Executive Editor

While major, minor and youth league sports were mostly shut down last year during the pandemic, disc golf has thrived, including in Battle Creek where there are five different courses to choose from from Springfield to Wattles Park.

To meet the demand, Marty McKibbin, a passionate player and competitor since 1997, is organizing everything from a free, fun downtown event on June 12 for all ages to a purely pro tournament in October for the Professional Disc Golfing Association (PDGA) at Territorial Brewing Company’s disc golf course, managed by Chad Curtis.

“Disc golf has become five times more popular during the pandemic,” said McKibbin. “The manufacturers can’t keep up.”

With so much demand for discs, he said, some small retailers have been forced to close due to lapses in materials and supply chain.

Others are limiting how many discs can be purchased at one time.

McKibbin discovered this when he tried to secure discs to include in the March 20 Irving Park Ice Bowl (fundraiser for the Calhoun County Animal Center and Food Bank) player packs.

“Players use their own discs and then we give everyone who enters a player pack with one disc and one towel,” said McKibbin, who is limiting the number of amateur entrants to 50 for that reason, and, due to the ongoing dangers of the still-spreading virus.

While registration is now closed for the Ice Bowl, he is turning his focus to Disc Golf Downtown which will coincide with an effort by Downtown Battle Creek to encourage people to take advantage of the new downtown social district.

The district has been expanded to reach from Cafe Rica to Handmap Brewing. 

“It goes like this,” wrote Annie Kelley of the Calhoun County Visitor’s Bureau, “buy a beer or cocktail, ask to have it served in the Live it Up plastic cup, and then take it outside.”

Customers of six participating businesses downtown can also gather at the State Street Commons to eat and drink outdoors.

According to McKibbin, the idea is to not only tap into the pent up demand for safe, outdoor activities but to boost the downtown business district.

“It’s a nine-hole, temporary urban disc golf course in downtown Battle Creek,” said McKibbin. “It’s going to start behind Handmap Brewing, go behind the parking garage next to the river, follow the path past Clara’s, then to Friendship Park, cross the street and finish behind the Kellogg House.”

The other goal is to get people to play disc golf who have never done it, he said.

“After people finish playing at the Kellogg House, they can walk up Capital Avenue to Michigan Avenue, go to Cafe Rica or stop at the Griffin or New Holland Brewing, hopefully and support the people downtown,” he said.

MicKibbin has ordered 100 discs for the first 100 who register, which he expects to open May 1, he said.

“We’re going to run out quick,” he said of the discs. “They’re a special kind of soft disc so if it hits a door or a window, it won’t do any damage.”

McKibbin won a grant from Penetrator Events to cover the costs of Disc Golf Downtown.

“Our friends in Grand Rapids have done it so I contacted them to make sure they were okay with me doing something like that here in Battle Creek” he said. “They had great success with it we’re putting our own spin on it.”

McKibbin suggests that anyone wanting to try disc golf check out any one of a number of helpful YouTube videos. And, while disc retailers are hard to find locally, gear can be purchased at Otter’s Oasis in Kalamazoo or online.

The best way to learn, however, is to join local league to join, he said. (Email him at martymckibbonster@yahoo.com for more information.)

While the former Irving Park Agency developed the year round course at that park on North Avenue across the street from Bronson Battle Creek, they also developed the 18-hole course at Leila Arboretum where Matt Collins was playing during unseasonably warm weather Tuesday.

“It’s a good one,” said Collins of Battle Creek. “It’s a lot of up and down hills, it’s a long hike. I played when there was lots of snow out here, too. It’s a little harder in snow. As long as you dress warm, you’re good to go.”

The Begg Park course has been operational for about 10 years and the city’s first, nine-hole course at Kimball Pines has been restored after it was destroyed during the 2011 Memorial Weekend windstorm.

The newest course in town is the 18-hole Territorial Brewing Company DGC, said McKibbin.

“It was put up about five years or so ago when it was the Ale House and they liked it,” said McKibbin, “so they (TBC) has expanded it. It’s my favorite course in Battle Creek.”

In fact, that’s where McKibbin will host the TBC Open on Oct. 2 for players who are members of the Pro Disc Golf Association.

“Anyone can enter, they just need to join the PDGA before they register,” he said. “While the June 12 event is a fun event, this one is a true competition. There is no open registration for these types of tournaments.”

With the newfound interest in disc golf, a way for people to get outdoors and stay active while social distancing from others, tournaments are filling up fast.

“I signed up for one last year in July and it was filled in a day and a half,” he said. “Playing disc golf is what people are doing right now.”

In all, there were tournaments in Battle Creek last year, which were not shut down by public health orders, at Leila Arboretum, at Begg Park and at Irving Park.