2009 Worlds !

[Dan Michler]

What I've found on the amateur courses.

Water Works and Blue Valley are the only courses I've seen.  Shawnee Mission, Prairie Center, and Wyandotte will be completely new to me, and this will be the first time I've actually played Blue Valley.

After researching the courses a bit, it looks like Shawnee Mission and Prairie Center are ~6000 ft courses without heavy rough, but alot of trees (looks like a ton of pine trees at PC) to contend with.  Mostly holes in that 300-400 ft range.  Wyandotte looks long as hell, especially if they have it setup in the long placements, with alot of wide open holes over 400 feet.  Blue Valley obviously is the ballbuster and Water Works is a very fun course with a ton of elevation and tricky shots.

I'm thinking you'll want to practice Blue Valley before the tournament round as this course will probably produce the largest spread in scores due to its difficulty level.  I'd like to practice it on Sunday so it doesn't wear me down immediately before the tournament.  SM and PC are played 2 times and look like they have alot of difficult deuce holes that you might want to get comfortable on.  Wyandotte looks like a course you might be able to get away with not practicing.  Water Works is the 1st round of the tourney and a fantastic course, so you'd be crazy not to practice that one!!!!!

Overall, it looks like your not going to want to leave your high speed drivers at home.  10 days from now your arm will be feeling it cuz none of these courses are short (atleast not by Lake County terms).

[OvEr HaNd AsSaSiN]

My predictions.

Kinkle folds under the pressure of having a kid like david wiggins beating him early.

Wiggins wins  and Taylor Cimala makes a huge comeback after Am Nats to take 2nd (Maybe even winning in the late rounds)

Taylor Cimala winning... that has to be the funniest thing ive heard this year on a forum.. and val will win by alot..

[tacimala]

Definitely a long shot, but probably more realistic than you or Rodgers finishing a tournament.

[Dan Michler]

The competition in these Junior divsions is fierce.  There is a 1000 rated kid in <16 this year, and he has 37 rounds on his rating so its the real deal.

I looked at his history and he played Worlds last year in <16.  He lost by 9 shots to a kid who averaged 1000 rated golf for the 8 rounds.  Dave Wiggins is a 14 year old kid who won <19 by shooting 990 golf for the week.  Had he played <16 he would have placed 2nd.  All these kids could have played in the Advanced division and either won (the winner averaged 999.5 golf for the week and won by 12 shots) or atleast made the finals.

The lesson is: if you are a Junior boy who is 950 rated and very talented for your age, don't expect to pick up an easy World title by playing in the Junior divsions because there is probably a soon-to-be 1000 rated kid somewhere in the world who already thought of that.  Might be more fun to play Advanced where you have another 280 players to compete with other than the 2 or 3 phenoms at the top who are there to make a name for themselves by picking up an Am Worlds Title before moving on to play against Nate Doss and Dave Feldberg at NT events.

[KenGmoney1]

I am leaving for worlds in 12 hours!

[Bruce Brakel]

The pathetic thing on the junior boys is they don't make a name for themselves doing that.  No one knows who won junior boys last year other than his mom and dad, maybe uncle and aunt.  Or, and this is really pathetic, all the people who read the custom shirts dad went out and had made! 

[Arok]

Good luck fells. Tear it up!

[Grayson Dewey]

Anyone got any ideas on how to distract oscsar(1000 rated 16 yr old). I am playing with him.haha well kc is hot! I left yesterday and it was 100 degrees down there. Everyone goodluck.

[pdga#7648]

taking off in a little less than 19 hours.

[tree]

How may days do they play in worlds? What are the days that they play?

Last year I played worlds in the Women's Am Master's division. We played 7 rounds before the finals; the bigger divisions (Advanced men) have semi finals then finals and more than one pool of players. Last year we had a tough schedule: Monday 2 rounds, Tues 1 round, Wed 2 rounds, Thurs and Friday 1 round each.

[tree]

Sweet. Solid tee time day 1 and get to play with super thumber man Brian Schweberger.

COOL! Have fun!

[tacimala]

The pathetic thing on the junior boys is they don't make a name for themselves doing that.  No one knows who won junior boys last year other than his mom and dad, maybe uncle and aunt.  Or, and this is really pathetic, all the people who read the custom shirts dad went out and had made! 

So age and gender restricted divisions are pathetic? I mean I'm not in full agreement with everything PDGA related, but being that the U-19 division is very competitive with 15-20 people, wouldn't a world championship there be as commendable as any other narrowly competitive division with 5-8 people tops?

[Bruce Brakel]

I don't see anything competitive in any of the junior boys' divisions.  In <19 you have a 985 rated player with one opponent at 972 and four or five players rated aound 960, and then there are a bunch of kids with no chance.  If the 985 rated kid has a horrible week and the 972 rated kid has a mediocre week, there could be a competition.

In <16 you have a 1000 rated junior whose closest competition is three kids in the 940s.  That division will have a competition for about 9 holes and then the three are playing for second.

In <13 the highest rated kid has 45 ratings points on the next kid.

Year after year the junior boy's competition is an excuse for the top rated kid NOT to compete for a world title.  If Oscar or Nageeb wanted to compete for a world title, they'd play advanced. 

Last year the junior girls mostly decided that they would compete for a world championship.  They finished 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 8th, 19th and 25th -- maybe 29th and 38th were junior eligible also -- in the Advanced Women's Division. 

When three of the ten highest rated players in the amateur side of the tournament go hide out in the junior divisions, yeah, that's pathetic. 

[SERG]

Best of luck to all the DISCONTINUUM members! I'll be on the computer watching the progress of you all.
I'll be joining you all next year at Lemon Lake.

Don't forget to save some energy for the Praire Open at the end of August 

[ChrisPUTTS]

i thought the first round scores would be up ...

[jimklem]

This is the worse coverage and website linkage in years.

[Steven Jacobs]

Good luck IL 

[tjdub26936]

i thought the first round scores would be up ...

Despite the Mon-Sat dates listed on the PDGA schedule, the tournament web site's schedule has first rounds starting today, not yesterday.

[Bruce Brakel]

Which, to complete the thought, would make it hard to post first round scores yet, especially since Krupicka is not volunteering in the scorer's tent. 

[Arok]

They need to invest in better coverage for these big events.