Outdoors

POSTED: Friday, Nov. 21, 2008

Professional disc golfers hoping to help sport grow

Watching local disc golfers Mike Leslie, Pat Sullivan and Nick Sanchez take on 42 holes at Cornwall Park with the sun's blessing is kind of like witnessing poetry unfold on a surgeon's operation table. The three are considered professional disc golfers, or "open" players, meaning they play in local and not-so-local disc golf tournaments but are rated too high to play in the amateur divisions.

That also means they win money - sometimes pretty big money.

Mike Leslie, who the Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA) rates as the 109th player in the world, estimates he took home $2,700 this summer. Sullivan took home $550 for a second-place finish in the Washington State Championships a couple years ago. And Sanchez, who moved to Mount Vernon from California a year ago and works at Western Washington University in Bellingham, said he wins money regularly, just not "top 5" money like Leslie, whose reputation as "Big Mike from Bellingham" precedes him in the disc golfing community.

Disc golf is similar to traditional golf in rules and format, but players use flying discs, rather than balls and clubs. The sport, which was started in the 1970s, according to the PDGA Web site, shares with golf the object of completing each hole - from tee area to target hole - in the fewest number of throws. Holes in disc golf can be any target, but usually use an elevated metal basket.

The course the group is playing on Veteran's Day only exists in Leslie's imagination, but it presents a more challenging route than the nine baskets at Cornwall Park. From an assortment of 15 to 17 discs each person carries, including drivers, putters and mid-range discs, the players split two-foot gaps between giant Douglas Firs with laser throws, conquer dog-legs and other obstacles with a slice, even bounce discs off concrete pathways, using spin to lay up perfectly for an ensuing shot.

The occasional joggers, dogs and dog-walkers meandering along Cornwall's many pathways are just a couple of differences between those who play for fun and those, like Leslie, Sullivan and Sanchez, who play for rankings and money - as well as for fun.

In some of the bigger disc golf tournaments - the largest probably being the United States Disc Golf Championships, at which Leslie represented Washington in October - a gallery of 100 or 200 might be looking on. That means dealing with pressure, and opposing players going mental with behavior Sullivan describes as "passive-aggressive mind games because they want your cash."

"Sometimes it can be nerve-wracking," Leslie said. "But I think I do better when there's pressure."

A sponsorship means Sullivan and Leslie don't have to spring for discs. Bent Discs gives each 20 to 30 discs per year. The next step, Sullivan said, is finding someone to help pay entry fees, which can cost each player as much as $120 a pop.

When Sullivan isn't working as a forester or playing disc golf, he's doing a lot of the behind-the-scene tasks that causal disc golfers likely don't account for but enjoy. Hundreds of golfers have enjoyed playing Mossy Roc, a course located in Sudden Valley. Sullivan, Leslie and avid player and Cornwall Classic organizer Bob Johnson created the course. Sullivan also started the organization that manages Mossy Roc, the Whatcom Disc Golf Club.

Leslie, Sullivan and Sanchez recently sat down to answer a few questions about playing serious disc golf:

Question: What exactly is an "open" player?

Leslie: A player that plays tournament play for money, basically.

Sullivan: Somebody who's shooting a player rating of better than 955 or 960 and over. He's got multiple shots in his bag as far as back-hand, side-arm, roller; can successfully throw a disc over 350 feet consistently; make seven out of 10 putts at 30 feet. (Turns to Sanchez and Leslie). Right? Stuff like that?

Leslie: Yeah, I think 20-footers you've got to be around 95 percent; 30-footers you've got to be around 70 percent.

Q: What kind of pressure comes with playing in tournaments?

Leslie: I usually try not to put the pressure on myself until the end. It usually comes down to the last three or four holes in every tournament with one or two players. It's always first and second are battling it out and third and fourth got their own battle. Usually, in every tournament there's a big jump.

Sullivan: There's sorting, and it happens by score. Round 1 you're playing with whomever. Round 2, there will be sorting where your top four guys are playing together, then your next four and your next four. Therefore, group dynamics do become pretty important.

Leslie: If you're playing with guys who are playing good, you tend to play better yourself.

Sullivan: Or other guys who enjoy being around it and are actually positive can lift you up out of a funk. At the same time, someone in a funk in your group can drag the rest of the group down with them. You learn these things about these players and you find out you enjoy their company in the parking lot, but not out on the golf course.

Leslie: When you start playing for money there are people out there who will try everything to try and get in your head.

Q: Mike, talk about your experience at the U.S. Disc Golf Championships in South Carolina.

Leslie: It was tough, dude. I represented the state of Washington. My first round I played with a guy from Switzerland, a guy from England and a guy from Texas. The (Switzerland) guy had his girlfriend there, because he didn't even speak English. But we could totally tell what was going on with each other just because of the game.

Q: How do people react when you tell them you play disc golf --- and get paid for it?

Leslie: People think it's pretty cool. People think it's not fair (laughs) ... The money I made this summer, with our economy and all this, helped me make it through with all my bills. I paid my rent because of disc golf tournaments. There aren't a whole lot of people who can say that.

Q: Are people surprised when they find out disc golfers actually make decent cash playing tournaments?

Leslie: They just don't know here because we're so secluded up here. But everywhere else, they just know it.

Sanchez: Did you know it was as big as it is when you started (says to Leslie and Sullivan)? I didn't know.

Leslie: Nah, I thought it was a hippie sport and it was dumb. I thought it was super-dumb the first time I played it.

Q: How much time do you put in a typical week?

Leslie: I try to putt every day, 200 putts a day.

Sullivan: On average, 45 minutes to an hour a day.

Q: What attracts so many people to disc golf?

Leslie: I think it's because it's outside. And it's free once you buy your Frisbees. With our economy the way it is, it's always nice to find entertainment that's cheap.

Sanchez: Everybody that I know that takes it seriously, when you can make that disc do what you want, you feel linked to something ...

Sullivan: You know what it is - it's the closest a guy's going to get to flying without becoming a pilot, I think. It's pretty cool when a disc leaves your hand and gives you the flight pattern you're imagining in your mind and lands within 20 feet of a basket.

Leslie: For me, it's putting. Making putts, every putt, it doesn't matter what putt --- 10-footers, 20-footers.

Q: Talk about the Bellingham disc golf community.

Leslie: It would be cooler if there were more tournament players.

Sullivan: It would be cooler if some people started helping ...

Leslie: (Most people) play here and they think this is what disc golfing is. This, Cornwall, is not disc golf. This is like going to the mall and the miniature golf place and saying this is golf. To me that's the same thing.

Q: You've at least got the interest here. That's kind of exciting.

Leslie: Well, the interest here (at Cornwall) is get here when we can play the course we want to play.

Sanchez: The way I see it, the guys who play the easy holes, one of them, three of them, five of them are going to be better than the rest of the people and want something a little more interesting. I remember when it was me. I was better than my scrub friends that didn't take it that seriously. And then you see some guy just really ripping one and can play, and you're like, 'I'm going to play with that guy or against that guy or where else does he play.' You start really checking out the different courses. That's one of the more exciting things for me, you find new courses and you lay up and like 'wow, this is such a beautiful hole or a great environment, whatever it happens to be.'

Q: What can other people do if they want to get more serious about disc golf?

Sullivan: Well, first, the No. 1 thing is public image. That's the number one thing because people walking their dogs and their kids see that random group that's more interested in drinking than playing, and that just wrecks it for everybody else. So we're out there doing damage control.

Sullivan: And the surge. If you're having an event, you're having an average of 80 to 120 people showing up so local businesses around here are definitely benefitting. It's another positive of the sport impacting the outside community.

Leslie: I just want everybody to play. It's good to be outside. It's good exercise.

Sanchez: Mike just wants to take everybody's money.