Every few weeks, we get a tweet from Jussi Meresmaa with a question with the hopes of a discussion to soon follow. Yesterday, Meresmaa tweeted and posted on Facebook as he was checking out the results of this weekend’s Disc Golf Hall of Fame Classic in Georgia.

Question of the Day: what are the benefits of multiple courses on an NT event? @PDGA @ATDiscGolf @TalkDiscGolf

— Jussi Meresmaa (@JussiMeresmaa) September 12, 2015

It is a question we’ve heard more and more recently as some tournaments have opted to use multiple courses over the span of a few days instead of remaining at one course and having people battle the same course for 3-4 rounds. We’ve seen some on Twitter chime in with their thoughts in response to the question:

@JussiMeresmaa @PDGA @ATDiscGolf @TalkDiscGolf #ZeroBenefits Play 1 course and change pins maybe? @PGATOUR play 1 course.

— Thomas Lackey (@lackey_thomas) September 12, 2015

@JussiMeresmaa @ATDiscGolf @PDGA @TalkDiscGolf more variety really. Would love to see major pin placement differences on 1 course rather.

— Dude K (@ScottDudek) September 13, 2015

@JussiMeresmaa @PDGA @ATDiscGolf @TalkDiscGolf if they are different, they test a broader skill set of the player. If same, no reason.

— MindBodyDisc (@MindBodyDisc) September 12, 2015

We’ve also seen some comments on Facebook that bring up the idea of using multiple layouts on the one course. As with most tournaments on the PGA tour, the hardest pin placements are on Sunday’s final round. You could use a mix of pin placements and tee pads for the first few rounds to give a different look to start the weekend.

Meresmaa’s Facebook post led to some good feedback as well including from Nate Heinold, who was the tournament director for the recent Ledgestone Insurance Open:

I think one main benefit people forget about is the ability to have a larger field. At this point in our sport’s growth, we can’t be turning players away. Having two or more courses allows you to have 300+ players. We get a lot of funding from Convention Bureaus for our NT and the more players we have the more they are wiling to support the event.

For the sake of the Tourism Bureuas, they like hard numbers. All of their applications ask for how many players and how many people travel with each player. None of their applications ask for spectators. I hope we get there someday, but at this point in time they know that players spend money in the area and its a quantifiable number (ie, they can look it up right on pdga.com)

Nate Heinold, LEdgestone Insurance Open Tournament Director

Disc golf professional Shasta Criss chimed in with a point that we’ve heard many pros say:

I know that trying to learn 3 courses for a tournament, in less than a week, gives you no time to do anything else in that area.

Shasta Criss

If you are unfamiliar with the area and want to compete at the top level, knowing each course like the back of your hand is vital. On the other hand, some have argued that if you have a variety of courses that show different styles of course design, this would play to the more all around golfer and would test every part of their game.

Meresmaa asked a great question and the feedback has been great on both sides of the argument. Keep the DISCussion going below in our comments!

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