Disc Golf in Scotland
This past September my wife and I had the opportunity to visit Scotland. It was a wonderful trip which I could post a few times about - this post, specifically is about a bonus event I got to take place in - a disc golf tournament in Glenrothes Scotland. It was on our first Saturday in the country and took about a 90 minute bus ride from where we were staying in Edinburgh.
We woke up early and trundled off to the bus stop and waited on a cool wet morning for the bus. We weren’t exactly sure where the bus route would go but Google had helped us plan the trek. The driver was awesome and helped us avoid switching busses unnessicarily and got us to the bus stop in Glenrothes. We then walked about 1/2 mile to Riverside Park and quickly found tournament central - a FDGC Tent. After arriving and signing in I received my mystery bag of three discs. A factory second MVP Glitch and two discs I’d never heard of before; a Yikun Crossbow in base plastic and a Doomsday Cataclysm ( think, Im having trouble remembering the doomsday disc name).
After a few practice throws I figured the Crossbow was a lot like my Prodigy A2 and so I used it for putting and approaches. I basically ignored the Glitch. If I had to throw anything farther than 200 feet I threw the Cataclysm.
We had the option to swap discs with others out of their mystery bag but I decided to stick with what I had.
There were a few more people who participated I think. Disc golf is fairly new to the area and the brothers who put on the event, the Glen brothers, are doing a great job of growing the sport there. Jason Glen was the tournament director and he (black shirt, gray hat on the left side of the image) was super welcoming. He, his brother Kris (in the pink shirt), and the guy with his arms crossed just to the right center of the image (maybe David), and myself were the MA2 division. There might have been others, I wish I had taken better notes.
The course was pretty fun. They have done a great job of creating a wide variety of shots in a very public and well used park. The players are super courteous of other people in the park though other people had no idea what we were doing. At one point we did wait about 10-15 minutes to throw off a tee as people kept walking from the parking lot to a playground.
On the hardest hole of the course (hole 4 or 5 I think) you play along some rough briar looking area that has a couple large cement hippos in it. The hippos are featured in the clubs logo. They were pretty cool looking poking out of the tall grass. The tall grass is OB and there is a large set of trees that, if you miss the hyzer over the hippos, will definitely keep you in the rough!
During the first round I was on a card with Jason, his wife/girlfried Lauren (just to the left of him in the photo) and the other lady (Ellen) just behind to the right of him were on the card together. My wife walked with us and we had a great time. I think I shot -6 and I was one or two strokes behind the leader (David).
A cool tidbit - the lady to the right, in the back row, is Ellen Ranklin - a member of the Scottish National Women’s Volleyball team. She had just recently picked up the game but you could tell she’ll get good at disc golf fast.
In the second round it was myself, Jason, Kris, and David. I shot -8 and took the lead. We then played another 9 holes. I didn’t do well that last 9, I think I was getting tired and had stopped focusing. But, I maintained the lead and ended up winning the event - with the low score in all divisions. That was cool - but the highlight of the event was Kris getting a walk off ace on the last hole of the 3rd round.
His disc was about 1/3 of the way there when his brother Jason called it! It was a great looking line and just missed the big bush on the left as it faded into the basket. It was great and he won about £70 from the local club ace pot!
Everyone we met there was super nice. They ended up having a cookout at one of the guys houses after the event - but my wife and I had to catch a bus to get back to Edinburgh so David was nice enough to drive us back to the station.
My prize pack included a disc stamped with the FDGC club stamp (one thing I wanted to get while there) as well as stickers, bag tag, and the cool trophy. Plus, 3 beers from Loch Lomond Brewery - “Southern Summit American IPA”. It was a good beer and a cool part of the prize pack!
I wish I had gotten some contact info of some of the folks - it was a pleasure to meet them all and, next time I’m in Scotland, I’ll try to get back out to play another round with the club.
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