Disc Golf Evolution in New Zealand. An American’s perspective.

Two Decades of Disc Golf Evolution in New Zealand. From an American’s perspective.

Part 1

I first visited the beautiful country of New Zealand way back in December of 2005, and within a week of arriving, I found myself playing a round of disc golf. I played the round at the Onetangi Sports Complex on Waiheke Island, which sits just to the west of Auckland City. The Waiheke course is notable as the very first disc golf course in New Zealand to offer players proper catching baskets, though those baskets weren’t even official Innova or Discraft products. Instead, they were handcrafted by one of the island’s locals, who was a skilled metallurgist and avid player.

Before the Waiheke course was constructed, people playing disc golf in New Zealand had to make do with “obstacle golf”. This was as crude as the sport gets. It amounts to choosing a distant tree, or lamp post, or garbage can or whatever, and making that the “hole”. The sport had a long way to go down under.

A few minutes after I arrived at the Waiheke course, a local guy named Nigel walked up and immediately asked me if I wanted to trade discs with him. That notion might seem insane to a modern player, but keep in mind that in 2005, much of global E-commerce hadn’t yet reached New Zealand. So my American-made bag was a novelty to Nigel, he pawed through it with genuine wonder and delight. Eventually he pulled one of my two Orcs out, and asked me what I wanted for it. Sadly, we didn’t reach a deal, as I didn’t want to part with anything in my bag,

A week later, I was once again on Waiheke Island, ready to compete for real. The course was hosting the inaugural “Waiheke Open”, and all the best players on the North Island were attending. I didn’t have much experience with the course prior to this event, but found it was perfectly suited for my extremely remedial skillset. I had only learned the X-step the year prior, and my form at that point was objectively awful. My putting was only serviceable, and I had no real forehand. There was in fact only one thing I could do well as a disc golfer in 2005. I could throw an awesome thumber.

I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s as an outdoors kid, and I had developed an ability to throw rocks and balls quite well. That natural understanding made me particularly well-suited to throwing thumbers when I started getting more serious about disc golf in 2004. By the time I played in the Waiheke inaugural event, I could throw a thumber with pinpoint accuracy about 300 feet.

My ability to crush a thumber earned me several things that day on Waiheke island. It found me tied for the lead after two full rounds, ready to contend for the tournament title in a sudden death duel against a lefty named Marty. It also earned me a nickname among the locals, who granted it out of a mixture of admiration and condemnation. Some of my cardmates grumped about my dependency on the thumber, which they felt was unsportsmanlike. They called me “Brian the Bomber”.

Alas, my bombing capabilities failed me on the first hole of sudden death, and I wound up finishing second place to Marty. That actually seemed like the best outcome, since it would have felt a bit awkward and icky taking down the inaugural tournament as a foreigner using a throwing technique many of the locals found undignified.

Something interesting was going on in the background of the event, involving a person who would go on to become the most influential figure in New Zealand disc golf for the next two decades. That figure was the incomparable Kiwi named Simon Feasey. I will tell you all about him in part 2 of this story.