.

[spinachio]

i saw a couple of people taking pictures.  Does anyone know if or where they will be posted?

[tallguy007kc]

That was Minna and Loomis.  My guess is that the pic's will probably be posted on Facebook.....they may even have a link to them posted here at some point. 

[tallguy007kc]

I'd like to add one other side note for either Smitty or Tom or whoever has the power......I let Jeremy know when I checked in that I had fat fingered my PDGA# when I signed up, and had it entered as 38535 and it should be 39535.  I'm sure they haven't had a chance to change it, but, would like someone with the power to do so for me, and my ratings sake.  Probably for the person that actually has that number as well. 

[kidmills]

didn't think you were at 925