The Team Jenkins Disc Golf Documentary was set to begin filming the weekend of April 4, so our family made plans to fly down to Houston, TX where Director Rob Engle has a large production studio where he works. It actually happens to be the largest production studio in Houston. Val and I were flying in from Atlanta, GA where we played the Atlanta Open National Tour Event the previous weekend and my parents, Sharon and Leroy, were traveling from the cold winter weather of Ohio. It all seemed to work out as the Texas States Disc Golf Championships was taking place that weekend along with the initial start to the filming of our documentary.

This whole idea for a Disc Golf documentary was started by Rob Engle when he was trying to pursue making a film that granted greater exposure to the sport. But much like everyone else that has attempted to makea film telling the history of Disc Golf from the beginning, it seemed a little cut and dry to just produce a film about the timeline and future of Disc Golf. He wanted a story and a plot that would intrigue viewers that had no knowledge of the game and have them understand why we love this sport so much. He approached his good friend Neal Dambra about his idea over a year ago, and Neal mentioned that his doubles partner Leroy has an entire family that plays. And thus Team Jenkins became the story line for his documentary that he was looking for. He met up with us at the World Championships in Kalamazoo, MI and explained to us his grand idea to have a film that portrayed the “family friendly” sport of Disc Golf by highlighting how we all started this great game. He captured some great tournament footage throughout the week and later produced an youtube teaser to really get us interested into what was to come – he is doing the entire film in HD quality.

We all met up in Houston on Wednesday and played some practice rounds as a family to get a feel for the courses before the tournament. On Thursday we all arrived at the Tom Bass course and were greeted with 30-35 mph winds to start the first day of filming. Rob Engle is the director of the film, with Patrick Brogdon on Audio and Humberto Jaime working the HD camera. Rob had Innova Champion Discs Inc. deliver a United States Disc Golf Championship basket to Houston for us to use during the action shots of the documentary. We set the basket up in certain locations on the course and each of us did individual putting and driving sessions in some extremely windy conditions. We did some really cool putting and driving shots on the side hill of the Wilmont course with an amphitheater in the background. We spent a majority of the day capturing lots of different views and perspectives, giving Rob lots of footage to work with for the documentary.

The tournament started on a windy Saturday morning on the Tourney course which seemed to be the most difficult of the 3 courses that we played for the weekend. Rob had mic’d and follow around my mother, Sharon, and Valarie for the first round. Matt Orum played an amazing first round shooting a 52 – besting the next best score by 4 strokes. I played really tentatively and made too many mistakes in the wind to shoot a 58, 6 strokes off the lead. I was mic’d for the second round and played a lot more confidently, shooting a 50 with a few mistakes on some of the easier holes to remain 6 strokes off the lead to Matt Orum, who shot a 50 as well. It was going to be a battle going into Sunday as we faced the longer 24-hole layout on the Wilmont course.

I was on the attack on Sunday knowing that I could make up some ground on the lead card and possibly close the gap on first to win the tournament. It was as windy as it had been the majority of the weekend and never let up the entire round. I parked the 1st hole for birdie to start things off but made a misread on the 2nd hole as my disc kicked off a tree in the fairway and when flying OB in the creek to the left. I was left with nothing but a layup and an automatic 5 to start the round. I knew at that point that there were lots of holes left and I could still do what I set out to do when this all started. I began playing super aggressive in the wind, trying to score and catch up as I kept continuous watch of the lead card to get a feel on how they were playing. I made some misreads later in the round on some routine upshots leaving myself 25-30′ footers that I missed due to some crazy swirling winds. I continued to play out the round even though things did not seem to be going my way. We approached the last and final hole of the tournament, it was a 500′ shot from one end of the pond to the other with a generous right to left crossing tailwind. I stepped up to the tee with only the intention of going for the pin and nothing else. I bombed my bright yellow Pro Destroyer way wide to the right, all hyzer angle. It came in spike hyzer 15′ short of the basket and closer than anyone all day long, Parked!! I tapped in for birdie to finish the tournament with a 76 the final round as we waited for the lead card’s scores to come in. It turns out that Matty O played another great round, shooting 76 to hold on the win and I finished in a tie for 2nd with Mike Olse. Val also had a tough weekend as she battled it out with Des Reading, and Val ended up finishing 2nd as well. My mother came in 3rd and my father came in 7th. All in all, a great Texas States Disc Golf Championship as always. The tournament director Chuck Conaway and staff really put on a quality event this year. Congrats!

We made arrangements to meet up at the studio on Monday morning to continue shooting the film, it actually turns out that we did not get to the studio until around 12 pm because we were really worn out from the windy weekend of golf. We got all set up as the studio crew (Humberto, Patrick and Rob) got the stage ready for the family interviews. Our first shoot was set up as a group interview as we were all sat in a makeup living room setting with all of us sitting on the couch or chairs. Rob had us start to describe the how it all began, with details from when my parents first met all the way until their involvement with disc golf to until Val and I started playing professionally. The interview process and questions were a lot more in depth than I initially thought, but my parents were coming up with stories that even I have never heard. It was a great family interaction interview that is sure to look great in the film.

Next we then separated to do individual interviews and question sessions, and as the night grew later we began to tire. I had Val and the parents go first, as I wanted to be the last interview of the night. I also wanted to get in a quick nap on the couch while I had the chance, only to be awaken because I was snoring and they could supposedly hear it during the interviews. So I had Val make up some cappuccinos before I was ready to be interviewed. We stayed at the studio until 3:30 am to make sure that we had collected enough footage for the day, knowing that we would be available throughout the summer and into USDGC for more player interviews and live action footage.

Val and I returned to the studio the next day to do some more action shots – this time in front of the huge white seamless backdrop. We did a variety of poses and throws, from putting to upshots to jump-putts to full drives. We even did some 360-turnaround drives that will look great in the slow-motion footage. Rob got really creative with the artistic style of pulling out on many of the full-frame action shots and poses. Over the week he had collected and compiled over 25+ hours of footage including interviews and lots of tournament coverage. I can’t wait to see what it all looks like when it is all edited down into the trailer just before gearing up for the final project. This documentary will release at a few film festivals early next year and the final goal is to have this documentary air on National TV.

He will also have lots more footage to add throughout the season with lots of player interviews at the USDGC and our home tournament, Roscoe’s Revenge, this coming July 4th weekend. Thanks to all that are making this production possible. I will keep everyone posted on the exciting news from the Team Jenkins Disc Golf Documentary.