From July 19 – July 25, I represented Canada as the only competitor in the World Overall Flying Disc Championships.
I ended up in 4th place Overall and won a gold medal in Self Caught Flight & Disc Golf!
An overall flying disc competition consists of 7 different disc sports where players are awarded points for each event based on how they placed. It’s similar to a hepthalon except every event involves a flying disc.
The seven events are: Double Disc Court (DDC), Distance, Disc Golf, Self Caught Flight (SCF), Discathon, Freestyle and Accuracy.
The overall have been around since the mid 70’s. Back then, people were frisbee players compared to the current day where we see a lot of specialists especially in ultimate, disc golf and freestyle.
In the Self Caught Flight event, which I won, I had an MTA score of 10.62 seconds and a TRC score of 67 metres for a total SCF score of 125.41.
My personal mantra is “Let the Wind Guide You” and in the final, that was my secret to winning. I noticed that the other competitors were throwing too much straight into the wind during TRC so I knew if I got a catch, I would win the event. They weren’t listening to the wind enough so it’s not that I threw better than they did, I just read the wind better.
This is my 3rd Self Caught Flight World title in a row and last year, Macleans Magazine decided to include me as one of the “18 Reasons it’s Great to be a Canadian” during their annual Canada Day Issue: http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/were-no-1-18-reasons-why-its-great-to-be-canadian.
Training for and competing in the overall hones a variety of disc skills not only because each event tests different skills but also because each event uses different discs.
I also won the gold medal in Overall Disc Golf. Disc golf is similar to [ball] golf but instead of hitting a ball into a hole, you throw a disc into a basket. I won the event in dramatic fashion, draining a 20 foot birdie putt on the final hole to win by one stroke. You can watch my drive and putt below:
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXSvUQshTqM[/youtube]
I was one stroke behind after the first one and was tied for the lead after the second round, five strokes clear of the next closest golfer. The whole week I told himself to play smart and believe in myself. Going into the finals, I had a plan to get birdies when I could but to make sure that I didn’t make any big mistakes. Going into the final hole, I knew that I had to birdie to win. I didn’t want to win in a playoff, so I threw a great drive and gave myself a putt for the win. It’s an awesome feeling when you can have a plan, stick to it, and see the results come from it.
There are overall competitions held each year in the USA, Germany, Taiwan, Japan and Belgium. The US Open Overall is held every two years (on the even) and the WFDF World Overall are also held every two years (on the odd).
Frisbee goes back to playing catch and inventing games. When a ball dreams, it dreams that it’s a frisbee. And when we throw, frisbee combines our perfect dream, which is to fly, with our pefect tool, which is our hand.
If you are interested in finding out more about any of the overall events, or if you would like to get an overall going in your city, please send me a message.
Rob McLeod
“Let the wind guide you”
