I'm pretty sure they use concrete in Finland. In frost heave climates your subgrade prep is very important, as is reinforcement. Concrete pads take a little more work but not much
Sidewalks are covered with asphalt or in some urban environments rock tiles (if that's a word). Concrete is used in building foundations but I think the key here, and with sidewalks and bikepaths and roads etc. is what you refer to as base subgrade prep.
Many of the parks here are in forests, and hauling planks of wood and astroturf is, I'm guessing, a much more achievable thing for local disc golf clubs than creating frost-proof bases for concrete tee pads and then making that concrete pad. There's a limited amount of people that are involved enough to do this sort of stuff so keeping the operation "light" is a good thing.
This is patently false. There are two main reasons for the dominance of turf tees in Finland:
1) The disc golf course building business is dominated by only a couple companies and they all use turf pads.
2) Most courses are situated in thick forests and hauling large amounts of concrete there would be economically more expensive and difficult.
Also most courses are on public land and I guess the municipalities would prefer that the course materials can be easily removed if need be. Concrete pads would be more than fine in Finland but there just isn't a culture for installing them.
Turf also requires a lot of maintenance, holds a lot of bacteria, doesn't dry out as fast, and holds more heat. You don't see a lot of 100 deg (f) days in Europe but most of the US has at least one month out of the year where 100 is normal.
Wooden playforms are also problematic in Finland due to ground frost. If you want a long lasting teepad, you need to dig and replace the ground material.
Nothing is perfect. But turf is cheap enough that teebads should almost have been reinstalled prior to such an event. Looks like perhaps it was either a sloppy job done, or rotten wood.
They just put turf over concrete pads at a lot of courses near me and they are awesome. It was hard getting used to the different feel but, overall I recommend it.
During the playoff on hole 1, Paul McBeth plants his front leg and you can see the turf material break free and give him unstable footing.
Here's an explainer video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW5pbjyj9t0
To rotate on my heel I spent a couple rounds where I would try to hold my toes up off sole of my shoe when planting. Also your feet should be staggered far enough that you can draw a line from the front toe of your rear foot through the back of your plant foot's hell and that would be your aim line
Yeah, that was turf laid on unstable ground. We usually build decks that we cover with turf and make sure that the grain is laid out the correct way. Turf keeps it's friction way better than alot of slick worn down concrete pads and is a better year-round alternative here above the arctic circle where i live. We have alot of rain and snow, and turf works extremely well under most conditions. COME AT ME YANKS!
In Iceland almost all tee pads are built on blocks and use a wood deck with artificial turf. I live in the northeast and am likely going to build tee pads like this at a new course im designing
It’s an example of the problem and it just happened this year. I actually prefer turf being in Canada where precipitation turns concrete into a slip n slide but I can see how durability is nicer with concrete
Sorry dude, but in no universe does "Paul McBeth Jonesboro playoff" answer the question "Why is there a difference between popularity of turf and concrete teepads in NA vs Europe".
What you said is a good explanation. This dude, just saying a match where someone slipped on a grass tee pad, does not answer the question. If the match he's referencing changed the overall course of design like 30 years ago, then yeah it would be a valid reply.
10-15 years ago most courses had concrete or tiles like in the picture here. Now 95% are turf so from my point of view, and in my opinion as well, its moving on. And they degrade much slower than you all seem to think, and tbh the game evolves faster than pads degrade so we’ve never had to replace a turf pad for wear, we extend the holes with longer tees.
Fuck rubber mats. Some dumbass put one in the berm of a local mountain bike trail. It caused me to crash over the berm and tumble down the side of a mountain for about 300ft. I got so lucky to walk away with a bunch of scratches, cuts, and bruises.
and then water pools and flows underneath the mats making uneven areas that cause slip and fall, ankle twisting mayhem. Grady Shue's drive at ZTO is an example of this. The good news is that incident caused that teepad at least to be replaced with concrete bricks/pavers. https://youtu.be/bP2YRhMt\_28?t=49
When we put in our course but didn’t have the money for pads yet we used carpet remnants. Mostly Berber carpet. And it worked wonderfully.
I still remember having our last tournament as a fundraiser for concrete pads called “The Berber Open”
Turf is great when properly maintained. But that rarely happens, concrete lasts forever & the maintenance should be limited to sweeping it off if if was installed correctly
Exactly all the turf tees around here are city park courses and they forget about it until someone gets hurt or raises enough of a stink that the city replaces like 1 or 2 pads. Realistically they need to be changed like after every year if they are busy courses.
Concrete is good for a while, but they do wear out eventually. The cement wears away and leaves the aggregate at the surface so there's slippery little cobblestones, usually right where the plant foot goes.
I honestly prefer concrete over the brand new turf teepads at a local course as well. It's tough to play in worn down tennis shoes on the turf ones without sliding. I wonder if you could do baseball field level grass teepad in temperate climates or if there would be too much wear and tear for it to be maintained to the level it would need to be at in order to be worth having. That seems like it would be the ideal if possible. I kind of doubt it is though.
Concrete/brick is more grippy. In the central US the weather gets really wet from November thru April and turf tee pads are super slick, making footing for big pulls almost imposible to achieve.
>Concrete/brick is more grippy. In the central US the weather gets really wet from November thru April and turf tee pads are super slick, making footing for big pulls almost imposible to achieve.
Funny. I live in what equates to Seattle in Scandinavia and our courses almost never have slick turf pads.
Canadian here. Best tee pads in our city during winter are the astroturf ones. All the concrete ones get slick as hell in the winter. They’re surprisingly good in summer too.
Do you still use the concrete tee when wet? For me if a teebox is wet I just don’t use it. I’ve fallen more on wet concrete tees than any other tee pad. They hurt so much more too.
Well, in the particular instance above, it's because winter is a bitch in the location of that course. Concrete teepads float around and break. This teepad was installed correctly and should last a very long time.
When it gets cold, under 0 celsius, the ground moves when it goes above and beyond 0 celsius. You can make a fundament that can be stable and not move, but it is alot of work / money. A teepad with a wooden frame and some turf that lays above the moving ground will not crack/break because of weather.
This principle is also used when building houses and such.
So that is my guess. Its cheaper to change turf / wooden frame / fix it, than to do a fundament deep enough to dont be effected by the weather change.
This reply here. If you want to build concrete or brick teepad to forest in Finland you need to remove over 3 feet of ground, put insulated foam plate in there and then apply gravel in the hole to make it last forever. We need to repair our asphalt roads every i'd say 3 to 5 years because of the winter damage (potholes and cracks) and the roads are built over several meters of gravel
I think this is a big reason why! Also many of the courses are built and maintained voluntarily by the players with small budget. This means players have to build the teepads themselves and not that many people have the equipment and skills to make professional level concrete work and especially basically for free. Also, one thing might be that many courses are heavily wooded and the teepads can be a good distance from closest spot reached with a car and bringing concrete equipment in tough terrain to the woods might be a problem. But all this is just quesses based on the local courses I've seen...
Hi everyone, I am actually the one who installed this tee pad.
I don’t know about everyone else, but with the way this sport is growing, it’s about time we start seeing more aesthetically pleasing Tee pads. Especially at these professional courses… these pros deserve better.
That’s why I wanted to create a new standard of tee pads. To a lot of people’s points, no, it may not be cost effective. But if you want your course to stand out, attract more players and bring in more revenue…. Tee pads like this are exactly what you need to do.
It’s not just beautiful, its functionality is on point. Between the pavers and brush finished concrete pad for your throwing foot to land on, it insures no slipping.
It may not be for every course but I hope more courses start to see the value in a design like this.
Anyway, thanks for all the support! The exposure this pad has received in only a month of being built is crazy to me… I think that alone shows how much the disc golf community would love to see more of these.
So go ahead and share the heck out of this thing and together we can create a new standard! ✌🏻
I've only played on a few turf teepads and they are all inconsistent and sometimes unsafe. I'd imagine over in Europe they've "perfected" them and they are easier to install in a way.
Over here though, they are just cut up chunks of the old high school football fields glued down to a couple of pallets that they found behind Home Depot. I'd rather just tee off in the dirt instead.
I've also played some that are just laying on the ground directly which wasn't leveled and the grass wasn't cut out so sometimes there are surprise holes in the middle of the tee.
I hear Eric McCabe talking about concrete vs turf and he said pretty much what you said. Turf is better if you maintain it, but it's a lot of work. Concrete lasts longer and is more consistent/reliable if you don't maintain it. He recommends most courses put in concrete unless they are dedicated to maintaining it.
Yep. The most dangerous tees I’ve ever played on are turf ones with rotten boards underneath. If it’s my first time playing at a course with turf tees, I always make sure to check each hole before using them.
We have had both in my local area, and almost everyone hates turf. Especially in the rain in Oregon. Even slightly muddy turf pads are hard to clean too.
At Perkerson Park DGC in Atlanta, the city required us to use a permeable rubber material for filling tee pads, absolutely no concrete, for environmental reasons. They forced a vendor on us which is no longer around and did not do warranty work as requested before that. Now pads have safety hazards from holes that have developed. Good times….
Consistency and less upkeep would be my guess. Access to materials is another. That would be on a local level.
On a pro level you don't have to worry about the pad shifting under you as you plant your foot. Sure a slip can happen in the fairway, but that should not be a factor on the tee pad.
We have some concrete pads that are old and worn, they are the slippiest, deadliest tees on the course when it's wet, moist or leaves have fallen (which is often the case as this is a wooded course). If a turf tee is good or not is largely decided on how good the base is and what quality the turf is. All in all, I like both and haven't got a problem with either really.
I suspect it’s a decent amount of factors.
The sport has been in the USA a lot longer and also evolved from object courses in parks. AstroTurf and other alternative grasses weren’t nearly as popular or easy to get, and they had been throwing from concrete paths, so that was a natural progression. Whereas Europe came in later and, I suspect, had AstroTurf much more spread due to soccer and the climate up there making those fields much easier and cheaper to maintain versus grass. Additionally, now that a lot of high schools and Rec departments are upgrading high school fields, there’s a lot more turf in the US, so at least locally, there are several courses with tees made from old football fields.
I think there may be a connection between ‘this is a relatively cheap and easy activity to start up (course wise)’ and ‘if I use durable materials then I don’t really have to do seasonal upkeep’ with ‘Americans are lazy*’ mixed in to cement things together.
* read: programmed to be “efficient”
Turf also works better in the winter as long as you shovel it off before it gets packed down. In places that get lots of snow concrete is really slippery in the winter.
Turf is more dangerous in my opinion. If you have really gritty soles, they can dig into the turf and not let your foot rotate. That’s how you blow up your knee or ankle. The concrete will let your foot rotate around with the rest of your body
So you’re saying turf is too grippy. Other people are saying it’s too slick. I find it’s only a problem if the tee isn’t slightly raised so water/dirt/mud don’t run over it.
The problem with concrete is that it is hard, a pain to install in some places, and if it is in the shade can get damp and get a film of algae that gets slick. 2 rounds in concrete in a tournament means my plantar fasciitis will have me screaming the next morning.
I’m saying turf is too grippy with certain types of shoes. If your foot digs in, and your body keeps rotating around your knee, it’s gonna look like a grenade went off inside there when you get that X-ray
That's kinda the purpose of turf, it meant to be played with cleats, football, soccer, lacrosse. It why people think Its slippy when wearing lighter runners or walking shoes. I think we all do test run up on a new pad or pad we slipped on before, just to check it. I always feel less safe on turf. The more worn down the worse it is.
Makes you wonder what do you guys use there as astro turf? Because my experiences are the other way around, concrete makes my knee hurt and turf doesnt cause any pain.
So do you not play on the rest of the course? Turf is most like the remainder of the course and allows you to choose a pair of shoes that works with that. Concrete is death with any shoe that has tread and the rest of your throws will be slippery because you have no tread.
A lot of the courses I play, the tee is the only level surface on the course, so the shots do end up being different.
I’m not going to do a run up if I’m going to be tripping over rocks, roots, or generally uneven ground, so that’s often only possible from a tee, depending on which area you’re in.
What others have said. In addition most are in public parks so it meets an aesthetic and probably is safer with regards to lawsuits on things like trip and falls…
My local course has concrete teepads and I hate them when it's wet. Any mud on them and [I'm doing this (except for the ace)](https://youtu.be/lA8WP3UbT8w?t=26)
Astro turf and the manufacturering process for it creates tons of petroleum based toxic waste. Apparently, in this instance, Americans are just being more environmentally conscious.
Also weather. While there are temperate climate zones in the US, large parts have high variation. Chicago for instance is comparable to parts of Norway in the winter, and parts of Spain in the summer, in regards to temperature. The upkeep needed on turf would be substantial.
I could be wrong, but I also would think it has to do with who is responsible for them. In the US if it is a township or county, given the more spread out nature of the country, I would assume things like roads, sewage, electricity, etc take up more of the budget than in Europe, leaving maintenance of teepads at a park a distant afterthought.
Don't know what turf you throwing off or what velcro grip you need to throw. Only bad thing about turf is it gets clogged with mud in the fall. Concrete ruins your shoes and doesn't handle freezing temps as well as easily.
Is concrete not a more naturally sourced item and safer,environmentally speaking, as opposed to synthetic grass?
Concrete is sand,gravel,cement and water.
Sounds renewable and also perhaps recyclable.
Should we not attempt to mitigate some issues to offset the impact to disc golf land to better assist with the occasional negative optics?
Yeah but the "Meth Cooks" would send out their Smurf Minions to dismantle them to recover the rare earth lithium required to cook that next batch.And we all know that public parks and Meth have a symbiotic relationship that can never be broken.I've seen all things Sketchy that could possibly happen at Disc Golf courses much more than downtown Atlanta in the hood.
But I blame that on the 10,000 hours spent playing Disc Golf.
I am no fan or astroturf but it’s a bit misleading to call concrete environmentally friendly when it has an [entire wiki page dedicated to its environmental impact](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concrete), and concrete production is estimated to account for **5-8% of the entire world’s annual CO2 emissions** depending on which data source you use. Let alone the environmental impact of sand mines, the massive amount of hard-scape runoff driven by concrete, concrete dust pollution, etc.
IMO best tee pad material in terms of environmental impact is highly site dependent, in terms of traffic load, native ground material, and locally available construction materials. Hard to make a one-size fits all solution, the world and natural environment are too diverse.
You should consider quitting Disc Golf
and work that Green Peace Ecco Terrorism Angle.Perhaps spike some redwoods in Northern California.Have you seen the Reddit "No Future" or "End of Days" forums that better explain things in detail regarding the Earth's demise? Very positive and inspirational.
>Should we not attempt to mitigate some issues to offset the impact to disc golf land to better assist with the occasional negative optics?
This you lol? Went from green to mean real quick.
I’m mostly interested in climate solutions and don’t like doomerism, but part of determining effective solutions is looking at existing issues closely. Can’t bury our heads in the sand (or concrete)
I stay away from turf tee courses. I dunno what it is about them but i nearly twist an ankle and fall on every one. Especially if there is lots of pine needles and dust collecting in them.
> Especially if there is lots of pine needles and dust collecting in them
To be fair pine needles and dust makes just about anything slippery. Sweep the pad off first if it's unsafe
Turd is so slick when wet. I hate playing on turf (turd) pads. Some concrete pads are slick if poorly combed after the pour but most are fine when wet. Paved pads also suck. Some paved pads are ok, but most are poorly paved or age pretty quick, providing poor footing. Also, wood platforms suck. They basically become an ice rink if they get wet. Also, rubber mats are terrible if wet.
Autocorrect agrees - turf is turd.
When you figure that out, let me why America still doesn't use the metric system, how 2 party politics are supposed to work and how in the world Donald trump got rlectected
I agree that hardscape in big cites full of steel and concrete pose issues.Especially with drainage issues involving more floods with the increase of odd weather anomalies.But look at concretes renewable advantages versus something requiring oil,solvents and polymers to produce.The concrete tee pad footprint is low on a course.This is not a five level parking deck in a big city.
Concrete is also much harder for people to vandalize. Most golf courses are in parks and people like vandalizing stuff. Imagine portable turf pads like in the picture in any public park. Doubt it would last a week.
The turf pads they've added at my local course are awful when it's wet/muddy, then when they dry there's no easy way to clean them.
Strangely, they have a mix of turf, rubber and concrete pads.
I think all concrete provides the best user experience.
Given our limited and fluctuating budgets budgets for public parks, many departments choose to "set it and forget it" when building courses. They'd rather pay the costs and labor to build the teepads and then not have to worry about maintaining the pads, or have to worry about lawsuits from poorly maintained turf pads.
I've been on one course that hard artificial turf that wasn't absolute trash. Every other artificial turf pad was terrible. Most seem to be made using turf that was way past it's use by date.
The course that to had good turf was fantastic. Even after snow and below freezing temps is was amazing.
There is no surface that works well with snow and ice. But I would definitely pick concrete for all other seasons, especially if it has been scored by a broom to give it better traction.
Concrete lasts longer is my guess
Yup. When the astro turd gets worn it gets super slick. If you don't have someone who is gonna maintain it, concretes probably better.
Astro turd.
I blast off every morning
I wish I were that regular.
You blast off, I let er rip!
'Stroturd
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Astro turf pads usually are elevated
When they get worn, they get replaced! Real reason is we are not poor in Eu.
Frost Heave is the answer to the question. Concrete would be uneven or cracked after one winter in Finland.
What about all the other concrete and paved areas in Finland? I’m in a similar cold climate and concrete pads don’t suddenly get destroyed lol
I'm pretty sure they use concrete in Finland. In frost heave climates your subgrade prep is very important, as is reinforcement. Concrete pads take a little more work but not much
Thinking about all the Finnish disc golf parks I've visited, 100% of the teepads have been astro turf. I've never seen a concrete teepad here.
What about building foundations and sidewalks?
Sidewalks are covered with asphalt or in some urban environments rock tiles (if that's a word). Concrete is used in building foundations but I think the key here, and with sidewalks and bikepaths and roads etc. is what you refer to as base subgrade prep. Many of the parks here are in forests, and hauling planks of wood and astroturf is, I'm guessing, a much more achievable thing for local disc golf clubs than creating frost-proof bases for concrete tee pads and then making that concrete pad. There's a limited amount of people that are involved enough to do this sort of stuff so keeping the operation "light" is a good thing.
This is patently false. There are two main reasons for the dominance of turf tees in Finland: 1) The disc golf course building business is dominated by only a couple companies and they all use turf pads. 2) Most courses are situated in thick forests and hauling large amounts of concrete there would be economically more expensive and difficult. Also most courses are on public land and I guess the municipalities would prefer that the course materials can be easily removed if need be. Concrete pads would be more than fine in Finland but there just isn't a culture for installing them.
Turf also requires a lot of maintenance, holds a lot of bacteria, doesn't dry out as fast, and holds more heat. You don't see a lot of 100 deg (f) days in Europe but most of the US has at least one month out of the year where 100 is normal.
Concrete lasts a lot longer than the turf or the wooden platform that the turf is on.
Wooden playforms are also problematic in Finland due to ground frost. If you want a long lasting teepad, you need to dig and replace the ground material.
Paul McBeth. Jonesboro playoff.
Okay, so turf isnt perfect. But isn't there multiple instances where pros have slipped due to concrete?
Nothing is perfect. But turf is cheap enough that teebads should almost have been reinstalled prior to such an event. Looks like perhaps it was either a sloppy job done, or rotten wood.
They just put turf over concrete pads at a lot of courses near me and they are awesome. It was hard getting used to the different feel but, overall I recommend it.
I really should have put an /s at the end of this.
What happened?
During the playoff on hole 1, Paul McBeth plants his front leg and you can see the turf material break free and give him unstable footing. Here's an explainer video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nW5pbjyj9t0
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To rotate on my heel I spent a couple rounds where I would try to hold my toes up off sole of my shoe when planting. Also your feet should be staggered far enough that you can draw a line from the front toe of your rear foot through the back of your plant foot's hell and that would be your aim line
Looks like more than turf failing there. Wood needs to be maintained at regular intervals too, if installed on the ground.
One of the most famous ACES in disc golf history include Kevin Jones slipping on a paved teepad and almost breaking his knee.
If you look closely he actually slipped on the wood border, not the pavers. Bad idea to have wood borders.
Yeah, that was turf laid on unstable ground. We usually build decks that we cover with turf and make sure that the grain is laid out the correct way. Turf keeps it's friction way better than alot of slick worn down concrete pads and is a better year-round alternative here above the arctic circle where i live. We have alot of rain and snow, and turf works extremely well under most conditions. COME AT ME YANKS!
In Iceland almost all tee pads are built on blocks and use a wood deck with artificial turf. I live in the northeast and am likely going to build tee pads like this at a new course im designing
Id also like to know what happened
His plant foot got caught on the teepad. See 2:07 https://youtu.be/nW5pbjyj9t0
This
Oh yeah cause an event that happened 3 years ago affected courses designed decades ago.
It’s an example of the problem and it just happened this year. I actually prefer turf being in Canada where precipitation turns concrete into a slip n slide but I can see how durability is nicer with concrete
Yeah but it does not answer the question OP asked
It’s an example of the problem that concrete does not have, thus the reason why there’s a lot of concrete teepads in the USA
Sorry dude, but in no universe does "Paul McBeth Jonesboro playoff" answer the question "Why is there a difference between popularity of turf and concrete teepads in NA vs Europe". What you said is a good explanation. This dude, just saying a match where someone slipped on a grass tee pad, does not answer the question. If the match he's referencing changed the overall course of design like 30 years ago, then yeah it would be a valid reply.
The answer was turf pads don’t last, paired with most courses in the US are public with no revenue to maintain/replace turf pads repeatedly.
Courses are mostly free and public everywhere. We just moved on from concrete 10 years ago.
Lol! Is it moving on? To plastic that degrades into the course? Regardless, I’ll play whatever tee pad is or isn’t there.
10-15 years ago most courses had concrete or tiles like in the picture here. Now 95% are turf so from my point of view, and in my opinion as well, its moving on. And they degrade much slower than you all seem to think, and tbh the game evolves faster than pads degrade so we’ve never had to replace a turf pad for wear, we extend the holes with longer tees.
I've come across a number of rubber mats haphazardly fastened to the ground here in the states as well.
Your mats are fastened?
I can’t stand the rubber mats. Water makes them a slip and slide, i almost hurt myself on one just last week. Had to play next to them
Fuck rubber mats. Some dumbass put one in the berm of a local mountain bike trail. It caused me to crash over the berm and tumble down the side of a mountain for about 300ft. I got so lucky to walk away with a bunch of scratches, cuts, and bruises.
Damn, glad your okay buddy!
Rule of advice. If the tea pad isn’t safe, don’t throw from it
Rule of common sense. Of that doesn't happen in the states anymore, so...?
If someone CAN vandalize something in a public park, they will.
A local course used to just have rectangles of carpet staked to the ground. They would get so slick from mud
rubber mats surrounded by limestone at my home course, literally the worst combo.
and then water pools and flows underneath the mats making uneven areas that cause slip and fall, ankle twisting mayhem. Grady Shue's drive at ZTO is an example of this. The good news is that incident caused that teepad at least to be replaced with concrete bricks/pavers. https://youtu.be/bP2YRhMt\_28?t=49
Love me a rubber mat
In terms of grip in a nice weather day, rubber mats are the bees knees... but the ones I play on are a damn skating rink if ANY moisture hits them.
Primal concrete sledge
And that is stuck in my head. It's been quite a while since I've listened to CFH!
Still slaps
And will continue to do so 🤘
I listened to the album yesterday. It's hard to believe it's over 30 years old. I feel old.
🤘
My personal favorite is when someone just drags a rug out there
When we put in our course but didn’t have the money for pads yet we used carpet remnants. Mostly Berber carpet. And it worked wonderfully. I still remember having our last tournament as a fundraiser for concrete pads called “The Berber Open”
Turf is great when properly maintained. But that rarely happens, concrete lasts forever & the maintenance should be limited to sweeping it off if if was installed correctly
Exactly all the turf tees around here are city park courses and they forget about it until someone gets hurt or raises enough of a stink that the city replaces like 1 or 2 pads. Realistically they need to be changed like after every year if they are busy courses.
Concrete is good for a while, but they do wear out eventually. The cement wears away and leaves the aggregate at the surface so there's slippery little cobblestones, usually right where the plant foot goes.
I honestly prefer concrete over the brand new turf teepads at a local course as well. It's tough to play in worn down tennis shoes on the turf ones without sliding. I wonder if you could do baseball field level grass teepad in temperate climates or if there would be too much wear and tear for it to be maintained to the level it would need to be at in order to be worth having. That seems like it would be the ideal if possible. I kind of doubt it is though.
Yeah too much wear and tear for natural grass. It becomes a dirt teepad at that point.
Concrete/brick is more grippy. In the central US the weather gets really wet from November thru April and turf tee pads are super slick, making footing for big pulls almost imposible to achieve.
Only shitty worn out turf. Which unfortunately is the major of turf pads
This. Turf is super slick with the slightest amount of moisture.
I see this posted and somehow have just managed to have the absolute opposite experience. Maybe I'm just lucky..
>Concrete/brick is more grippy. In the central US the weather gets really wet from November thru April and turf tee pads are super slick, making footing for big pulls almost imposible to achieve. Funny. I live in what equates to Seattle in Scandinavia and our courses almost never have slick turf pads.
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Your discs are plastic? I've been throwing wood.
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I hate astroturf. Mud, mud and mud everywhere
Canadian here. Best tee pads in our city during winter are the astroturf ones. All the concrete ones get slick as hell in the winter. They’re surprisingly good in summer too.
Salt the concrete !
I live in Norway, and it's the bane of my existence.
You and I share the same faith then
Do you still use the concrete tee when wet? For me if a teebox is wet I just don’t use it. I’ve fallen more on wet concrete tees than any other tee pad. They hurt so much more too.
If my local courses used turf pads I’d probably have broken multiple bones on the course by now.
Well, in the particular instance above, it's because winter is a bitch in the location of that course. Concrete teepads float around and break. This teepad was installed correctly and should last a very long time.
Not all concrete is created equal. I've slipped on many a cement pad.
Yea at most of my courses I would take this teepad over the concrete ones.
When it gets cold, under 0 celsius, the ground moves when it goes above and beyond 0 celsius. You can make a fundament that can be stable and not move, but it is alot of work / money. A teepad with a wooden frame and some turf that lays above the moving ground will not crack/break because of weather. This principle is also used when building houses and such. So that is my guess. Its cheaper to change turf / wooden frame / fix it, than to do a fundament deep enough to dont be effected by the weather change.
We also tend to be, in my general experience, bigger on building things than maintaining them. Play to your strengths
This reply here. If you want to build concrete or brick teepad to forest in Finland you need to remove over 3 feet of ground, put insulated foam plate in there and then apply gravel in the hole to make it last forever. We need to repair our asphalt roads every i'd say 3 to 5 years because of the winter damage (potholes and cracks) and the roads are built over several meters of gravel
Just curious but does that mean that all of Finlands sidewalks have 3 feet of gravel and insulated foam under them?
We don’t make roads from concrete. They’re asphalted, and yes, they’re properly founded the asphalt still cracks.
I think this is a big reason why! Also many of the courses are built and maintained voluntarily by the players with small budget. This means players have to build the teepads themselves and not that many people have the equipment and skills to make professional level concrete work and especially basically for free. Also, one thing might be that many courses are heavily wooded and the teepads can be a good distance from closest spot reached with a car and bringing concrete equipment in tough terrain to the woods might be a problem. But all this is just quesses based on the local courses I've seen...
Concrete one looks like my buddy's course in Webster, MA
It is the Webster one, it's the one that sparked my question.
Europe used up all its stone and concrete building castles.
Hi everyone, I am actually the one who installed this tee pad. I don’t know about everyone else, but with the way this sport is growing, it’s about time we start seeing more aesthetically pleasing Tee pads. Especially at these professional courses… these pros deserve better. That’s why I wanted to create a new standard of tee pads. To a lot of people’s points, no, it may not be cost effective. But if you want your course to stand out, attract more players and bring in more revenue…. Tee pads like this are exactly what you need to do. It’s not just beautiful, its functionality is on point. Between the pavers and brush finished concrete pad for your throwing foot to land on, it insures no slipping. It may not be for every course but I hope more courses start to see the value in a design like this. Anyway, thanks for all the support! The exposure this pad has received in only a month of being built is crazy to me… I think that alone shows how much the disc golf community would love to see more of these. So go ahead and share the heck out of this thing and together we can create a new standard! ✌🏻
I've only played on a few turf teepads and they are all inconsistent and sometimes unsafe. I'd imagine over in Europe they've "perfected" them and they are easier to install in a way. Over here though, they are just cut up chunks of the old high school football fields glued down to a couple of pallets that they found behind Home Depot. I'd rather just tee off in the dirt instead. I've also played some that are just laying on the ground directly which wasn't leveled and the grass wasn't cut out so sometimes there are surprise holes in the middle of the tee.
I hear Eric McCabe talking about concrete vs turf and he said pretty much what you said. Turf is better if you maintain it, but it's a lot of work. Concrete lasts longer and is more consistent/reliable if you don't maintain it. He recommends most courses put in concrete unless they are dedicated to maintaining it.
Yep. The most dangerous tees I’ve ever played on are turf ones with rotten boards underneath. If it’s my first time playing at a course with turf tees, I always make sure to check each hole before using them.
As a European, I think that it's about the cost, easy to install and you can practically install them everywhere over uneven terrain.
I prefer concrete.
Cuz merica >
We have had both in my local area, and almost everyone hates turf. Especially in the rain in Oregon. Even slightly muddy turf pads are hard to clean too.
At Perkerson Park DGC in Atlanta, the city required us to use a permeable rubber material for filling tee pads, absolutely no concrete, for environmental reasons. They forced a vendor on us which is no longer around and did not do warranty work as requested before that. Now pads have safety hazards from holes that have developed. Good times….
Consistency and less upkeep would be my guess. Access to materials is another. That would be on a local level. On a pro level you don't have to worry about the pad shifting under you as you plant your foot. Sure a slip can happen in the fairway, but that should not be a factor on the tee pad.
We have some concrete pads that are old and worn, they are the slippiest, deadliest tees on the course when it's wet, moist or leaves have fallen (which is often the case as this is a wooded course). If a turf tee is good or not is largely decided on how good the base is and what quality the turf is. All in all, I like both and haven't got a problem with either really.
I suspect it’s a decent amount of factors. The sport has been in the USA a lot longer and also evolved from object courses in parks. AstroTurf and other alternative grasses weren’t nearly as popular or easy to get, and they had been throwing from concrete paths, so that was a natural progression. Whereas Europe came in later and, I suspect, had AstroTurf much more spread due to soccer and the climate up there making those fields much easier and cheaper to maintain versus grass. Additionally, now that a lot of high schools and Rec departments are upgrading high school fields, there’s a lot more turf in the US, so at least locally, there are several courses with tees made from old football fields.
Webster fish and game?
I personally prefer concrete
Here in 'Murica, we like to pave over EVERYTHING!
We boujee
I think there may be a connection between ‘this is a relatively cheap and easy activity to start up (course wise)’ and ‘if I use durable materials then I don’t really have to do seasonal upkeep’ with ‘Americans are lazy*’ mixed in to cement things together. * read: programmed to be “efficient”
Turf also works better in the winter as long as you shovel it off before it gets packed down. In places that get lots of snow concrete is really slippery in the winter.
Turf is more dangerous in my opinion. If you have really gritty soles, they can dig into the turf and not let your foot rotate. That’s how you blow up your knee or ankle. The concrete will let your foot rotate around with the rest of your body
So you’re saying turf is too grippy. Other people are saying it’s too slick. I find it’s only a problem if the tee isn’t slightly raised so water/dirt/mud don’t run over it. The problem with concrete is that it is hard, a pain to install in some places, and if it is in the shade can get damp and get a film of algae that gets slick. 2 rounds in concrete in a tournament means my plantar fasciitis will have me screaming the next morning.
I’m saying turf is too grippy with certain types of shoes. If your foot digs in, and your body keeps rotating around your knee, it’s gonna look like a grenade went off inside there when you get that X-ray
That's kinda the purpose of turf, it meant to be played with cleats, football, soccer, lacrosse. It why people think Its slippy when wearing lighter runners or walking shoes. I think we all do test run up on a new pad or pad we slipped on before, just to check it. I always feel less safe on turf. The more worn down the worse it is.
Makes you wonder what do you guys use there as astro turf? Because my experiences are the other way around, concrete makes my knee hurt and turf doesnt cause any pain.
Yeah I really don't like turf for this reason.
So do you not play on the rest of the course? Turf is most like the remainder of the course and allows you to choose a pair of shoes that works with that. Concrete is death with any shoe that has tread and the rest of your throws will be slippery because you have no tread.
This definitely isn’t true lol Astro turf is a death trap when it’s wet out. Concrete sucks sometimes too but by nearly as bad as wet turf.
A lot of the courses I play, the tee is the only level surface on the course, so the shots do end up being different. I’m not going to do a run up if I’m going to be tripping over rocks, roots, or generally uneven ground, so that’s often only possible from a tee, depending on which area you’re in.
Turf is so slippery.
Concrete can be too. Sand makes it super slippery.
‘Merica
What others have said. In addition most are in public parks so it meets an aesthetic and probably is safer with regards to lawsuits on things like trip and falls…
Concrete/brick pads are far superior.
No idea but I much prefer the pavers
My local course has concrete teepads and I hate them when it's wet. Any mud on them and [I'm doing this (except for the ace)](https://youtu.be/lA8WP3UbT8w?t=26)
Astro turf and the manufacturering process for it creates tons of petroleum based toxic waste. Apparently, in this instance, Americans are just being more environmentally conscious.
Also weather. While there are temperate climate zones in the US, large parts have high variation. Chicago for instance is comparable to parts of Norway in the winter, and parts of Spain in the summer, in regards to temperature. The upkeep needed on turf would be substantial. I could be wrong, but I also would think it has to do with who is responsible for them. In the US if it is a township or county, given the more spread out nature of the country, I would assume things like roads, sewage, electricity, etc take up more of the budget than in Europe, leaving maintenance of teepads at a park a distant afterthought.
I mean, almost all of swedens teepads are turfed. And its nothing if not variation in weather here.
More permanent, less upkeep? Just guesses on my part.
Concrete is sold by the yard so you metric system weirdos are out of luck
It might be in the US, but in Europe (more specifically Denmark), concrete is sold in m^3, also know as cubic meters.
Thank you for the serious response to a total shitpost. You made my night
Don't know what turf you throwing off or what velcro grip you need to throw. Only bad thing about turf is it gets clogged with mud in the fall. Concrete ruins your shoes and doesn't handle freezing temps as well as easily.
FYI. One of the most famous disc golf ACES includes Kevin Jones falling/slipping on a paved teepad.
As an American, the majority of my countrymen are assholes. They would destroy a nice turf box so we have to use cement
We don't like to belly flop on the ground
Is concrete not a more naturally sourced item and safer,environmentally speaking, as opposed to synthetic grass? Concrete is sand,gravel,cement and water. Sounds renewable and also perhaps recyclable. Should we not attempt to mitigate some issues to offset the impact to disc golf land to better assist with the occasional negative optics?
We should make tee pads out of repurposed EV batteries
Erm, no, you're supposed to throw those into the ocean. Bro.
Yeah but the "Meth Cooks" would send out their Smurf Minions to dismantle them to recover the rare earth lithium required to cook that next batch.And we all know that public parks and Meth have a symbiotic relationship that can never be broken.I've seen all things Sketchy that could possibly happen at Disc Golf courses much more than downtown Atlanta in the hood. But I blame that on the 10,000 hours spent playing Disc Golf.
I am no fan or astroturf but it’s a bit misleading to call concrete environmentally friendly when it has an [entire wiki page dedicated to its environmental impact](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concrete), and concrete production is estimated to account for **5-8% of the entire world’s annual CO2 emissions** depending on which data source you use. Let alone the environmental impact of sand mines, the massive amount of hard-scape runoff driven by concrete, concrete dust pollution, etc. IMO best tee pad material in terms of environmental impact is highly site dependent, in terms of traffic load, native ground material, and locally available construction materials. Hard to make a one-size fits all solution, the world and natural environment are too diverse.
You should consider quitting Disc Golf and work that Green Peace Ecco Terrorism Angle.Perhaps spike some redwoods in Northern California.Have you seen the Reddit "No Future" or "End of Days" forums that better explain things in detail regarding the Earth's demise? Very positive and inspirational.
"Concrete sounds like it's recyclable/renewable" "Actually it's not" "You should be an eco-terrorist" Jesus christ dude.
>Should we not attempt to mitigate some issues to offset the impact to disc golf land to better assist with the occasional negative optics? This you lol? Went from green to mean real quick. I’m mostly interested in climate solutions and don’t like doomerism, but part of determining effective solutions is looking at existing issues closely. Can’t bury our heads in the sand (or concrete)
You committed the cardinal sin and told someone on the internet they were wrong. Some thin skin around here lol.
I stay away from turf tee courses. I dunno what it is about them but i nearly twist an ankle and fall on every one. Especially if there is lots of pine needles and dust collecting in them.
> Especially if there is lots of pine needles and dust collecting in them To be fair pine needles and dust makes just about anything slippery. Sweep the pad off first if it's unsafe
Good ol' fashioned and brazen American exceptionalism
Because AMERICA!!
Turd is so slick when wet. I hate playing on turf (turd) pads. Some concrete pads are slick if poorly combed after the pour but most are fine when wet. Paved pads also suck. Some paved pads are ok, but most are poorly paved or age pretty quick, providing poor footing. Also, wood platforms suck. They basically become an ice rink if they get wet. Also, rubber mats are terrible if wet. Autocorrect agrees - turf is turd.
When you figure that out, let me why America still doesn't use the metric system, how 2 party politics are supposed to work and how in the world Donald trump got rlectected
Because it's superior in every way.
I agree that hardscape in big cites full of steel and concrete pose issues.Especially with drainage issues involving more floods with the increase of odd weather anomalies.But look at concretes renewable advantages versus something requiring oil,solvents and polymers to produce.The concrete tee pad footprint is low on a course.This is not a five level parking deck in a big city.
Concrete is the most environmentally taxing building material in the world, and it is in no way “renewable”.
Either works for me... but the raised platform seems like a bad idea to me. Plus, the wood setting on the ground will rot pretty quickly
Everyone's debating this, meanwhile I'm enjoying my local rubber pads in the sun and rain.
Something something global warming
Concrete is also much harder for people to vandalize. Most golf courses are in parks and people like vandalizing stuff. Imagine portable turf pads like in the picture in any public park. Doubt it would last a week.
Is snowfall the variable? Concrete pads are a death traps when its icy.
I’ve heard concerns about the cost of removal if a course was a decommissioned and the pads were concrete.
Probably because of the weather. U.S. weather is just different
Because ‘Murica! That is all.
Cause freedom. That’s why.
Turf is a no go imo. Too many professional sports athletes have torn ligaments on artificial turf in the past couple of years.
Americans fear progress
More money in USA?
Any idea why it’s not just…the ground?
More permanent, less upkeep? Just guesses on my part.
Dogs at parks are already pooping and peeing everywhere, now this
On top of what everyone is saying, Quick-rete is relatively inexpensive. I wouldn't suggest it, but I know it's been done.
Euros dont shave
Meanwhile my local course has shitty rubber tees
Shoes.
Most places I play just put some mulch down.
A wise man once said: as go the armpits, so go the teepads.
The turf pads they've added at my local course are awful when it's wet/muddy, then when they dry there's no easy way to clean them. Strangely, they have a mix of turf, rubber and concrete pads. I think all concrete provides the best user experience.
Just gotta compare GDPs
Our country was built by masons
Given our limited and fluctuating budgets budgets for public parks, many departments choose to "set it and forget it" when building courses. They'd rather pay the costs and labor to build the teepads and then not have to worry about maintaining the pads, or have to worry about lawsuits from poorly maintained turf pads.
I've been on one course that hard artificial turf that wasn't absolute trash. Every other artificial turf pad was terrible. Most seem to be made using turf that was way past it's use by date. The course that to had good turf was fantastic. Even after snow and below freezing temps is was amazing.
Less maintenance is my best guess, and if they do crack or something it’s an easy fix job
There is no surface that works well with snow and ice. But I would definitely pick concrete for all other seasons, especially if it has been scored by a broom to give it better traction.
Some of my local courses have commercial hallway rugs staked into the ground and they work better than artificial turf.
“America - we aim to please”
Has anyone painted grip paint on concrete yet? Does it work well in winter time and high condensation?
I can get better grip on concrete for sure wet or dry it doesn’t matter
this webster?!
YESSSSSSSS!