18 baskets at Live Oak Park expected to benefit community, promote tourism
A new disc golf course is underway at Live Oak Park on U.S. 15 in Sumter, and local enthusiasts are hoping it will help generate revenue and increase popularity for Sumter County by attracting tourism.
“Let's put in something that people can do that will bring commerce to our community,” said Kelly Melton, founder of the Sumter City Disc Golf Club.“That would be my ultimate dream; to
have more courses and more people come in. Because that's the financial benefit to businesses here is that people will like disc golf courses because disc golf is free. People travel. I travel. I travel all around and play courses all around South Carolina. People can drive from all of the states to play the course, and so they’ll eat here, and they’ll get gas here.”
Melton likened his hope for Sumter to the story of Emporia, Kansas, a small city where disc golf was able to boost the economy by hosting the Glass Blown Open, the world’s largest disc
golf tournament, according to udisc.com.
“The hallmark of disc golf is that it’s so much cheaper and easier to play than ball golf because there's low barriers to entry. So, with three discs, you can play here for free,” said Hobe Scholz, a local disc golf enthusiast and Sumter City Disc Golf Club treasurer. “It’s easy to bring the whole family out. If you're going to have even a public ball golf course, you must pay greens fees and you probably have to rent a cart. We don't want to say disc golf is cheap, so we'll say it’s economical.”
The new course at Live Oak Park was made possible by there being new disc golf baskets soon to be installed at Sumter’s Dillon Park course. The old baskets from Dillon will be installed at the Live Oak course and should be ready for players to use in July, according to Melton.
The Sumter City Disc Golf Club is responsible for the improvements at Dillon and the new course on U.S. 15.
“Our club’s founding purpose is to make sure the courses are playable. You can find us on Facebook,” Scholz said. “It looks like in the last 60 days, as far as I can see on the app, we've added 25 members, and we have 323 right now. Seven percent growth over the last 60 days, and I would say we’ve probably added 100 people since last February when COVID-19 started. The club started back in 2010.”
Disc golf increased in popularity because of the pandemic.
“During COVID-19, disc golf was one of those few sports that we could do socially distanced. I think that's part of the reason this grew so much as a sport in the last year,” Scholz said.
There are 20 baskets at Dillon Park that will soon be at Live Oak Park. The new Live Oak Park course will have 18 holes with a practice and alternate basket and will be slightly more difficult than the Dillon course. Melton said that is because at Live Oak Park, there is an abundance of greenery that will serve as obstacles for players to maneuver their discs around.
“There is not going to be a huge difference in difficulty between the two courses, but I want [the Live Oak Park course] to be a different setting, so Dillon Park is a little more open and so not as challenging in that way. But for this one, the holes are very technical, and it gives you a different feel than Dillon Park,” Melton said.
Part of the appeal of playing disc golf is the variety in course settings and how many courses are blended into nature.
“You’re able to interact with nature unlike with ball golf courses where things are manicured and to some degree kind of manufactured. Whereas here, we try to keep it a natural setting,
and you can be close with nature,” Melton said. “That's the appeal for me— getting out into nature and playing a game that's really fun and competitive but still relaxing.”
Members of the Sumter City Disc Golf Club are looking forward to the completion of the course at Live Oak Park and are hopeful that it will be a popular attraction. Members are also
making efforts to make disc golf appealing across an array of demographics.
“We've been trying to also get more women playing and kids playing, too," Scholz said. "I think a lot of women are nervous about coming out because it's still a very male-dominated sport, so in order to make it comfortable to learn, we were looking for an opportunity to have someone come in and have a clinic just for women."
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