Registration is open for Cranbrook’s next big disc golf tournament. Running October 5 and 6 at both the Wycliffe and College of the Rockies courses, the Kootenay Up and Down is a Professional Disc Golf (PDGA) sanctioned B-Tier event, sponsored by Innova Champion Discs.
Tournament director (TD) Serge Gosselin knows a thing or two about putting together a good event, having organized disc golf tournaments since around 2003. Based out of Fernie, he puts on the tournament at the Lizard Range disc golf course there every year, in addition to helping out with events throughout the summer in Alberta.
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“For this level of tournament, you’ve got to put a team together so there’s probably six or seven of us that are together and we all have our own chores that we need to do,” Gosselin said.
The tournament begins Saturday, but there will be an optional random doubles game at the Wycliffe course on Friday at 3 p.m. and a players meeting with time to be determined.
On Saturday, as people register and Gosselin gets and idea as to many people they have for each division, players will be split into two pools. One pool will be at the College course in the morning on Saturday and one will be at Wycliffe. After lunch they will swap. Therefore, each pool will play both courses on Saturday and then everyone will be at Wycliffe with tee-times on Sunday to finish out the tournament, beginning at around 8:30 a.m.
“We’ve got room for 144, but realistically seeing as there’s a few other tournaments, I think there’s two tournaments the weekend before and there’s two tournaments that same weekend kind of close to us but not too, too close. So it might affect our numbers a little bit. I’d be pretty happy if we could get 50 to 60 people out.”
He expects to get a lot of local players from around the Kootenays and many from the Calgary and Lethbridge area. He says there’s interest from Washington, Montana and Idaho, but a brand new tournament announced its inaugural event on the same weekend after the Kootenay Up and Down had already been organized, so that may hurt American registration numbers.
Gosselin said that they’re at a point where there’s not too much work to be done on the courses themselves to prepare them for the tournament, other than perhaps a few small tweaks in the weeks leading up, to make the courses more challenging.
“Other than that it’s mostly all administrative work leading up to it, getting the word out to different clubs, getting players packs organized, figuring out what to put in the players packs, getting stuff ordered. Lots of fundraising.”
Innova Champion Discs, one of the first and most prolific companies in the sport, is the title sponsor of the event and will be providing the discs for the players packs. Players packs will come with a custom disc with the Kootenay Up and Down logo printed on it, a performance shirt and an assortment of other items.
The event will also feature raffles, awards and an ace pot.
The Up and Down also has sponsorship support from the PDGA, the City of Cranbrook, COTR, RDEK, the East Kootenay Disc Golf Club, AceRunners, the Fire Hall Kitchen and Tap and more.
Players can register into 16 different division, split between men and women and into junior, recreational, intermediate, amateur masters, advanced, pro masters and open. Information on choosing the proper division to suit your skill level is available at www.pdga.com/divisions
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Costs range from $45 for juniors up to $90 for the most advanced divisions. If you are interested you can register and learn more about the tournament here.
“It’s a little bit higher level tournament and the Wycliffe course is a little bit more challenging,” he said, “but we will have shorter teepads for the lower divisions on the Wycliffe course itself, but otherwise yeah any tournament is good for all levels of play, there’s always division offered for beginners.”
Gosselin says he looks forward to putting on another great disc golf tournament here in Cranbrook, saying about the Wycliffe course:
“It’s got to be in the top three courses in B.C. right now from what people are saying, so it’s good to try to showcase that course in a bigger tournament.”
paul.rodgers@cranbrooktownsman.comLike us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter
