Thursday, October 14, 2010

Shocked by the sound of chains

One of the great things about disc golf is the way, when you think you've seen and experienced it all, something happens to make you realize you in fact have not. Such was the case for me today at Black Mouse DGC.

After two decades of playing disc golf, I can't remember anything like what happened today. I want to describe it in detail, and ask you, the reader, to share anything similar.

Hole 11 at Black Mouse is (choose your adjective): devious, frustrating, challenging, ridiculous. I'll try to describe it the best I can. From tee to basket, "as the crow flies", it's uphill and maybe 250 feet. But the terrain slopes steeply from left to right, and 80 or so feet from the tee the so-called fairway narrows to an opening maybe six feet wide and 10 feet tall. After that point the hole dog-leg's sharply to the left. On the left of that opening is a literal wall of redwood trees, and to the right is more trees and a continued downward slope. So you pretty much have to aim for that tiny gap and throw something that will bank left after passing through, or just sit down, to give you an extremely steep upshot.

I'm left-handed, and I try to throw a side-armed Surge driver through that gap that will ideally curve left and uphill toward the basket. Today I missed by at least 10 feet to the left, hit one of the Redwoods, and dropped straight down. My choice was to either sacrifice a stroke by tossing my disc a few feet to the right and hope I'd get a clean look at an upshot for a bogey four, or try to squeeze a blind shot through the wall o' Redwoods in the general direction of the basket. I knew it wasn't the wise choice because the gap was barely the width of a disc, and there were plenty of other trees to get past in the fairway, but I chose it anyway because it seemed more fun. I made sure to keep it flat to avoid a second wall of Redwoods closer to the basket, and let 'er fly.

The first and main objective was accomplished as soon as the disc made it through the 'crack in the wall'. Since the disc disappeared from view immediately, I listened closely to monitor its progress. I was hoping to hear nothing, actually, since that would mean the throw got as far as possible without hitting a tree. And that's just what I heard, until I was . . . . SHOCKED BY THE SOUND OF CHAINS! Honestly, I don't remember being more pleasantly jolted by that sound in all the time I've played the game. It was the perfect tone, too, where you just know it stayed in the cage.

I'm interested to hear if any readers have experienced anything comparable. I was hoping to scratch out a bogey, and in an instant realized that instead I birdied a hole I've only birdied once before. Do you have a similar story of being 'shocked by the sound of chains'?

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