Q2: How can I estimate how I should shoot on a new course?

A2: The PDGA has put together a system that will allow you to determine what you can expect to score on a new course. As long as the course has hosted a PDGA tournament and you have a PDGA player rating, you will be able to do this calculation quite easily.

1. Find out the course SSA.
2. Find out your player rating.
3. Use this chart to find your expected score. (This link is no longer working so we will try and find it.)

One thing to note is that this chart is an estimation. If you are a 900 rated player, is it because you don't have big distance? Or because you can't drive accurately? Depending on the answer, I expect you would score quite differently on a long wide open 60.4 rated course than you would on a tight, technical 60.4 rated course.

Disc golf is at an exciting stage. We are starting to develop these statistical models and tools and it will be fun to watch as they grow, improve, and become more universal. Encourage your local course to host a PDGA sanctioned tournament and it will then have a course rating.

As disc golf matures, the tools we use to measure our performance against each other, and against our expectations, will improve. Thanks to folks like Chuck Kennedy, and many others, we've got a pretty good start.

What if the course does not have a rating? The next best thing would be to ask locals how they score and what their PDGA player rating is. If they don't know, ask them how the best player in the area does and assume his average score in the course SSA.

What if I don't have a rating? Find a friend who is a member of the PDGA and you can roughly base your rating on theirs. To keep it simple, for every stroke difference in your scores, assume 10 points difference in player rating.

Sincerely,

Torque Novitski, Marshall Street