What’s new with SIDGS?
We’ve had a busy summer! Hopefully everyone got to play some new courses and had some fun locally. The South Island is lucky to have such an amazing disc golf community and so many talented players. As a society and community we are so proud of the success of our players in their competitive endeavours and the work they do to grow the sport. We’d like to highlight and congratulate the following achievements:
Julie Moens – 2nd Place – PDGA Amateur Worlds – (Florida)
Chad Kaila – 1st place MA1 – Island Series Winter 2020/2021 – Overall Standings.
Tyler Flint – 1st Place MA1 – BC Open
Scott France – 1st Place MA2 – BC Open
Aleesha Bird – 1st Place FPO – BC Open
Kristy Lee/Bridgitte Coss – 1st Place FPO – BC Doubles Championships
Julie Moens – 1st Place FPO – Canadian Nationals Satellite Event
Andrew Leyland – 1st Place MPO – Canadian Nationals Satellite Event
Gabby Lee – 1st Place FA2 – Canadian Nationals Satellite Event
Chad Kaila – 1st Place MA40 – Canadian Nationals Satellite Event
Kristy Lee – 1st Place FPO – Falcons Flight 12 – (Alberta)
Division Winners at Island Series Events (4) July – October – Todd Martin, Chad Kaila, Katelin Albert, Aleesha Bird, Ed Jordan ,Gabby Lee, Andrew Leyland, Scott France, Geoff Maciver, Kathryn Tang.
We’d also like to thank all the individuals within the disc golf community who are working hard to improve the disc golf scene locally and are contributing in many different ways. SIDGS has been busy and we’re looking forward to the fall!
Results of Community Engagement and Course Usership Study Day
On Saturday July 17th SIDGS sent representatives out to all the courses in the local area to capture a two hour snapshot of the local disc golf demographic. The day turned out to be extremely hot and anecdotally the courses all seemed slow for the time surveyed. The data is still quite useful as we feel it represents the lower end of usership on an average Saturday. Highlights of the survey were the diverse age range of disc golfers and the total usership for the time period. Extrapolating to a full day with likely busier periods mid morning and early evening (8-10hrs x (214 golfers/2hrs)) it’s probable that ~1000 people disc golfed on the South Island that day. This information, especially the general age demographics will be incorporated into proposals going forward.
Date | July 17 | Time | ~2-4pm | ||
Course | Youth (under 12) | Youth (12-20) | Adult (20-50) | Senior (50+) | |
Millstream | 5 | 0 | 57 | 3 | 65 |
Shoreline | 5 | 4 | 18 | 2 | 29 |
Layritz | 5 | 6 | 17 | 2 | 30 |
Bayside | 4 | 11 | 15 | 4 | 34 |
Mary’s Farm | 0 | 0 | 46 | 0 | 46 |
RAP | 1 | 3 | 6 | 0 | 10 |
TOTAL GOLFERS | |||||
Totals | 20 | 24 | 159 | 11 | 214 |
Layritz DGC Drop-in Nights in Partnership with Saanich Parks
We had great success running separate drop-in nights for women and families at Layritz DGC. The drop-ins were geared towards new players and growing the sport, we had a number of first timers out who really enjoyed themselves. Saanich reported the engagement with the first social media post about the events having the highest online engagement of any post that far in 2021, which is really exciting. The women’s nights were a huge success and we saw mostly brand new players coming out to try the sport — we got them hooked! Saanich Parks was really happy with the concept and the use of the space.
Community Nights at Mary’s Farm
Alternating wednesday nights at the farm, to foster community within the Women’s Disc Golf Scene and to provide a safe and fun space for families to enjoy the course and introduce the next generation of disc golfers to Mary’s Farm. The family nights were a huge success, with many families utilizing the chance to access the course. Womens nights were also a big hit! It was so great to see so many new players or folks who had not played in a while coming out to get back into the sport. At times, we had up to 15 players out enjoying women’s night! Depending on numbers, we often had fun rounds of the reds, a few CTP competitions, putting game warm ups, on the last night, we even tried out non-dominant hand forehands (lots of laughs all around). SIDGS would like to express the utmost gratitude to Mary, Tania, and Owen for opening the door to the farm for the community on these nights. We’d also like to thank Aleesha Bird, Myriam Luzadas, and Kristy Lee for getting this night off the ground and acknowledge the Island Womens Group for the financial contribution that made this possible. Based on the success this summer we’re hopeful that we can fundraise over the winter to make it an ongoing event!
Saanich Update:
We have some great news! Our proposal to upgrade Layritz DGC to baskets with long and short tee pads has been accepted! Sadly, we were not awarded funds to do the upgrade through the Federal grant we had applied for. At this time Saanich is looking for extra money within their current budget and failing that we are hopeful we can obtain funding during the 2022 Budget Cycle. If this option proves to not be viable then SIDGS will look at fundraising options. In the meantime we will also monitor for applicable grant opportunities that could fund the project sooner.
Victoria Participatory Budget 2021
After some back and forth with the City we’ve had our Participatory Budget request accepted into the public voting phase. SIDGS has requested $7200 to purchase nine baskets and discs, as well as operational costs, to host popup events in City of Victoria Parks in 2022. The Parks selected were Topaz, Oaklands, and Vicwest. What this means is when voting goes live later this month the community can hopefully rally behind this initiative and help us grow the sport with the City of Victoria. There is $50,000 in total funding available and the allocation is based on community votes. We’ll be sharing the voting platform far and wide once it launches, so keep an eye out!!
Island Series Tournament
We have finalized the details for our Island Series Tournament happening November 14th at Lambrick Park In Saanich!! The layout is going to be a blast and it will be a great local showing for the area as Lambrick Park looks for something more permanent in its future parks plan. Lambrick is entering the planning phase in 2022 and SIDGS has provided a potential 9-hole layout for consideration. We will be looking to crowd source Dan Walker Baskets for this event, we currently have about 10 accounted for. If you’d consider lending your Walker Basket for the day please reach out to [email protected] and we can work out the logistics. Thanks!
BC Club Championships
As many of you may have heard, this weekend, October 16/17th, is the BC Club Championships at Raptors Knoll. We are beyond excited to have an incredible team representing South Island Disc Golf heading over. There will be some heavy competition out there with the likes of Mundy Park, The Bramble Bashers, Chilliwack Disc Golf Club, The Gulf Islands, Raptor Knoll Disc Golf Club, Nanaimo Disc Golf Club, and the Kamloops Disc Golf Club. The South Islands own Kristy Lee has put in a huge amount of work coordinating the event itself and with SIDGS Board Member Joe Salkeld as SIDGS Team Captain driving the ship, we can’t wait to see how our golfers fare. The format of the event is super cool, with a combination of best disc and alternating shot doubles, as well as match play. Heres the proposed SIDGS roster with respective divisions. Join us in wishing them luck!
Name | Eligible Divisions |
Kristy Lee | MPO FPO MM MMA |
Kathryn Tang | FA FPO MA |
Andrew Leyland | MPO |
Sylvain Verrier | MPO MA |
Chadwick Ellis | MPO MM MA MMA |
Aleesha Bird | FPO MA |
Dan Van Egmond | MA MPO |
Braeden Simmonds | MPO |
Gabrielle Lee | FA FPO MA |
David Simmonds | MPO |
Brad Brown | MPO MM MA |
Tony Pacheco | MPO MM MA |
Chad Kaila | MPO MM MA MMA |
Gryphon Vester | MPO MA |
Pat James | MPO MA |
Joe Salkeld | MPO MA |
John Kiefer | MPO MM |
Sean Coss | MPO MA |
Coming Soon!
We’re working on a few things and will have more to share coming soon, keep an eye out for announcements about the following:
- 2021 Tag Wrap Up
- Annual General Meeting
- Winter Indoor Putting League
- Winter Flex League 2.0
Membership Update
As of October, 2021 SIDGS currently has 167 paid members, our highest to date!! We look forward to working with you and leveraging the collective power of so many disc golfers.
Please reach out by email ([email protected]) if you hear of course opportunities since we may have resources to help support you, contacts, or background information we can provide. If you have an Idea for an event send it to our email with a brief description. We look forward to hearing from you.
We look forward to sharing more with you in the near future. For questions about what we are up to or to get involved please email and we will get back to you!
Sincerely,
The SIDGS Board of Directors