Course Reviews

[Lowe]

You can see the course reviews that I've done at "DG Course Review (http://www.dgcoursereview.com/profile.php?id=74)".

I keep detailed info on the courses I play in an Excel spreadsheet and an Access database.

Let me know what you think.

Lowe
Raleigh NC

[Lowe]

I'm working on updating my review of George Ward. It's almost finished. When I'm done it'll be posted to my google group, DG Course Reviews. You might want to check out the "Lowe Score" for the course.

[Thomas M]

Thanks for the PDGA color code link.

[Lowe]

Lowe,
I tried about 15 course reviews (both adobe and excel) and only 1 would open once and none will again. Keeps telling me file could not be found.

Sorry, but I don't know what the problem is. No one has reported this to me before.

[Lowe]

Thomas,

You raised some valid questions, and I'd have some of the same questions of some stranger from out of town. At some point I'll have to provide some FAQs to tell a little more about myself and my credentials.

Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Take care,
Lowe

[Lowe]

We all have opinions but to use club research to back up a personal blog page might give the impression the club is endorsing your assesment (dgb may totally disagree). Seems like anything but the official PDGA course ratings are just personal opinion and should be based on personal experiences, not data mined from clubs. This will probably come across sh*#ty but I dont know any other way to ask.

I hardly see how I've done anything shady. The only data that I've asked for are the correct hole lengths. I only got on here because I sought to verify the lengths that I got from the tees signs on the course. I have not "mined" any other data. I'm only trying to get the most accurate information that I can. I see can no way that DGB will be seen as endorsing my review. The hole lengths should be public knowledge. If anything, I've helped in a very small way because it seems that some of the lengths that Jebb gave me on the Excel spreadsheet may not match the layout letters.

I'll write more thoughts later, but I'm only offering these reviews as a small service to the DG community. I see it as a way to give something back to a great sport that I love.

[Parkntwoputt]

Online criticisms/evaluations/appraisals whether valid or not need to be backed up with scrupulous credentials. This is true not only in disc golf course evaluations, but every other aspect of information mining on the internet.

Disc Golf Course design and evaluation is something that is very subjective.

So many factors go into making a course that without knowledge of what is proper to do with limited land and park usage. Not to mention what skill level the course is designed for, and how appropriate it is for the other skill levels that actually do play it.

While someone evaluating the courses may have opinions, as we all do. It is important to make transparently public where and how these opinions are being formed.

I see on your ratings you gave Water Works a rating of ~93 and Rosedale only 7.5?!!!?? While water works is a nice park, I would never rate it that high, for the most part it was actually a pretty boring park with exception to the elevation changes....#1 is exciting to throw a midrange 550ft, but other then that, the excitment stops until you get to #4 where there is a risk of going down the hill to the water treatment plant for a few holes in series and then on the back where an OB road comes into play on the long holes. I know because I went OB behind the basket on the longest hole on the back.

Rosedale was a good strategy course? #18 a par 4? I saw it dueced too many times at the NT event last year to call it a par 4...difficult 3...yes.

Water Works is a better course then Rosedale but only because of the frustration factor assoicated with going "down under" at Rosedale. I was fortunate never to go OB on the island hole, down under, and I successfully navigated the turn over route over the softball field on the hole heading back to the pavillion.

My concerns on your weight for these assessments is one "family friendly", did you not see the play ground and skate park? There were families and kids constantly in the park during the summer tournament. But you give a lot of weight to the factor "use of water" so effectively if a course has no water, it receives a low score.

I personally think it is great that you volunteer your time to publish your assessments of these courses. But credentials of your ability to evaluate courses would be appreciated.

Playing 173 documented courses is impressive. But I think that with amateur course evaluation and design, skill level highly effects judgment on the quality of the hole design. For example, hole #17 at UAH in Huntsville is a great example of how the ability to play the hole affects the judgment in how good of a hole it is. The hole is 380ft in total straight line distance. The fairway is narrow with an OB street on the left. The lake covers 90% of the distance from tee to pin in a straight line, and the natural bend of the lake creates a 40ft wide C-Shaped fairway.

For the person with only 300ft max distance, this becomes a boring difficult hole. They have to throw two long shots to get to the basket, each time flirting with the possibility of losing their disc in the water, or going OB. The best they will ever do is a 3, and will likely only get a 4 or worse with OB penalties. Now for the person with a 400ft max drive, they are tempted by this hole, it will take all of their distance to reach the hole only adding to the risk that they will turn the disc over and end up in the lake. Their chances of a birdie two are low but tempting. But they have the option of playing safe and taking the smart three. Now lets look at the players who throw 450+ max distance. These players would typically throw an easy slow wide hyzer shot over the lake fading into the green. As far as risk and technical difficulty of the shot it is pretty boring. The only real risk factor associated with the hole is the luck factor of catching bad wind and either ending up short in the lake, or going long and into the road OB.

#17 at UAH is an excellently designed hole. This hole while designed for the Blue level players as with most of UAH, really tests the abilities of the player both mentally and physically.

Unfortunately not all courses can meet a strict standard of playability and matching requirements of a subjective evaluator.

Don't get offended when someone asks or questions your credentials for evaluating courses. Me? I am a mid level new Open player who as played around 50 courses, ranging from the simplest pitch and putts to World Class private and public courses. I have been called one of the longest throwers in this game and there are many holes distance wise that I cannot get a three on. I was taught to play by the best players this game has ever seen, with a in-depth mentorship by one of the games founders. I have redesigned a few holes and revamped an entire White level course to make it suitable for Gold Level standards. Do I expect everyone to value my opinions? No, but all I can say is what I think while giving them validation and backing of my opinions.

Take Care Lowe,

And thank you again for what you do.

[Justin L]

I didn't like your tone, though.

See, this is one of the problems with the internet. Most all of us on this messageboard know Thomas, we play golf with him all the time. You however, haven't met him. So when we read that post we just read it as Thomas asking questions. You, not knowing Thomas, become defensive when its not necessary.

As far as "tone of voice" goes, the same could easily be said for your posts Lowe. Between the wording of some of the messages here and the private messages sent to me your tone could be described as rather off putting.

You've caught DGB at a bad time, we have a lot of things going on right now. From forming a club, to organizing events, to dealing with some of our best members leaving town. You'll notice that I haven't responded to any of your posts, it's not because I don't appreciate what you're trying to do. I just simply don't have the time right now.

As far as your site/ratings goes. If you're serious about making a ratings based site and attract some attention to it you should probably get a webhost and design your own page. The google groups thing is tedious to navigate and no on likes to have to signup for a service just to read some posts.

Hope this helps,
Justin

[Lowe]

Online criticisms/evaluations/appraisals whether valid or not need to be backed up with scrupulous credentials. ...

Don't get offended when someone asks or questions your credentials for evaluating courses.

There are definitely inherent limitations with communicating on a message board, so I hope to make it clear that I'm not offended in the least by someone asking for my credentials. It's a perfectly valid and natural question. I'd ask the same thing if I some guy showed up out of the blue and wanted to review my home course. I tried to say that in one of my earlier posts.

It's a great question, so I'll try to write something up.

Take care,
Lowe

[Lowe]

I see on your ratings you gave Water Works a rating of ~93 and Rosedale only 7.5?!!!??

Thanks for pointing this out. There are many pitfalls to evaluating courses. One I face is that my system itself is continually evolving and it takes lots of work to go back and correct changes. This is a case in point. Shortly after my Waterworks eval I changed my rating scale from 1-100 to 1-10. Waterworks should really be 9.3 on the new scale. I guess I need to go back and change all of the old evals. Ugghhh!

Rosedale was a good strategy course?
Is this a question or a statement? Did I say this? I'm curious where you got this from my eval. Would you elaborate?

Take care,
Lowe

[Jebb]

Lowe, hopefully soon we'll have all this info 'ratified' and can better answer some of these questions. We're pretty hard pressed right now as Justin mentioned to get a LOT of things done prior to our March 10th tourney. One project we're working on (new tee signs for GW) will benefit us all, and I'm even taking a day off work next week to get that ball officially rolling. As you can see, your questions have obviously shined a little light on some decisions we need to make regarding pin placements and naming.

FYI to everyone:
Tom put Lowe in touch with me, I sent him the spreadsheet from Richard in an attempt to help him out. Please be nice :)

[Lowe]

Disc Golf Course design and evaluation is something that is very subjective.

I totally agree! I don't want to give the impression that my ratings are THE final score. It's just my opinion and my hobby. The weight I place on various factors will differ from others.

But you give a lot of weight to the factor "use of water" so effectively if a course has no water, it receives a low score.

Actually, it only gets a low score in this one area.

One thing that I need to explain somewhere is that the total D-B-A score has very little relation to the overall "Lowe Score". The total DBA score has turned out to be unreliable, and inherently flawed. (The most value comes from either very high scores or very low scores.) It's better to look at each item individually to see what I thought was strong or weak. I'm thinking of taking that out to avoid confusion. On the other hand, I do give high weight to course beauty, elevation changes, variety of tee'basket positions, and water when I come up with the overall "Lowe score". I ponder them all together then I compare the course to others I've played, so I "grade on the curve". Other people have different values. A course can still score high without water (e.g.- Renaissance is my #1, and Water Works is high), but the presence of good water holes elevates a course, IMO.

[Parkntwoputt]

Sorry, that was a typo...Rosedale was a good strategy course. (period). I meant that to be a statement. And what I meant by that was that the long baskets (pro set-up) all holes that involved risk with the "down-under" had treacherous greens. While not impossible, but sometimes that 30ft birdie putt was going to turn into a possible 6 if you missed and went down under.

Sorry about that confusion.

[Lowe]

Where is the legend to explain all these color ratings etc?

On the excel sheets there is a worksheet called "Explanation". You'll find it on a tab at the bottom of the screen.
-You can also learn more about the PDGA playing level colors at http://www.pdga.com/documents/2004/PDGAGuides2004.pdf
That document was the source for many of the standards that I use.

What are the formulas supposed to tell me?
Thomas, which formulas are you referring to? Under "Difficulty Factors" there are a number of items that only make sense in comparison to other courses. This is still in progress, and I need to provide some tables on my google group. Also, some are still experimental; I'm testing and evaluating their usefulness.

I hope this helps.

Take care,
Lowe

[Lowe]

My concerns on your weight for these assessments is one "family friendly", did you not see the play ground and skate park? There were families and kids constantly in the park during the summer tournament.

The "family friendly" refers to the course itself and not to the park as a whole. I try to base it on how much women and kids would like playing the course.