1st big tournament

I just paid my entry fee for the 1st disc golf tournament I've ever entered. It's on the weekend of the 18th/19th. I have a written goal to take top-10 in a rec/sport division of a major regional tournament by Summer 2009. I might be able to do it well before that. I hope so. I've played in a few minis, but never in something as big as an A-tier event. I got my PDGA #, too: 37439. Yay!

Based on the PDGA rating, and knowing how I compare to some of the local players listed on the PDGA.com web site that I've played minis with, I'm guessing my rating would fall between 750 and 790. The guys rated around 930 beat me by 12-15 strokes most times, depending on the course. The rating system is fairly complex, though very interesting and fun to think about if you're me, but here's the basics. They use top player's scores to come up with a baseline -- the baseline is exactly 1000 -- and from there scores are compared to what you'd shoot or probably shoot against a person rated 1000. 10 points is about a stroke. So, if I'm 750, I'd generally score about 25 strokes worse than a top player during a given round. The best players are around 1040, meaning that they'd score about four strokes better than the really-good-but-not-quite-"best" players. The major flaw is a good player can get a sky-high score by playing easier courses against easier competition, but hey, if they want to travel that much maybe they should get that perk. Lord knows there are not that many other perks to a professional disc golfer, excepting open-awed respect from their peers.