Trek Disc Golf

What an incredible weekend of disc golf in Finland. From the courses, to the crowds, FPO, and MPO, there was incredible action from Thursday through the final moments on Sunday morning. Let’s get into it.

The European Open, a preview for 2025 Worlds, took place at the Tampere and Nokia, Finland to watch the best disc golfers in the world fight for a Major title. The Tampere Disc Golf Park, nicknamed “The Monster”, was a new addition to the event this year and it was a great course to get the weekend started. It was a beautiful challenge for the field, that really separated out those in contention heading into The Beast at Nokia. Everything about European disc golf courses is so elegant. The manicured fairways, pin locations, the way the land and trees are used to create a challenging, but breathtaking landscape. I can only imagine what it is like to play the courses. At Tampere, the only drawback I felt were the baskets that were up on the hills seemed to be SO many, and a lot of them had turf surrounding the pin. Not a big deal, but somewhat of an eye sore in my opinion. And then in Nokia at “The Beast”, the course is simply iconic. Scoring throughout the course, but a well maintained piece of property that frankly, I just hope to play one day. It has a mix of the woods and open holes, with nearly 5,500 fans turning out on the final day, the course is like nothing else.

As for the play, both the FPO and MPO fields had fantastic final days and done in the complete opposite way. Let’s start with FPO. Kristin Tattar wins her first major this year, coming back from seven strokes down to beat out Silva Saarinen and Evaliina Salonen. But truthfully, the top of FPO was an absolute mess at The Beast. After Tampere, Kristin was -10 and Evaliina was -9. Heading into Nokia, I am thinking that we have a battle, but Kristin played so well here last year, I have to imagine she has the edge. And then Day 3 and she is absolutely DREADFUL. 906 rated +8. -6.15 strokes gained tee to green. All the while Evaliina shoots even par and Silva comes back and shoots -5. So heading into the final day, Evaliina has the lead at -9, Silva is at -6, and Kristin is back at -2. I remember waking up and seeing that result and thinking, holy shit, she blew it and its not even close. Well, I was dead wrong, because on Sunday, Evaliina said hold up, I got this, and shoots a 908 rated +9 and Silva shoots even par. And guess who comes storming back to win with a -5. KRISTIN! Insane, but also, just some awful golf. Kristin was hot early on Sunday, but kind of did not do anything special in the back nine other than not lose. The most impressive thing I watched honestly was how good Silva is on the putting green. Effortless, perfect, nearly all of the time. And the stats back that up. She led the field in strokes gained putting with 10.71. Not unexpectedly, Evaliina led the field in strokes gained tee to green with 14.40 throughout the event, but since she can’t putt, it negated all of that. That final round, Evaliina did not card a single birdie and watched one too many putts from 15 feet trickle off the side of the chains. Inexcusable. Kristin won this, but did she really? Congrats to her regardless.

On to the MPO, where the finish was unreal and the tournament itself was just unreal. Gannon Buhr won with a 1063 event rating, finishing at -35, followed by Ricky Wysocki at -33, and Paul McBeth at -30. But the story of how we got there is incredible. Similar to FPO, Tampere was a challenge that separated a lot of the players. At the top after two days, there was Gannon, Paul, Chris Dickerson, Niklas Antilla, Ricky Wysocki, and Isaac Robinson all separated by just three strokes. With the weather suspending play on Day 2, those scores were finalized on the morning of Day 3, before the players headed over to Nokia to play their Day 3 rounds. Unforuntely, because of the rain and the different tee times and locations, the Day 3 pairing were not reshuffled so players stuck with their card mates from the early round, forcing us to miss out on a Gannon, Paul, Chris, Niklas pairing. I remembering thinking, man I hope we get this type of action on the card for the final day. And we did. We swapped Chris for Ricky, and head an electric card for the Sunday. Gannon at -24, Paul at -21, Ricky at -20, and Niklas at -17. But really, this was between the top three. The new generation against the old. Incredible.

Sunday, I watched every moment, and it was awesome. All three players were hot early, but it felt like Gannon was not going to give up the lead. Not until hole 10 where he had a phenomenal drive, and a layup shot that nearly dunked in the basket, but instead, stood up and rolled out of bounds long. Truly unlucky, as most shots you see there hit and roll towards the haybales that prevent discs from rolling out of bounds. Gannon then missed the putt, and takes a bogey, where I think, it was really the first time I saw some type of nerves for Gannon. Meanwhile, Ricky is in the middle of a streak of nine in a row, and Paul has gotten hot. Unfortunately for Paul, his tournament win ends on hole 13 where an initial bad tree kick, sends him screaming to the left and he was simply unable to recover. So its down to Ricky and Gannon, Rick two strokes behind throughout as we get to 17. This is where just pure insanity begins. Ricky parks the hole with a sidearm that from the camera angle, I was sure hitting a tree. Then Gannon goes, throws the same shot, drills a light post, and lands at circles edge. Gannon then MISSES the putt, and it ROLLS directly out of bounds. I could not believe it. I know that feeling of just missing, and watching it slowly roll just directly where you do not want it to. Nothing you can, you can’t believe it, and somehow, you have to move on. What a time for that. So going into 18 we are tied and I’m thinking this is about to be a playoff that never ends, give me that. Ricky is up first and sidearms to a good spot, but close to a tree. Gannon goes backhand and executes to perfection, finding himself farther up the fairway for a closer up shot. Ricky is up first, goes backhand, trying to land on a sliver of a green up a hill, and with minimal run up, looks to get a perfect shot off. I still think it would have been under the basket, but he pulls it just too wide and long, and hits the stage out of bounds. It would have come back in, but with it there, it hits and stays out. Gannon then throws and plants it under the basket. Taps in. Victory. Ricky with a bogey to still go -13. Incredible, amazing, awesome. What a finish.

Total purse at the European Open was $102,437 and with 122 players at the event, that would be about $840 per player. Gannon took home $12,532 and Kristin $8,173. What a tournament, best of the year.

On another note, more personal, I found myself rooting for Paul a lot. I definitely wanted to see him win, which is crazy because when I first started watching disc golf in 2019, I was all about Ricky. I hated jumping in and rooting for the best, so I was never someone that wanted to see Paul win. I always wanted the underdog. But now, as he has stepped into that role with the younger generation coming up, I just want to see Paul succeed all the time. I hope at Worlds this year, he gets it done. I’m not ready for the dominance to go.