Disc golfers getting excited about new course at dam

If everything goes as planned and no snags surface along the way, Lincoln County’s newest disc golf course could be open by June and hosting a tournament by the last week of August.

The newest venue for the popular activity will be located near Libby Dam.

“We’re hoping to have it playable – not perfect but playable by the third week in June when Timberbeast is going on in Troy so people can at least come over and try it out,” said Alana Mesenbrink of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. “The first tournament would be the last week of August and sponsored by the Missoula club – if it all pans out.”

Lincoln County has definitely put itself on the map in the world of disc golf. Courses at J. Neils Memorial Park in Libby and the Timberbeast in Troy are heavily used – something Mesenbrink noticed but also discovered through a survey conducted with high school students.

“We did an informal survey with the school and it ended up that about half of the kids in high school play disc golf,” she said. “Out of those, 70 percent said they would be willing to come up to play a course if we had one.”

The teens also indicated they wanted a more challenging course, which is something they’ll apparently experience at the dam based on a description of the design.

Local resident Brad Dodson helped get the project started with a phone call last fall to Mesenbrink.

“Brad is an avid disc golfer and his father-in-law works up here at the dam. They came in and met with me and we talked about disc golf,” Mesenbrink said. “I knew what it was but I’ve never played it.”

The idea for disc golf at the dam had actually been brought up a couple of years ago but nothing came of it.

After the meeting with Dodson and completing the teen survey, a gathering was arranged to talk about a possible design. Brian Bjortomt of the Garden City Flyers Disc Golf Club out of Missoula was on hand along with parents, high school students and others in the community who showed an interest.

“We spent six hours that day looking at the options,” Mesenbrink said. “They got really excited about the opportunities up here and agreed it was a lot different from the rest of the state.”

Bjortomt was especially excited about the possibility of tournaments coming to the Libby Dam course.

After the meeting, the effort to put in a course picked up steam. Communication continued between the Flyers and the local group and an 18-hole disc golf course was the result.

Nine extra disc golf baskets that were not used in a project at the Albany Falls Dam near Sandpoint, Idaho, were donated to the Libby group along with 18 signs for the baskets.

In late February, volunteers worked eight to 10 hours walking and laying out the course. The project is currently going through National Environmental Policy Act requirements.

“We’ve really tried to make this a community effort for those who like to play to have a say on this course,” Mesenbrink said. “In the future, we’ll have work days where we invite the public out and thin brush and put the baskets in.”

The course will begin near the Libby Dam Visitor Center parking lot. Plans call for two alternate starts on the first hole – one that allows participants to throw back toward a hillside and another near a visitor center overlook area where participants can throw down toward the same basket.

The course features loops through the woods and eventually takes players down along the lake. Later on, it hooks up with an old Libby Dam construction road where players will have some long, clear shots.

“There are some challenging holes, some fun things, elevation changes and fairly long shots that are 500-feet plus,” Mesenbrink said.