Amateur Disc Golf – ADG is an organization that offers disc golf tournaments with clinics specifically tailored to the needs of beginners, novice and amateur players. The organization provides a simple way for disc golf clubs and individual event directors to put on events and raise needed funds. The ADG has partnered with Disc Golf United – DGU to provide an easy-to-use online system for tournament event directors to create new events, and for players to register for events and claim their award prizes.

The ADG has assembled a large number of experienced disc golf event directors who run regular Amateur Disc Golf sanctioned tournaments that occur on a monthly, bi-weekly and weekly basis all across the country. The ADG provides clinic and tournament guidelines in addition to functioning as a liaison to the tournament directors. It also oversees negotiations and partnerships with primary and secondary sponsors.

One of the central goals of the ADG organization is to provide a consistent source of supplementary income for disc golf clubs and its tournament event directors. Club organizers and Tournament Directors (TDs) are the key persons to assure the success of ADG sanctioned events. Tournament fees and prize awards are designed for clubs and event directors to be well compensated for their time. They will be paid on a per-participant basis as well as additionally being entitled to a fair percentage of the prize award merchandise. Disc golf clubs and event directors can elect to either be paid in cash or in retail merchandise at a higher payout percentage.

There is no annual fee to play in ADG sanctioned events. A nominal fee is paid to ADG as part of each player’s entry fee in order to maintain the website, social media presence, maintenance of the tournament directors and players database, as well as basic administration costs of the organization. Players will receive over 100% of the retail value of their entry fee back in product and prize awards.

The ADG organization has its participating event directors adhere to the specific parameters for tournament formats and clinics. The event director’s experience will help to establish consistency in placing players in the correct divisions (Novice, Intermediate and Advanced divisions for both men and women) and distributing prize awards at the conclusion of each event. There is a standardized prize award chart made available to all of the players and event directors. The TDs will be responsible for reporting the tournament results in a timely manner.

* The prize award chart is based on a prize pool of $7.50 per person. This is 50% of the $15 entry fee.

One Round Tournament Format

One of the largest problems with current competitive disc golf is the amount of time needed to participate in a one-day tournament. Most professional sporting events are completed within a 3-hour window. The majority of competitive disc golf events sanctioned by the PDGA require players to participate in at least two rounds consuming most of their day.

The ADG organization sanctions monthly, bi-weekly and weekly one-day tournaments that consist of one 18-hole round, which are played primarily on weekend days. All participating disc golf clubs and tournament directors are encouraged to run informative 15 to 30-minute throwing technique clinics prior to the start of each event.

Divisions

Players’ will initially choose a division when registering for the event. Event directors will be allowed to use their discretion to move players to different divisions based on past scoring performances. We want make sure that all participants are playing in a division that accurately matches their skillset.

There are six divisions for each event, three men’s’ divisions and three women’s’ divisions consisting of Novice, Intermediate and Advanced. It should be noted that it only takes one person to make a division. The player can choose to move up a division or remain in the division by themselves.

Players are divided by gender and skill level consisting of three divisions;

• Novice players are new to the game and just learning basic throwing techniques and the rules of the sport

• Intermediate players have achieved a basic consistency and accuracy in their game and have a good comprehension of the rules of the game.

• Advanced players have played in a number of tournaments and are throwing over 250 foot drives and are consistent with their approach and putting skills.

Disc Golf Clubs and Tournament Event Directors

It is essential to have responsible tournament event directors promoting and organizing monthly, bi-weekly and weekly tournament events. Event directors will operate as independent contractors as many of them currently do when running PDGA events and weekly mini tournaments. We recognize the importance of working with local clubs as not to disturb how they conduct their own ongoing mini tournaments. The event directors are expected to work with local clubs and organizations making the tournament available to their amateur members.

All of the event directors will be responsible for communicating with the local parks to make them aware of the regular tournament play similar to many of the weekly mini and doubles’ leagues being played around the country. It will not be necessary to close courses to public play for ADG sanctioned tournaments, where we hope to have an average 20 to 24 participants at each event.

The tournament directors and board members of local clubs are valued direct liaison to the public. They are the marketing muscle that will help to promote the amateur events. Sanctioned organizers will be provided social media marketing templates to assist them in their outreach efforts to market the tournaments to new players.

All disc golf clubs and event directors will receive financial compensation for coordinating events. This comes in the form of a rate per participant and also a percentage of the prize award pool. Our hope is that the online registration and online prize award redemption takes a considerable burden off of the event directors.

Merchandise for Event Directors

All participating event directors will receive an inventory of new discs without having to front any money. The amount of discs shipped to event directors are determined by the number of players who have pre-registered for the event within the advertised perimeters. A list of the players and the disc that they had chosen will be provided to the event directors. Players will be able to select a disc for a variety of choices consisting of various molds and weights. The player’s package discs will be awarded to every amateur participant that has preregistered on or before the Sunday prior to the weekend event.

Event directors will also be able to purchase scorecards, pencils, and scoreboards at a discounted rate through the DGU.

ADG Disc Golf Prize Coupon Vouchers

All ADG tournaments are prize only events. Disc golf merchandise will be made available to winners in each division through the DGU online store. Each player will have their own account and will be able to use their accumulated award voucher gift cards at their convenience up to one year after winning them.

Players will go to the ADG website and click on the button marked “Claim Prize Awards.” The button links directly to the DGU online store where they can easily retrieve their prize merchandise. Players will be able to redeem gift cards for a huge variety of discs and other disc golf merchandise.

Benefits for Players and Event Directors

Players’ Benefits

• Providing well organized events lead by experienced tournament directors.

• A positive introduction to competitive disc golf for novice players.

• Dependable and consistent monthly, bi-weekly and weekly tournaments.

• Three divisions; Novice, Intermediate and Advanced for men and women.

• Easy-to-use online registration that is also available through mobile devices.

• A very reasonable entry fee of only $15.

• Every pre-registered player receives a new disc onsite with a good variety of molds and weights to choose from.

• A distribution of award prizes to the top 50% of the field. The award distribution will always slide to more than less. i.e. If 3 players enter, 2 get paid out with prize awards.

• Only one player is needed to make a division.

• Easy-to-use online redemption of ADG prize reward vouchers.

• Encouraged to give feedback to the event director and the ADG organization to continue to constantly improve the experience at ADG sanctioned events.

Club Organizers and Event Directors’ Benefits

• Great opportunity to promote the sport and establish a substantial supplemental income stream for disc golf clubs as well as individual event directors.

• Establish a leadership role in the community.

• Use years of disc golf experience to teach novice players by leading throwing clinics.

• Utilize the automation of the DGU’s online registry and prize award store through the ADG website.

• Less time required for one-round only tournament format.

• Social media promotional tools as well as pre-designed flyers.

• A consistent prize award chart provided by the ADG organization for all players and event directors to use.

• Discounted event directors items like scoreboard, scorecards and pencils.

• Opportunity to expose brand new players to the fun of competitive disc golf.