2021-08-12
BC Open Update and questions
Hi Everyone,
We have been getting lots of email questions. Most of them are answered on the www.bcopen.ca website. The following questions include some that are not addressed on the website.
1. Where are the tee times posted? The direct link to tee times is on the front page of the website.
2. Where is the players’ meeting? The players’ meeting is posted on the website.
3. Will players be playing the same tee pads for all 3 rounds? Yes.
4. When do I need to arrive? Please show up 30 minutes before your tee time to check in. We will be set up at the Ace Runners Tent at the Log Pavilion.
5. Is there water onsite? There is no running water onsite and since it will be hot bring lots of water with you. There will be cold water and drinks available for purchase from the Aldergrove Farm Shoppe.
6. Are there any camping options left? Please see https://www.hipcamp.com/en-CA/british-columbia/diane-p-s-land-9/zip-camp-and-fun-farm
7. Can I buy food at the park? There will be food onsite at the Aldergrove Farm Shoppe; check out their link on the Amenities Page of the website.
8. Can I change my tee time? No, they are all pre-assigned.
9. Can I change the pool I am in? No, they are all pre-assigned.
10. Can my family come watch me play? Yes, just make sure they don’t distract other players and are respectful.
11. Can I run to my car at hole 1 to get more discs, water, food, etc? Yes, as long as you are not delaying your card from teeing off.
12. Can I bring a caddy? Yes, but remember that your caddy must follow the PDGA Rules of Play and you are responsible for your caddy and his/her actions.
13. Do I need to have a PDGA rules book with me? You do not need to have one, but it is a good idea to have one. Or you can also search the information on your smart phone.
14. Are the posted tee times locked in? They will be official at 4:00 pm on August 13, 2021.
15. Do I need to call a player if I see him/her break a rule? Yes, we do understand that it is not always comfortable to call a player for a foot fault or other rule infraction, but players are expected to make these calls as per the official rule 801.02 B.
16. Is it a foot fault if only part of my foot touches the coloured section of the tee pad? Yes, you must release the disc before your foot touches the coloured section of the tee pad.
17. Can I borrow a disc from a cardmate to use? Yes, if they allow it and it has an identifiable marking on it.
The main thing everyone should do is watch the players meeting and double check their tee times after 4:00 pm on August 13, 2021.
We look forward to seeing everyone this weekend.
John
Have your Breakfast or Lunch Delivered at the BC Open
The Aldergrove Farm Shoppe right next to the Raptors Knoll Disc Golf Park has made a huge effort to offer a food and drink service for the BC Open weekend. They have put together a menu that you can order from and pick up on the weekend before or after your rounds without even having to start your car and leave the property. They may have a small amount of food available to purchase on site but to help them prepare and make sure they have food for you, please try to order ahead of time. Check out their menu below and contact information.
2021-08-05
Thank you to everyone for signing up for the 2021 BC Open and an extra thanks to all who sponsored this event (listed below).
We are working through the process of assigning pools; however, with the cancellation deadline of Aug 6, 2021 at midnight there have been a number of changes to the registration list and in order to avoid publishing the pools and then having to dramatically change them we are going to wait until after the cancellation deadline and will announce the pools on Aug 11, 2021.
We have been able to move a number of players from the waitlist to the event because of cancellations. Since we do still have a waitlist, if you will not be able to attend please let us know as soon as possible so that we can make the adjustments and get as many people playing as possible.
2021 Business Sponsors
Ace Runners
B.C. Disc Sports
Fulton & Co.
Innova Disc Golf
PDGA Canada
Raptors Knoll
Individual Sponsors
Adam Bowles
Andrew Harback
Andrew Henderson
Bodi Mclean
Byron Underhill
Carl Bruggeman
Carlos Marticorena
Chance Stad
Charlotte Crabtree
Dan Laitsch
Daniel Guillon
Danny Vermette
Dave Brown
David Ohnona
DC Lee
Donald Siddall
Dylan Laviolette
Erik Hjorth-Olsen
Jeremy White
Julian Zimmer
Justin Da Silva
Kerel Weirmeir
Liam Hernberg
Luke Levesque
Luke MacLean
M Duffield
Marlon Strang
Matt Ohnona
Matthew Brown
Michael Calvert
Michael Klemarewski
Mike Minifie
Nicholas Dunn
Noah Valyi
Paul Laviolette
Paul Rokeby-Thomas
Randy Christianson
Roger Smith
Rory Girard
Ross Kagna
Ryan Watson
Spencer Munro
Steve Crozier
Stewart McIsack
Terry Yaremchuk
Timothy Haraldson
Tony Iammarino
Trenton McIntyre
Zach Bernier
Yours Truly,
John
2021-07-27
A few camping spots have just opened up next to Raptors Knoll Disc Golf Park. You can find the details at https://www.hipcamp.com/en-US/british-columbia/diane-p-s-land-9/zip-camp The camp site is small but you can walk less than 100 feet and be on hole 13 of Raptors Knoll so it is ideal if you want to camp for the BC Open weekend, or relax any time you want to enjoy the outdoors and get a bit of disc golfing in at the same time with a number of amenities.
2021-07-11 Update
BC Open Update: Registration opens tomorrow at 6pm. When it opens there is a required $40 course sponsorship to register until July 15th at 6pm. This sponsorship is going towards added cash and volunteers. If you do not want to make this donation, registration after July 15th will no longer require it. There are 160 spots for this event and historically more spots get opened up if demand is there. However, this year we can state in advance that there will be no added spots. There simply hasn't been enough planning time to secure contingencies for greater demand. Thank you!
John Gould-Thorpe
Co / Tournament Director
2021-07-07 Update
We have finally been given the green light to hold events in BC. Unfortunately, because of the delay in approval we have made the hard decision to change the BC Open to a C-Tier for 2021.
We will continue to work toward holding the 2022 BC Open as a full A-Tier but for now our goal is to just get everyone back to some sort of competition and a large C-Tier in August seems to be the way to go. We are just getting the registration organized and will post more updates shortly.
John Gould-Thorpe
Co / Tournament Director
2021-06-09 Update
We are still looking at options and date to possibly still hold the BC Open in 2021. Unfortunately, the current Provincial and Regional restrictions still do not allow up to hold our event.
We will continue to look into future dates with hopes that we may be able to hold the BC Open in the Fall however the Provincial and Regional restrictions will both have to change significantly for that to happen. As things change, we will update our communications page.
John Gould-Thorpe
Tournament Director
2021-04-04 Postponed
Although we are not ready to officially cancel the 2021 BC Open, It is with sadness that we are forced to postpone the 2021 BC Open. Unfortunately, the current Provincial and Regional restrictions still do not allow us to hold our event. Without any firm timeline that these restrictions will be eased there is no longer enough time to make all the arrangements necessary to run a quality event.
We will be looking into future dates with hopes that we may be able to hold the BC Open in the fall; however, the Provincial and Regional restrictions will both have to change significantly for that to happen. As things change, we will update our communications page.
John Gould-Thorpe
Tournament Director
2021-02-01 BC Open Update
We know that we have been very quiet about announcing any details for the 2021 BC Open and we apologize for this lack of information.
Unfortunately, even though we want to give a more positive update the only thing that we can say is that we are still on a holding pattern waiting for the province to approve competitive sporting events.
We have considered opening up registration so that players can hold their spots and plan forward but we do not want to take anyone’s hard earned money just to have to return it back again if things don't change.
With that said not all is lost and there is a still a bit of time before we have to make a final decision as to whether the BC Open will be able to happen as originally scheduled in 2021. We will continue to plan in the hopes that things will change and we can move forward. However,based on the most recent information, the forecast is more grim than hopeful.
We would like to thank you all for your support and inquiries about playing and/or volunteering your time. We would like to especially thank Innova Disc Golf, PDGA Canada, Raptors Knoll Disc Golf Park and the BCDSS for their continued support of this event should we be able to move forward.
John Gould-Thorpe
Tournament Director
2020-08-07 BC Open Update
It is with a heavy heart that we are advising that the 2020 BC Open will not be taking place this year.
We have been carefully monitoring all the official announcements about return to sport and competitive play in BC and still feel strongly that disc golf will be one of the first sports to be approved for return to competitive play in BC. The most recent communications from Via Sports stated that the feedback they received from the BC Centre for Disease Control was favorable to BC Disc Sports’ proposed approach to implementing more competitive opportunities and that Via Sport is continuing to work on guidelines. However, it does take time to put together a good event and even more time to put together a great A-Tier event so we have had to look at our time frame and with less than 45 days before our event was set to run we have had to make the hard decision to cancel the 2020 BC Open.
Even though our event was not able to run in 2020 we would like to thank Innova Disc Golf, who would have been our major sponsor, for maintaining its commitment to support our event throughout all the recent uncertainty and we look forward to working with Innova in years to come.
Refunds will be coming over the next few days. We hope to see you all in 2021.
John Gould-Thorpe, Tournament Director
Stewart McIsack, Tournament Director
2020-6-3 Announcement of temporary 2nd course.
Before giving some exciting news about the BC Open we first have to say that we are still waiting for official approval to actually hold the BC Open this year in September however…
Since we feel like we have only been posting about delays and limitations lately but, today we want to announce something exciting about the BC Open 2nd course.
You did read that correctly for the next BC Open we not only get to play on the amazing Raptors Knoll course but, with the help of Indesign Disc Golf we are currently building a temporary extended course layout on the wetlands property to the west of Raptors Knoll.
Indesign Disc Golf has now posted a few pictures of some of the work that has already been done. And you can follow them at https://www.facebook.com/indesigndiscgolffor more updates.
2020-5-25
Our 2020-09-18 date has now been approved by the PDGA. We are now just waiting on the approval for disc golf events to once again take place in BC. We will update as we know more.
2020-05-22 BC Open Rescheduled
We apologize for being quiet for a long time and not posting any updates as to what is happening with this year’s BC Open. The first thing to mention is that we have extended the full refund date for our event until at least July 10, 2020.
Although we were hopeful that the BC Open could still run in July as originally planned, it has become very clear that holding the BC Open in July will likely not be permitted based on the current regional guidelines. It is however encouraging that many disc golf courses including Raptors Knoll are once again open for casual play with social distancing expectations in place.
After much discussion with the Township of Langley, British Columbia Disc Sport Society, Fraser Health Authority and multiple other organizations, we are feeling positive that we will still be able to hold the BC Open later this year and have moved our focus to September, hopefully with September 18, 2020 as our new date.
This date has not yet been officially approved by our Provincial PDGA coordinator as we still do need to go through the steps outlined by the PDGA on May 14th to have our event officially sanctioned for the new date and this requires the region to issue directives that allow organized competitive sporting events including disc golf to resume.
As an exciting aside to the above information Raptors Knoll Disc Golf Course has never looked better and hundreds more hours of work have been done to the course since last year. If you thought it was great before, you will be amazed this time around as to what has been done.
We will update as we have more information. Wishing that this message finds everyone safe and healthy.
Yours Truly,
BC Open Team
2020-03-14 COVID-19 update
In light of everything that is happening both around the world and locally here in BC regarding COVID-19, we want to assure everyone that we have not yet invested your entry fees into players’ packages or other event costs at this point. With the news of other big events not being able to return entry fees due to items already having been purchased, there is no need to panic and request a cancellation now as a preventative measure.
Although we are going to continue planning the BC Open and work towards running the best event we can we are not going to spend any of the registration entry fees until we have a much better understanding of how the current situation is unfolding.
We send you our best wishes and hope that you are all safe and healthy.
Yours Truly,
BC Open Team.
2020-3-2 Player Cap expanded and general updates
Thank you to all of you who have registered for the BC Open 2020. We are pleased to announce the following:
Capacity:
We are very excited that registration filled up in less than one week. To accommodate those on our waitlist and a few more registrants, we are expanding the field to 276 players. As a result of the strong relationship between the Jackman Wetlands Disc Golf Society and the Township of Langley, a second temporary course will be created on the same property just for the BC Open 2020. We will be building tee pads (likely platforms with artificial turf, but we are exploring other options) for this course which will feature 18 portable Innova PRO 28 baskets.
Schedule:
All players will be playing one round per day on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Of the three rounds, every division will play Raptors Knoll twice, and once on the new Wetlands Course currently being developed specifically for the BC Open 2020. The draft format is tee-times for all divisions on Hole 1 of each course. More information on when and who tees where on which day will be available much closer to the event.
The new Wetlands Course will only be available for practice rounds on July 9th. Any practicing in that area of the property prior to this date will result in disqualification and more importantly, the likelihood of the Wetlands Course being pulled. Could you imagine the consequences of this happening a day or two prior to the BC Open 2020? Please respect this restriction!
Event Coverage:
We are very excited to announce that Cory Murrell and Coast Central Disc Golf will once again be back in British Columbia to film the MPO feature/lead cards. We considered filming the BC Open 2019 but decided it would be best to wait one more year to allow Raptors Knolls to mature a bit more to make filming on it even better.
Camping:
We are trying to secure some camping options (all “DRY” camping). However, please do not count on this. If we can secure something we will announce the details as soon as feasible.
For today, that is all. Hopefully more announcements coming soon with respect to sponsors who are getting involved in this event!
2020-2-25 Registration and Wait list
The BC Open 2020 took just over 6 days to fill up. We now have 80 Pro's and 152 Amateurs registered. The wait list is now open and growing. We will continue to monitor the wait list to determine the need for more spots. We are working on options that will accommodate as many people as our venue can facilitate.
2020-2-18 Registration opens today!
Registration Opening Soon 2020-2-14
Although it took a little longer than we expected to get all the details worked out, we are please to announce that registration for the BC Open 2020 will go live on Feb 18th at 6:00 pm PST.
We received a lot of great feedback from BC Open 2019 and we have taken these thoughts and comments into consideration while planning for 2020. We hope you like our improvements.
Don’t wait too long to register. We expect to have an even larger registration this year than last.
Early stages of the 2020 BC Open Planing 2019-12-6
We have taken the first steps once again hold the BC Open for 2020. Our event has been added to the A Tier list and the timing looks good to possibly attract a few touring pros this year. With Beaver State on Jun 26-28, DGPT - Portland Open July 3-5 and then BC Open July 10-12 the timing couldn't be better for people to keep heading north!
As with any large event we are looking for sponsors and volunteers to make it even better this year If you know of anyone that would like to be involved we would love to speak to them Please get them to contact us at the link below.
Wrap up 2019/07/08
Although the tournament is complete our work is still not over. This week we will be sending all of our all prize and payouts to players that have won something at the BC Open. In addition to all the volunteers that have been on the course during out event helping out Thank You so much! Your Volunteer thank you Packs are currently being put together and we will get them to you as soon as we can.
We will be putting a more detailed letter / post together with details about the finances and the event later this week.
If anyone has any questions please send them to john@acerunners.ca and I will respond as soon as I can. Any messages sent via social media and other methods will also be responded to but they may take longer.
Also Mikee Kiesz was out again on Sunday to take some more photos for us and has graciously provided the link for free downloads. Thank you so much Mikee.
Yours Truly,
John Gould-Thorpe
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