News Archive

Friday, December 26, 1997

Community Meeting on McLaren Park Proposal

On Thursday, December 18, members of the San Francisco Disc Golf club, and members of the greater disc golf community at large, including local PDGA Coordinator Conrad Damon, and Local Living History Leonard Muise, attended the first community meeting held on the subject of a disc golf course in McLaren park. The community surrounding McLaren Park was represented by William Carlin, the president of the Friends of Mc Laren Park, Joan, the club treasurer, as well as many other neighbors whose concern for their park is great enough to lure them out of their homes at 7:00PM on a cold Thursday evening. Many of the community members had never heard of disc golf before, let alone the proposal for a disc golf course in McLaren Park, and so it was with a certain amount of surprise that some members of the community entered the meeting.

I am pretty sure that the disc golfers outnumbered community members at the onset of the meeting, and while that was a great show of support on behalf of everyone (you all rock, by the way) it put a few of the community members immediately on the defensive. Once the meeting got under way, Marvin Yee had made a fantastic presentation, complete with a great map of the park, and a slide show about disc golf, and where and how it would impact McLaren. After the presentation was over, the floor was opened up for questions, and it became appearant that the greatest concern was how a disc golf course would affect existing uses of the park, as well as the native species of the park. Many great points were raised by everyone, and the general sense seemed to be that disc golf would be a good thing for McLaren park, but people want to be sure of what they are getting into, and they also want to make sure that all of their neighbors have a chance to voice their opinions. Marvin agreed to another community meeting, and before that happens neighbors are going to have a chance to go on walk-throughs of the course with Leonard, Conrad and Ross.

The course is by no means a done deal, but the potential continues to grow in my mind. It is my personal belief that once community members see what the sport entails, how unobtrusive a course would be, and especially how children of all ages take to it they will understand why we feel as positively as we do about the prospects for a course.

I have said it before, and I will say it again; if a course goes into McLaren I am going to add it to my list of neighborhoods I am looking for a place in.

First Ever Monthly Doubles Tournament

On Saturday, December 20, the San Francisco Disc Golf Club hosted its first event, a doubles tournament consisting of teams randomly drawn from two skill pools: beginner and advanced. The teams consisted of

Dan Warburton and Brian Henderson
Tom Pitmon and Ken Ingrey
Greg Quiroga and Warren Sedar

That was the order in which they were drawn, and ironically enough, that was the order in which they finished. Prizes included the last Roc from this year's Safari, soft and stiff Aviars with the Safari stamp, and 150 class Millenium plastic.

The next step is to get our stamp on discs and start selling those discs to raise money for baskets. Give us time, we are going to be adding a "Goods" section to the site soon.

Last Round of the Year

Saturday, December 27th, we are going through the Presidio for one last round of the year. Meet at Q's house for coffee and bagels at 9:00am, or meet at Julius Kahn Playground at 9:30am. For those of you who have not seen the new 4-7, you have not yet had the chance to bomb 450 feet, dropping over 80 feet! The "new" hole #6 is old #11 from the original map. A classic hole that begs for the hyzer, but demands the straight shot.

Happy Holidays, and have safe new year!

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