At the dreaded and signature eighth hole, Jacob Adams gets ready to take his shot.
Adams isn’t playing traditional golf on a course at the edge of the city, he is playing disc golf at Marsh Pond Park, a weekly event for a small but mighty group of Stratford and area residents dedicated to the sport.
Disc golf is similar to the traditional game, with players throwing discs – not frisbees – towards a far off hole, a metal basket a couple feet off the ground with chains hanging over it to catch the discs as they fly.
The discs themselves can vary quite a bit. From the plastic used for its construction to its weight, disc golfers carry a bag of various discs for specific circumstances.
Some tend to lilt to the left or right, some can hit the ground and bounce off, and some can land and stick, for instance.
In terms of rules, there are a few official differences to traditional golf as well as a few customs, as Adams shared with StratfordToday.
“There’s a general rule that you don’t ‘nice’ anyone until it's stopped or in the basket,” he said.
At the eighth hole, Adams gives a running go, twisting his body, and sends the small disc through one of the two soccer nets that are mandatory obstacles, repurposed for the course from the previous use of the park.
The disc flies toward the second soccer net, needing to pass through the posts before it can make it to the basket, as one of his companions whistles and breaks the rule, exclaiming “nice shot.”
On cue, the disc delicately curves away from the net.
Adams is one of the disc golfers that took up the sport during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the sport garnered a lot more attention. Like many people during that time, he was looking for a way to get out and do something.
“Had to be outside, had to be distanced, still wanted to compete with my brother,” Adams said, listing the checklist he had for whatever activity would best suit him. “My brother saw some baskets outside a school in Kitchener and I was like ‘cool.’ Bought a disc and we just went out and started.”
Adams and his group of four golfers sink their discs in the chain basket and make their way to the next hole. There are nine holes in the park and every Tuesday the Stratford Disc Golf Club (SDGC) holds a rec league, running through the course twice for 18-hole games.
The course was put in Marsh Pond Park by then-Stratford-resident Scott Nowack, who lived around the corner and thought it would be an excellent course.
As Dave Framst, one of the members of the club, explained, with some help from other interested parties and a Trillium grant from the government, Nowack and the City of Stratford created an initial course.
That course has since changed, with positions being revised and more trees planted for shade and obstacles.
After Nowack’s departure from Stratford others have taken over.
Steve Law is the organizer for the SDGC. In 2017, Law reached out to Nowack, who had left the region, asking if it was alright if he started a casual league. Nowack was very enthusiastic about the possibility, encouraging him to do so.
Since then, it has been an incredible change. Law explained that the course was used by the same familiar faces back then.
“Now if you come out on the weekend,” Law said. “You'll often see two, three groups … and you may know some people, but there's gonna be a lot of people that are out of town or getting into the sport.”
The SDGC started with six people and gradually grew year over year. During the pandemic, there was a shocking boom for the sport in Stratford and across the world.
It reportedly took the professional disc golf association 40 years to get to 100,000 members. In the last three years the membership has doubled.
Now, the SDGC sits at about 25 to 30 members.
On the SDGC’s website, the club assures they are hoping to be as inclusive and welcoming as possible. That comes from the relaxed nature of how they play and the not being judgmental towards anyone starting out.
“You find a lot of people who play disc golf are just salt-of-the-earth and the nicest people you’ve ever met,” Law claimed. “I think almost everybody I've ever talked to who plays disc golf would say the same thing.”
Additionally, Law said that in terms of cost, disc golf will not set interested people back too much. The local course is a public park and is free to play. While many disc golfers carry numerous discs, Law estimated that only four would be required to have an enjoyable time.
Perhaps no one has played this year as much as Ryan Duchesne, a relative newcomer to the sport.
Duchesne has played hundreds of games so far this year, all tracked through the Udisc app, which tracks information related to the sport like scores and course locations, among other things.
Duchesne told StratfordToday that it is a great recreational activity that gets him out of the house and away from video games.
Adams added that with a few children himself, it's a great pastime that the whole family can get involved in.
The SDGC hosts a Tuesday rec league, a Wednesday putting league, a Thursday ladies’ league, and Sunday funday doubles. Whether athletic or not, they are encouraging everyone to get out to the course if interested.
For more information, visit the SDGC’s website.
