Disc golf enthusiasts suddenly have two more courses in Allen County to try out their craft.
Work is nearly complete on an 18-hole disc golf course at Allen Community College.
All that remains is to install the tee boxes, although students and others from the community have already been playing the course for months.
“We didn’t realize they would be using it right away, since we hadn’t put the tee pads in,” reported Josiah D’Albini, ACC’s student life director. “But it was a daily use. And when it got a little warmer is when we really started to see the students out there.”
Meanwhile, Moran also installed a nine-hole disc golf course this spring at the south edge of its city park, made possible with a $5,000 Concern for Community grant from Heartland Rural Electric Cooperative.
“Our city council and city employees are always looking for ideas to help support our kids and community,” City Clerk Taeler Carr said. “The more we can update the park, the more active our community can be.”
THE IMPETUS for the Allen course, like at Moran, was to give students another reason to be outside and active.
“The idea had been tossed around for a while (no pun intended) because even before we purchased land to the north, we had tons of land,” D’Albini said. “And there wasn’t a lot we could do with it because of all the easements on the property. And we were thinking of different ways we could use it.”
D’Albini also is an alumnus of Emporia State University, whose community is considered the disc golf capital of the world, with more courses per capita than any other city in the country.
When he broached the idea to Allen’s administration, they were in full support.
Their only comment: “What are you waiting for?” D’Albini chuckled.
Eric McCabe, ESU disc golf coach and a representative of Dynamic Discs, assisted with the course design, which largely loops around the ACC campus.
With 18 holes, the Allen facility is considered a micro-course in that it is primarily for beginners, although there are some holes for more advanced disc golfers.
“Eric came down and spent an afternoon just plotting where everything would be,” D’Albini said.
The course begins in front of Masterson Hall, and south across the campus entrance, past the soccer fields, to the east beyond the ACC Theatre and activities building, then back north around the softball and baseball diamonds and track-and-field complex before ending near the college dorms. The course has an added “19th” hole, a practice basket set up just outside the Allen Student Center.
Tee boxes will be installed through the summer as weather permits.
